In 2024, not a week goes by without some media organization, group of authors, or artist suing generative AI corporations for using their work to train models without permission.
The problem, after all, is that there is still no clear framework for what constitutes copyright infringement in the context of GenAI training.
While such cases will definitely keep copyright lawyers busy, Made by peopleA brand new company that emerged from stealth on Tuesday goals to bypass costly legal battles by offering a marketplace where creators can license their mental property directly to LLM students.
Created by Humans is the brainchild of Trip Adler, former CEO of Scribd, a document-sharing service turned digital book and news subscription company.
Adler’s grand vision attracted $5 million in funding from a group of distinguished investors. The round was led by All-In podcast co-host and Craft Ventures founder David Sacks and Mike Maples, co-founder of Floodgate Fund. Other investors in the round included Jason Calacanis of LAUNCH Fund, Sam Lessin of Slow Ventures and Garry Tan. Bestselling writer Walter Isaacson also invested and joined the company as a creative advisor and first writer whose work AI corporations can license.
Created by Humans is intended to be a platform where creators of videos, photos, music and even medical data can sell licensing rights to AI training. However, given Adler’s experience and relationships in the publishing world, the startup will first launch a service for book authors and publishers.
This is not the only startup that is trying to match content owners with LLM creators looking for training data. Another example is Human Native, founded by a former Google DeepMind engineer.
As for Created by Humans, it has built a product so far—a platform for authors to submit their work and for AI corporations to purchase specific pieces with predefined usage rights. But the exact details of the licensing agreement are still evolving. “We’re trying to negotiate a three-way agreement between authors, publishers, and the AI industry,” Adler told TechCrunch. “It’s complicated, but we’re making great progress.”
For now, Created by Humans is proposing a philosophy called the Fourth Law, a set of guiding principles for how AI corporations can use and train human-created content. The Fourth Law, inspired by a science fiction writer Isaac Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotsstates that people should have the right to consent to and control how artificial intelligence uses their work, and to be paid (on demand) and recognized for their work (if a book is referenced in the results, there must be a link to its purchase).
“We want [the Fourth Law] be the latest standard for how contracts between AI corporations and content owners work,” Adler said. “Authors and publishers can contribute and manage all their content in accordance with the Fourth Law.”
Adler expects authors to submit specific work to Created by Humans and discover how that work could also be used by AI corporations. Once the rights are purchased, Created by Humans will participate of the deal.
For example, Walter Isaacson can select which rights he wants to license for his books. “He can choose training rights, reference rights. He can license his voice style, his characters, and choose which AI company he wants to license to,” Adler said. “And then Walter gets a panel that shows where his books are being used and how he’s making money.”
“Created by Humans” goals to set the framework for a range of licensing rights, from turning a book into a movie script to translating it into one other language in real time, Adler said. In fact, he sees “AI revenue” as the next major force in publishing, eclipsing even e-books and audiobooks.
“I think it will revitalize the publishing industry and give a whole new reason to write a book,” Adler said.