Amazon faces criticism for allegedly destroying books to digitise them for AI training, raising concerns about the preservation of physical culture and the ethics of AI data sourcing.

Amazon is facing fresh scrutiny over the use of physical books for artificial intelligence training after an investigation reportedly tracked a shipment of hard-to-find titles to a company facility in Las Vegas, where workers allegedly cut the bindings from books before scanning their pages and eventually destroying them.

The investigation, reported by 404 Media, involved placing a tracking device inside a book from a large order and following its journey across the United States. The shipment ultimately reached an Amazon facility associated with an operation known as VGT3.

The discovery has raised concerns among booksellers, librarians and readers about what happens to physical books once they are acquired as potential sources of AI training data.

  • bless@lemmy.ml
    31·
    22 hours ago

    And I’ve also been explaining to people that destroying the book means losing the rights to the contents of said book for an entire year. Yet, here we are

        • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          13 hours ago

          If you have a backup - and the original gets destroyed - you still own the backup.

          That’s what makes it… a backup.

          • bless@lemmy.ml
            1·
            13 hours ago

            Yes, the backup still exists. What is also true is that you gave your original away or destroyed it intentionally, as it is in this case, so you lose the right to the backup.

            • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
              21·
              13 hours ago

              Giving it away means there’s two copies owned by different people. That’s why you have to delete your backups.

              Destroying it, accidentally or otherwise, means there’s still one copy owned by whoever bought it. That’s why you get to keep your backups. What the fuck else do you think a backup is?

              A backup is not treated as meaningfully different from the original copy. That’s why you’re allowed to make one, at all. That’s also why you can keep the backup - you still own that copy. Even if you’ve transferred formats. Which is also explicitly allowed.

              • bless@lemmy.ml
                11·
                12 hours ago

                A backup is a “break in case of emergency or unforeseen circumstance,” a plan-b if you will. The last time I checked, destroying something on purpose is neither accidental nor unforseen.