Why the spread of powerful local AI models makes copyright enforcement even harder
The central theme of Walled Culture the book (free digital versions available) is the growing incompatibility between traditional copyright law and the digital, online world. The culmination of…
Why genAI means the end of copyright for software and the re-invention of open source
Most of the discussions about the impact of the latest generative AI systems on copyright have centred on text, images and video. That’s no surprise, since writers, artists…
Common Corpus, an open training set for AI, goes global – and so should support for it
As many of the AI stories on Walled Culture attest, one of the most contentious areas in the latest stage of AI development concerns the sourcing of training…
Why “public AI”, built on open source software, is the way forward for the EU
A quarter of a century ago, I wrote a book called “Rebel Code”. It was the first – and is still the only – detailed history of the…
Fighting fire with fire: how to tackle the AI bots that threaten the open Web
It is a measure of how fast the field of AI has developed in the three years since Walled Culture the book (free digital versions available) was published…
From DeepSeek to Stargate: How dramatic AI developments will re-shape the copyright landscape
Walled Culture started covering generative AI relatively early, back in October 2022. That’s just two years ago, and yet the technological progress since then has been extraordinary, whatever…
Generative AI will be a huge boon for the public domain – unless copyright blocks it
A year ago, I noted that many of Walled Culture’s illustrations were being produced using generative AI. During that time, AI has developed rapidly. For example, in the…
How long before all browsers are required by law to prevent users from opening allegedly infringing sites?
Mozilla’s Open Policy & Advocacy blog has news about a worrying proposal from the French government: In a well-intentioned yet dangerous move to fight online fraud, France is…
How to redeem big, bad music streaming so that it serves artists, fans – and local communities
Music streaming services are great – for listeners, who gain access to huge quantities of music, even if they don’t end up owning any of it. But it’s…
Time for the copyright world to stop attacking the Internet’s infrastructure
Despite the impossibility of stopping people making copies of digital material, the copyright industry continues to launch ever-more extreme legal actions against outside parties in a desperate attempt…
Squaring the music streaming circle: fair remuneration for artists, easy discoverability for users
Streaming dominates the recording music industry today, and everyone assumes that things won’t change for a while. But there are two opposing aspects of the current business models…
Unleashing the power of online sharing for all: the birth and rise of Creative Commons
Effortless copying lies at the heart of the Internet. As digital data is passed from location to location, copies of it are made at the intersection of the…