Thursday, May 16, 2024 - 18:58 (UTC -5)
Hello, Postcrossing Support:
With more and more stories coming out about how companies are training A.I. engines without permission or fair compensation (e.g., see this article in the New York Times today => https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/16/technology/ai-voice-clone-lawsuit.html?searchResultPosition=1), I am wondering what Postcrossing is doing to protect us Postcrossers from such A.I. activities.
This is a hard question. Postcrossing.com is a real-world tech business that has to pay its bills and let the Postcrossing principals/shareholders make a good living/return on investment. To that end, it sells ads on its website and accepts donations from Members and the public. I don’t know how else Postcrossing monetizes its assets but a big part of those assets has to be the immense amount of data and meta-data of many kinds that Postcrossing has accumulated over the years since its inception. And I would not be surprised that Postcrossing does monetize its assets as best it can. But does that include allowing A.I. training on “our” data?
A close look at the Postcrossing Terms of Service and Community Guidelines, including for the Postcrossing Forum, pretty much says that Postcrossing can do whatever it wants, forever and ever Amen Alleluia, with anything and everything that anyone posts, uploads, or does on the website and Forum even after a Member closes their account and leaves Postcrossing.
So, here are the questions I have.
Does Postcrossing currently allow A.I. engine training on the contents of the website and forum?
If yes, what are the details and how can Postcrossers share in the benefits or opt out from that?
If no, what steps is Postcrossing taking to defend us from that? Under what conditions would Postcrossing change the “No” answer to a “Yes” answer and start allowing A.I. training on Postcrossing assets?
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Thanks,
Michael