The Perplexing Art of Copywrong

Perplexity, copyrights and citing your work - the good ol' days

AI is in the news. In daily conversations. In your social media feeds (if you do that still).  AI is the digital magic wand that will make all your dreams come true: construct your code, paint your pictures and write your articles.  Or, at least, in some cases it will write your articles. In other cases, it will simply steal them from people who already wrote them (do people still write things on the internet?)

How Confusing: Perplexity

In case you haven’t heard, the latest scandal involves the company Perplexity, which, in summary, was caught copying articles that were not theirs and not attributing the source of the articles. I won’t summarize, as the company is not worth the time. You can catch up on it here. https://www.fastcompany.com/91144894/perplexity-ai-ceo-aravind-srinivas-on-plagiarism-accusations

In summary, it is the digital equivalent of going to a store, shoplifting a product, changing the label, and selling it in your store.  Amazing business model! Why didn’t anyone think of that before.

Old School Accreditation

Being a bit older, I am reminded of famous musical acts such as Milli Vanilli (side note: tragic story. search for it on the internet. You might even find an original journalistic note, rather than regurgitated AI tripe). Or just click here - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli

Why is Milli Vanilli famous?  Mainly for supposedly singing when they weren’t.

Back in the day, claiming something was yours when it wasn’t was not well received.

Today, however, it is apparently a very successful business model.

I remember back in school if you turned in an assignment without attributing your sources, you received a 0.

Maybe that should remain the model to follow?

Photo Used: pixabay.com