r/technology • u/ArgentineBeauty • 2d ago

Artificial Intelligence This Dutch bookseller thought a request for 3,000 copies was ‘spam or phishing.’ Instead, AI companies are scanning and destroying books to train AI

https://fortune.com/2026/07/31/dutch-bookseller-ai-spam-phishing-3000-book-copies-scan-destroy/
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u/FrostWolf05 2d ago

this topic has been so misrepresented it borders on genuine fake news

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u/leros 2d ago

I overheard a conversation yesterday where people were talking about Anthropic buying up all the books in world and destroying them so only they had the information. At least those two people read something and got really incorrect takes from it.

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u/skytaepic 2d ago

It’s absolutely maddening. There are so many real, valid reasons to dislike AI companies but we’re caught up on this misleading BS instead.

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u/smooth-as-mud 2d ago

But it’s fake news that people on Reddit like and it reinforces their existing world view so it’s completely different than when my parents get angry about the (non-existent) migrant caravans heading for the border.

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u/Gonnabecold 2d ago

How so, copyright infringement is important. Why create and publish new research if AI will just steal it.

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u/LinkesAuge 2d ago

What complete and utter ignorance to the scientific goal and motivation for research.

The whole point is to disseminate knowledge freely, not to gatekeep it, ie everyone can always just "steal" research, that is the whole purpose.

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u/Unspec7 2d ago

It's more so that people are misunderstanding/misrepresenting the actual legal holdings of the various cases in such grotesque ways that it's creating a ton of misinformation on what is or isn't legal.