this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2026
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For years, tech giants have argued that if information is available on the internet, it can be used for AI model development and outputs. They call it fair use. Content owners have tried to prevent this, with no success.

Now Anthropic, OpenAI, and Google are discovering what the rest of the internet has already learned through painful experience: once you put something online, people will find ways to use it in ways you don't like and can't stop.

The latest flashpoint is something called "distillation," using the outputs of one AI model to improve another. Anthropic says competitors are harvesting its outputs at scale, turning billions of dollars of research into a shortcut for rivals. OpenAI and Google have made similar warnings recently.

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[–] eicker@lemmy.world 15 points 4 hours ago

It is funny watching companies discover that data gravity works both ways. When scraping the web was innovation it was progress. When someone learns from their outputs it becomes theft. The legal lines still matter, but the irony is impossible to ignore, and this debate was always going to come full circle.