Authors have expressed their shock after the news that academic publisher Taylor & Francis, which owns Routledge, had sold access to its authors’ research as part of an Artificial Intelligence (AI) partnership with Microsoft—a deal worth almost £8m ($10m) in its first year.
On top of it all, that is such a low-ball number from Microsoft
The agreement with Microsoft was included in a trading update by the publisher’s parent company in May this year. However, academics published by the group claim they have not been told about the AI deal, were not given the opportunity to opt out and are receiving no extra payment for the use of their research by the tech company.
This is the main reason why I think advocating for stronger copyright laws when it comes to AI is simply foolhardy. Individuals will never get a dime out of any of this, might as well keep it free for everyone and have an open-source scene that’s thriving.