Anthropic wins key US ruling on AI training in authors' copyright lawsuit
Anthropic 在作家提告 AI 訓練侵權案中贏得關鍵判決

June 24 (Reuters) - A federal judge in San Francisco ruled late on Monday that Anthropic's use of books without permission to train its artificial intelligence system was legal under U.S. copyright law.
路透社 6 月 24 日電 – 舊金山聯邦法官週一晚間裁定，Anthropic 未經許可使用書籍訓練其人工智慧系統，在美國著作權法下是合法的。

Siding with tech companies on a pivotal question for the AI industry, U.S. District Judge William Alsup said Anthropic made "fair use", opens new tab of books by writers Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson to train its Claude large language model.
針對 AI 產業一個關鍵問題，美國地區法官 William Alsup 站在科技公司這邊，他表示 Anthropic 使用作家 Andrea Bartz、Charles Graeber 和 Kirk Wallace Johnson 的書來訓練其 Claude 大型語言模型，屬於「合理使用」。

Alsup also said, however, that Anthropic's copying and storage of more than 7 million pirated books in a "central library" infringed the authors' copyrights and was not fair use. The judge has ordered a trial in December to determine how much Anthropic owes for the infringement.
不過，Alsup 法官也提到，Anthropic 將七百多萬本盜版書籍「集中儲存」的做法，確實侵犯了作者的著作權，不算是合理使用。法官已經排定 12 月開庭，要釐清 Anthropic 到底要為這項侵權行為賠多少錢。

U.S. copyright law says that willful copyright infringement can justify statutory damages of up to $150,000 per work.
根據美國著作權法規定，惡意侵犯著作權最高可以要求每件作品賠償 15 萬美元的法定賠償金。

An Anthropic spokesperson said the company was pleased that the court recognized its AI training was "transformative" and "consistent with copyright's purpose in enabling creativity and fostering scientific progress."
Anthropic 的發言人表示，公司很開心法院認可他們的 AI 訓練是「具變革性」的，而且「符合著作權旨在促進創造力和科學進步的宗旨」。

The writers filed the proposed class action against Anthropic last year, arguing that the company, which is backed by Amazon (AMZN.O), opens new tab and Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab, used pirated versions of their books without permission or compensation to teach Claude to respond to human prompts.
這些作家去年對 Anthropic 提起團體訴訟，指控這間有 Amazon (AMZN.O) 和 Alphabet (GOOGL.O) 投資的公司，在未經他們許可或支付報酬的情況下，使用了他們的盜版書籍來訓練 Claude 回應人類的指令。

The proposed class action is one of several lawsuits brought by authors, news outlets and other copyright owners against companies including OpenAI, Microsoft (MSFT.O), opens new tab and Meta Platforms (META.O), opens new tab over their AI training.
這項集體訴訟只是其中一樁，最近很多作家、新聞媒體跟其他版權所有者都跳出來告像 OpenAI、Microsoft (MSFT.O) 還有 Meta Platforms (META.O) 這些公司，原因都是他們拿來訓練 AI 的那些資料。

The doctrine of fair use allows the use of copyrighted works without the copyright owner's permission in some circumstances.
依據美國法律的「合理使用」原則，在某些情況下，即使沒有著作權所有者的同意，還是可以使用受著作權保護的作品。

Fair use is a key legal defense for the tech companies, and Alsup's decision is the first to address it in the context of generative AI.
對於科技公司來說，「合理使用」是他們很重要的法律辯護理由，而 Alsup 的這項裁決也是首個針對生成式 AI 領域進行「合理使用」裁定的案例。

AI companies argue their systems make fair use of copyrighted material to create new, transformative content, and that being forced to pay copyright holders for their work could hamstring the burgeoning AI industry.
AI 公司認為，他們的系統是合理使用了受著作權保護的內容，來創造新的、具有轉化性的內容。他們也表示，如果被迫為這些內容付費給著作權所有者，可能會扼殺正在蓬勃發展的 AI 產業。

Anthropic told the court that it made fair use of the books and that U.S. copyright law "not only allows, but encourages" its AI training because it promotes human creativity. The company said its system copied the books to "study Plaintiffs' writing, extract uncopyrightable information from it, and use what it learned to create revolutionary technology."
Anthropic 向法院表示，他們對這些書籍的使用是「合理使用」，而且美國的著作權法「不僅允許，甚至鼓勵」他們進行 AI 訓練，因為這有助於促進人類的創造力。這家公司聲稱，他們的系統複製這些書籍是為了「研究原告的寫作方式，從中提取不受著作權保護的資訊，並利用所學到的知識來創造革命性的技術」。

Copyright owners say that AI companies are unlawfully copying their work to generate competing content that threatens their livelihoods.
而著作權所有者則認為，AI 公司非法複製了他們的作品，並生成具有競爭性的內容，這對他們的生計構成了威脅。

Alsup agreed with Anthropic on Monday that its training was "exceedingly transformative."
Alsup 禮拜一跟 Anthropic 達成共識，認為他們的訓練方式真的「超有變革性」啦。

"Like any reader aspiring to be a writer, Anthropic's LLMs trained upon works not to race ahead and replicate or supplant them — but to turn a hard corner and create something different," Alsup said.
Anthropic 的 LLMs 就像任何想成為作家的讀者一樣，他們閱讀作品不是為了抄襲或取代它們，而是為了能學會轉個彎，創造出完全不同的東西。法官 Alsup 這麼說。

Alsup also said, however, that Anthropic violated the authors' rights by saving pirated copies of their books as part of a "central library of all the books in the world" that would not necessarily be used for AI training.
不過 Alsup 也提到，Anthropic 侵犯了作者的權利，因為他們儲存了這些盜版書籍的副本，建立了一個「包含全世界所有書籍的中央圖書館」，而這些書不一定會用於 AI 訓練。

Anthropic and other prominent AI companies including OpenAI and Meta Platforms have been accused of downloading pirated digital copies of millions of books to train their systems.
Anthropic 以及其他知名的 AI 公司，包括 OpenAI 和 Meta Platforms，都曾被控下載數百萬本盜版電子書來訓練他們的系統。

Anthropic had told Alsup in a court filing that the source of its books was irrelevant to fair use.
Anthropic 之前在法庭文件中告訴 Alsup，他們書籍的來源跟合理使用無關。

"This order doubts that any accused infringer could ever meet its burden of explaining why downloading source copies from pirate sites that it could have purchased or otherwise accessed lawfully was itself reasonably necessary to any subsequent fair use," Alsup said on Monday.
Alsup 在週一表示：「這項裁決質疑，任何被控侵權的人是否能證明，他們明明可以合法購買或取得來源文件，卻從盜版網站下載，這種行為對於後續的合理使用來說是絕對必要的。」