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Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+1)

The whole AI industry runs on the principle of "you can never prove that this output stole from this specific input, so what we are doing is totes legal". It's theft that's being legalized through fancy math - which is why I reject AI models that are trained on copyrighted data without the consent of the creator as immoral outright and do not want anything to do with people who use those models.

That doesn't make it ethical to do so, which is why we have AI disclosure - so that I, as a consumer, know that you are willing to steal from others as long as you know that you can get away with it, and can then decide that I do not want anything to do with you.

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Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

Let me explain with an example we can all see right here: you have a pixel art avatar of a snake. Can we recognize its style? No, you can’t prove it’s yours, but that’s not enough to make stealing it immoral. What does allow me to steal it and get away with it is that there’s no law in the world that lets you claim ownership of such a simple combination of pixels... it would be like claiming ownership of a word, or a color, or a musical note.

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Ratsnake Games10 days ago(+2)

So now we've gone from "i respect pixel art and don't think of it as lesser" to "pixel art is so simplistic and stupid that it couldn't possibly be copyrightable".

You're wrong, of course, pixel art absolutely is copyrightable. I am not sure if the snippet of a larger tilesheet (from a larger game) is in itself copyrightable, but larger pieces of pixel art absolutely are. Even with mine, judgement is gonna depend a lot on legislation and on who has the better lawyer. As per ownership, I am actually pretty confident that my "paper trail" of my creative work, including aseprite files in a timestamped git repository showing my progress, would hold up to establish ownership in court. It doesn't really matter if you, personally, are able to recognize a distinct style in a work. That is not the standard the law applies to check if a work is copyrightable. I am not aware of any precedent when it comes to pixel art, but in music, landmark US cases have upheld copyright for musical motifs consisting of as little as four (that is the number that comes after three) notes because even that constitutes enough creative effort (the actual standard that is being applied) to constitute copyrightable material.

Could you get away with stealing my snake profile pic? Probably, because suing you is more trouble than it is worth. Would stealing my snake pixel art and passing it off as your own make you a thieving little asshat? Yes, absolutely. (Speaking purely in hypotheticals here, of course.)

To conclude:

* you have no clue about AI

* you have no clue about copyright

* your ethical framework consists of "if i can get away with it, it is morally acceptable"

It is pretty clear that itch.io should not take any advice from you. Now kindly stop embarrassing yourself.

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Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

Of course you can claim copyright on pixel art, but only when it’s complex. Let me explain with an example—and this is something a musician friend of mine told me: in the music industry, there are certain melodies that are so simple they aren’t copyrighted. That’s what I mean.

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Ratsnake Games10 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

Allow me to repeat myself:

I am not aware of any precedent when it comes to pixel art, but in music, landmark US cases have upheld copyright for musical motifs consisting of as little as four (that is the number that comes after three) notes because even that constitutes enough creative effort (the actual standard that is being applied) to constitute copyrightable material.

I would also argue that, if making pixel art doesn't take enough effort to justify copyright, surely you can just make your own without using AI. Right? You'd have to be a pretty big idiot if you need AI to generate the artistic equivalent of a single musical note.

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Melinda242410 days ago(+1)

That’s very relative; there can also be combinations of many more notes that aren’t copyrighted because they’re part of a broader musical style. The point is that while it’s true we can’t allow artists’ work to be stolen, we also can’t allow an artist to misappropriate something that belongs to everyone. Disney can claim the rights to Mickey Mouse, but not to mice in general—mice belong to everyone.

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Ratsnake Games10 days ago (1 edit) (+1)

And nobody is claiming copyright to animation in general, only to those animations that were stolen from their authors to train the AI models that are creating animations for you.

Again, if the animations you are generating with them are so simple and generalistic that they couldn't possibly be copyrighted, you should be able to just do them yourself. You aren't doing it, because you aren't able to, because it is nontrivial creative work, and therefor it should be protected by copyright just like any other nontrivial creative work.

So, again: why should this be treated differently and more lightly than stealing other kinds of nontrivial creative work?

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