Thread

Microsoft director: AI scraping 'the largest theft of labor in human history'

190 points · 52 comments · jonbaer

hagbard_c · 1789852540 · focus · HN ↗
Here's a Bible verse this Microsoft individual should acquaint himself with:
<a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Matthew%207%3A5" rel="nofollow">https://www.biblegateway.com/verse/en/Matthew%207%3A5
Whether religious or not, the verse applies to anyone and everyone making such statements from the position of companies like Microsoft. I'll quite the KJV version 'cause that one lends itself well to situations like these. Read it with a booming thunder-loaded voice:
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?
Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.
1. zugi · 1789853405 · focus · HN ↗
  By stealing text from the Bible rather than using your own words, you've just committed labor theft!
  Of course that accusation sounds outrageous as it should. All human knowledge and progress has come by building on the works of those who came before us, as it should. Turning this on its head and calling it "theft of labor" is insane, as is asking others not to build on today's knowledge.
  Or to steal some more human labor: "If I have seen further than others, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."
2. AlexErrant · 1789853624 · focus · HN ↗
  It's a memo taken out of context from Jan 2023, literally 1 month after the ChatGPT public release. All the article cites:
  > The brief cited an internal memo dated January 2023 by Microsoft director of Applied Science Brent Hecht, where he allegedly said, “Millions of people around the world will soon consider large models ‘hoovering up’ all their work to be an astonishing theft of unprecedented proportions” and also called it “the largest theft of labor in human history.”
  No need to add religion into this. Let MS employees write their emails. If anything, what he said a month after ChatGPT's release was prophetic.
3. throwawayk7h · 1789856922 · focus · HN ↗
  What is meant by "beam" in this quotation? A splinter of wood?
  1. mahboi · 1789858278 · focus · HN ↗
    Yeah
  2. ZephyrP · 1789858566 · focus · HN ↗
    It is a translation of "dokós", a plank of wood that would serve as a joist or rafter. An ancient palestinian Phineas Gage stuck through with a classical age 2x10, if you will.
  3. swader999 · 1789862425 · focus · HN ↗
    This is probably the best way to read it: Do not presume to correct another person while remaining blind to your own faults. Examine and correct yourself first; only then are you in a position to help your brother with his.
    It literally is meant as a beam, a bit of exaggeration for emphasis.
    So we are meant to assess and help others but first must correct our own selves.
  4. kgwgk · 1789862861 · focus · HN ↗
    A long, thick, figurative piece of wood - possibly load-bearing.
    mypalmike · 1789865104 · focus · HN ↗
    Somebody tell Claude we found the load-bearing part.
4. MiroslavPokorny · 1789870005 · focus · HN ↗
  For all human history, the subject only complains if they do it, its never wrong when others do it, never when they do it.
  Take the Hebrew return to the promise land, its strange how the non believers are always rich and their gold, cattle and virgin numbers are listed as gifts for doing gods will.

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