Amazon's AI leaves writers in a tough spot
Last week, the news came out that Amazon had introduced a new AI feature to its Kindle iOS app.
(...) Amazon has quietly added a new AI feature to its Kindle iOS app—a feature that “lets you ask questions about the book you’re reading and receive spoiler-free answers,” according to an Amazon announcement. (...) Perhaps most alarmingly, the Amazon spokesperson said, “To ensure a consistent reading experience, the feature is always on, and there is no option for authors or publishers to opt titles out.” — Molly Templeton, Reactor Mag
This development comes at kind of a funny moment for me. When I published New Names, Old Crimes, I modified my copyright page to include a statement that A.I. training of my story required prior written permission from me. I don't have a whole lot of hope that the same thieves who trained the current batch of LLMs on the entirety of the internet and every book they could pirate will respect that statement.
I am making it clear that whatever means you got my book by, I did not in fact license it to you for the purpose of training LLMs on. Someone could argue that it's fair use but they're not right about that. If that case goes all the way to the Supreme Court and they agree that it's fair use, then they will be wrong about it too.
The purpose
Image by Victoria from Pixabay
The purpose of copyright is to give the original creator exclusive control of their work for a set period of time so they can make profit off of it, thereby incentivizing the creation of creative work. Fair use is used for things like transformative works, journalistic purposes (such as reviews), and education. It also recognizes that the purchaser of a licensed work has a reasonable expectation that they will be able to use that work in ways that the creator may not have intended. But, in that specific example, it shouldn't be something that will remove the original creator's market.
I could buy a copy of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and change every reference to Ford Prefect to Ford Escort. Then I could sell the book to others with nothing else done to it. I've created a transformative work (not enough to meet the current bar!) but I'm potentially removing the original creator's market to sell that book. If I did that, I haven't engaged in fair use. Not in any meaningful way and certainly not in a way that would be protected by law.
Image by omarsaldib from Pixabay
An exception to copyright law that allows corporate thieves to use “fair use” as an excuse to take copyright works in the hopes of replacing creators removes the point of copyright law. If the law only exists to protect corporations and the wealthy, then what reason do the rest of us have to respect it?
That line is tenuous enough as it is right now.
SCOTUS has allowed companies to be people but prosecutors are too busy harassing poor people to prosecute companies as if they were people. “The game” is so rigged right now that even the most dedicated believer in “The American Dream” must seriously question whether they have been sold a bill of goods.
That's tangential to the Amazon thing, though. Through the process of publishing directly through Amazon, I have likely signed off on some Ron Swanson style “I can do what I want” statement from Amazon.
What to do
I'm seeing a lot of independent authors try to decide what to do with this. The way Amazon has phrased it, doesn't make it clear that they are training LLM on our books yet. Given what we've seen in other areas, it's unlikely that Amazon will hold off on doing training with our stuff.
Other authors have the same read on it. If they're not yet, they likely will.
Image by Sebastian Nikiel from Pixabay
There's not much we can do to stop them apart from taking our work off Amazon. Even that doesn't guarantee that they will avoid using material they had once published to train their LLMs. Independent authors' options are limited. We don't have a publisher to help us fight the good fight. We can band together and agree to move our stuff elsewhere. Unless we can get readers to move, all we're doing is cutting off our revenue.
For those who have a deep mailing list built up, they can probably persuade a lot of their audience to move somewhere else.
Writers like me are on the losing end. I don't have enough of an audience to ditch Amazon. I don't have a publisher to help me fight Amazon. I can take a principled stand ... and make even less money than I am right now.
What you can do
If you're a reader, get yourself an ebook account somewhere else. Kobo lets you download ePubs if they're DRM free. Everything on Smashwords is downloadable. Each Kindle account has a special email address you can use to automatically forward ePubs to so you can read it without changing devices. If you read on your phone, Kobo's got you covered already.
Image by Sasin Tipchai from Pixabay
Once you've got those accounts, start doing your buying there. Kobo has a subscription service like Kindle Unlimited. Unlike Kindle Unlimited, authors who opt into it aren't required to keep their books off other platforms. That does mean there are a lot of things that are Kindle exclusive. And that's a shame that probably shouldn't be allowed under anti-trust regulations. However, there's so much out there on Kobo's subscription plan that it'll keep you busy for a long while.
You can also buy directly from authors. I'm not in a position to set my own stores up yet but plenty of authors do. When you buy direct, you're generally giving the author a bigger cut than they would be getting from any of the publishers.
You can also tell Amazon that you object to what they're doing to authors. I'm not sure that anything less than moving your purchases somewhere else will make a difference there. The ocean is made up of drops. The more people who do their part, the more effect we'll have together.
Support the author
I've got two books out in the Vay Ideal series. It's a science fiction adventure series built around an eclectic assortment of travelers who find themselves running an independent ship. I'd love it if you'd check them out. While you can buy them on Amazon, the cover links will take you to a landing page which will let you choose any one of several other stores also.
