Is it legal to publish books with content copied from chatgpt output?
Is it possible to prove (in a legal sense) that this content comes from chatgpt?
Is it possible to prove (in a legal sense) that this content comes from chatgpt?
Just creating a book from ChatGPT is not against its terms of service, as “ OpenAI hereby assigns to you all its right, title and interest in and to Output. This means you can use Content for any purpose, including commercial purposes such as sale or publication, if you comply with these Terms.” What would be against the TOS is claiming that the output is human generated, so theoretically OpenAI could sue.
The courts have recently held that AI generated images are not copyrightable, so these “books” are basically just public domain content (where they aren’t directly copying existing human generated content). It’s not illegal to republish public domain content as your own.
The thing that might be straight up illegal here is the reviews. Those appear to be completely fake and probably constitute fraud.
How can it do that? ChatGPT isn't capable of owning or assigning copyright, because only humans can produce copyrighted works (or enter into copyright assignment contracts - typical in employment contracts), and ChatGPT isn't human.
It's giving you something that it doesn't own.
Where it gets entertaining is in Section 7. Indemnification; Disclaimer of Warranties; Limitations on Liability, which contains the following gem:
(a) Indemnity. You will defend, indemnify, and hold harmless us, our
affiliates, and our personnel, from and against any claims, losses, and
expenses (including attorneys’ fees) arising from or relating to your use
of the Services, including your Content, products or services you develop
or offer in connection with the Services, and your breach of these Terms
or violation of applicable law. [0]
Who says contract law isn't fun?
[0] https://openai.com/policies/terms-of-use
Edit: pedantic wordsmithing
And obviously he did not really even attempt to hide anything. Whether it's legal or not: I don't think we have a clear, 100% obvious understanding of the consequences right now, but I'm pretty sure OpenAI couldn't care less. Suing people who use ChatGPT to publish meaningless books would surely not do them any good. Who else might care enough?
It is one of the reasons I don't see Copilot going anywhere. Any company that uses it can't assert ownership over their own IP, and if Copilot accidently reproduces a chunk of training data verbatim then someone else can.
The copying verbatim thing is valid though, although they have mitigations against that
Non-humans do not have copy rights from the things they create. However, humans have copy rights even when they use tools.