[HN Gopher] Free Output - AI output copyright status checker
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       Free Output - AI output copyright status checker
        
       Author : knewter
       Score  : 23 points
       Date   : 2025-03-29 18:44 UTC (4 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (freeoutput.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (freeoutput.org)
        
       | knewter wrote:
       | just found FreeOutput, a website that compares AI providers based
       | on whether they assign copyright to the user.
        
       | Multicomp wrote:
       | I guess I thought that If an image was generated by these tools,
       | at least in the US, the copyright office did not consider it to
       | have any copyright at all, therefore it was by default public
       | domain?
        
         | numpad0 wrote:
         | Note that you can still violate someone else's IP rights, only
         | your side of claims will be null and void if courts determine
         | you're not the creator of content.
        
       | 6stringmerc wrote:
       | Very interesting tool yet completely irrelevant for the United
       | States as AI generated content is not eligible for copyright
       | protection by anyone (pending appeal). As it stands y'all may not
       | like this reality, but it's quite clear in legal terms. Claiming
       | an AI generated work is protected by copyright simply doesn't
       | matter regardless of which entity is asserting the right at
       | present.
        
         | AndrewSwift wrote:
         | I don't believe this is the case -- in the situation that is
         | commonly referenced to make this point, someone sought to have
         | an AI legally declared to be the author of a specific work, and
         | that was ruled not to be possible. But I am not aware of cases
         | where people use prompts to generate artwork with AI and have
         | found it impossible to copyright.
        
           | mountainb wrote:
           | For more, see the Copyright Office's reports on this:
           | https://www.copyright.gov/ai/Copyright-and-Artificial-
           | Intell...
        
       | rustc wrote:
       | What's the practical use of this? The AI doesn't know if the
       | output is sufficiently different from the training material. If
       | the output you get matches pre existing content, the license
       | these AI companies give you won't save you.
        
         | TuringNYC wrote:
         | >> If the output you get matches pre existing content, the
         | license these AI companies give you won't save you.
         | 
         | Really? Isnt that the purpose of the _indemnification
         | agreement_ the vendors have underwritten?
        
           | HeatrayEnjoyer wrote:
           | We don't see it aggressively enforced in the US (unclear if
           | that status quo will continue) but copyright infringement is
           | also in the criminal code, and that can't be indemnified.
           | 
           | Civil indemnification still means a sued party must go to
           | court and assert it as a defense, and there's no guarantee
           | that a judge won't throw it out as invalid. These are
           | uncharted legal waters.
        
       | Retr0id wrote:
       | It claims that OpenAI output is "free", but the OpenAI ToS says
       | (among other things)
       | 
       | > You are prohibited from ... Using Output to develop models that
       | compete with OpenAI.
       | 
       | If this were a software license, it'd surely be classified as
       | nonfree.
        
         | alexgleason wrote:
         | This means they would potentially cancel your account if you
         | violated it, but not that they would claim ownership over the
         | work.
        
         | binarymax wrote:
         | And as we can see from DeepSeek this clause means nothing,
         | outside the realm of OpenAI blocking your access to its models.
        
           | wizzwizz4 wrote:
           | I know someone from OpenAI _claimed_ this, but is there any
           | evidence that DeepSeek _actually_ trained their models on
           | output of the models OpenAI have?
        
         | jchw wrote:
         | But _I believe_ since a ToS isn 't a copyright license, this
         | can't really be enforced using copyright laws. Most likely they
         | can ban you. Is there even a slim chance you could be sued for
         | breach of contract? Hell if I know, I'm not a lawyer.
         | 
         | Thinking another layer deep, though, if someone used OpenAI
         | tools to develop software that then _later_ got used to compete
         | with OpenAI, surely it would fully workaround this already
         | unenforceable ToS restriction anyways, right?
        
       | IshKebab wrote:
       | Oh I thought this was actually going to try to check if your
       | output actually matched any copyrighted material, which would be
       | useful.
       | 
       | Oh well.
        
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       (page generated 2025-03-29 23:00 UTC)