TWiT 1074: Chicken Mating Harnesses - Supreme Court Rules AI Art Not Copyrightable

Podcast: This Week in Tech (Audio)
Host: Leo Laporte
Guests: Cory Doctorow, Joey de Villa
Date: March 9, 2026
Key Theme: A lively, incisive roundtable on the week's biggest tech news—AI ethics and regulation, the economics and eventual impact of generative AI, the Supreme Court’s stance on AI-generated art, privacy dilemmas, and much more.

Episode Overview

This episode reunites old Toronto friends Cory Doctorow (author, activist, "enshittification" theorist) and Joey de Villa (AI developer advocate, Global Nerdy blogger, and accordionist) for a deep, irreverent, and occasionally nostalgic dive into current tech events. The Supreme Court’s copyright stance on AI-generated art, the collapse-prone economics of big AI, the Anthropic-vs-DoD drama, labor politics in hyperscaler companies, tech worker solidarity, and product privacy fiascoes are delivered with candid analysis and historical context.

Key Discussion Points and Timestamps

1. Anthropic vs. The Department of Defense: The Ethics and Politics of AI in Warfare

[06:09 - 19:54]

• Anthropic Refuses Pentagon Demands: Anthropic draws a "bright red line" against use of its AI for mass surveillance or autonomous killing. The Pentagon retaliates by declaring Anthropic a “supply chain risk”—an extraordinary measure usually reserved for foreign adversaries, and a move that blacklists Anthropic from federal work.
• Ethics of “Woke vs. Based” AI: Cory Doctorow critiques the notion that there are fundamentally ethical AI companies:

  “What you've got is an extremely bad AI company with no ethical bright lines. And also an AI company with no ethical bright lines, but some pretexts.” (Cory, [09:43])

• “Human in the Loop” Fallacy: Discusses how ‘ethical’ military AI often comes down to mere seconds of human review, with little to no real moral weight for those affected:

  “If you’re the person whose building was just bombed ... the fact that there was a human in the loop ... isn’t very compelling.” (Cory, [11:22])

2. AI’s Role in Imperialism and Worker Solidarity

[19:31 - 27:45]

• Imperialism and Tech: The panel questions whether AI makes war more ethical or simply extends imperialist ambitions. Doctorow argues U.S. military interventions of the 21st century are illegitimate, thus AI shouldn't be used to “improve” them.
• Worker Power in Tech: Doctorow discusses the fleeting power of tech labor and missed opportunities for unionization during the Google walkouts:

  “The power that labor derives from scarcity is short-lived and brittle ... you should want to have a union in your shop because you can see what your bosses do to workers they're not afraid of.” (Cory, [26:02])

3. Are Big AI Companies Financial Time Bombs?

[28:12 - 34:42]

• Unsustainable AI Economics: Cory eviscerates the business models of OpenAI and Anthropic, observing they’re burning hundreds of billions in capex with no path to profit:

  “If you said to me, Corey, I have $700 billion ... and I would like to make a return of $50 billion, which is to say a loss of $650 billion, I'd give you a discount. I'd just set it on fire and do better than the AI companies.” ([33:23])

• Frontier AI as Modern Robber Barons: Joey likens Altman and Amodei to 19th-century tycoons, saying:

  “The only difference really that I can see right now between the Musks ... and the Rockefellers, basically.” ([29:33])

4. Generative AI as Tool or Threat: Centaurs, Reverse Centaurs & Labor

[54:08 - 57:16]

• Centaurs vs. Reverse Centaurs:

  • Centaur: Human aided by a machine (e.g., chess with computer assistance).
  • Reverse Centaur: Human acting as a peripheral for an automation system’s shortfall—i.e., Amazon drivers, gig workers, overburdened professionals rubber-stamping AI outputs.

  “The point of a reverse Centaur is you don’t just get used. You get, you get used up by the machine ... and no one is saying ... you solve these Erdos problems by Friday or you’re fired.” (Cory, [54:59])

• Memorable Moment: Doctorow credits Garry Kasparov for “centaur,” and Data & Society’s Madeleine Claire Elish for “moral crumple zone”—the human left culpable when AI fails.

5. Supreme Court: AI Art Is Not Copyrightable

[62:32 - 67:13]

• The Case: Dr. Stephen Thaler’s AI-generated image “A Recent Entrance to Paradise” is denied copyright; the Court finds human creativity essential.

• Doctorow Explains:

  “There is no copyright based on hard work. Copyright is only for creativity ... you can dash off a napkin doodle ... you get your life plus 70 years of copyright. If you spend 50 years going door to door ... you get zero copyright because there is no copyright in facts.” ([66:14])

• Memorable Quote:

  “These people who call themselves AI creators who type in a prompt ... No, you’re not a creator. You are a 21st-century version of a gouty Renaissance duke ... commissioning a piece from the local artists at best.” (Joey, [63:36])

6. Open Source and AI: Clean Room or Copy?

[75:46 - 87:07]

• Case of ‘CareDebt’: Python maintainer uses Claude to ‘clean room’ reimplement Chardet under MIT license, raising philosophical and legal questions (is code AI-generated from trained code a derivative work or public domain?).
• Doctorow:

  “The question of whether ... a highly automated process by which you re-implement creates an infringement—I don’t think it does.” ([85:03])

7. AI and Human “Soul”: Teleology and Materialism

[95:56 - 103:45]

• Soulfulness of AI Work: Debates if generative AI can truly contain anything equivalent to human “numinous” creativity.

  “The model knows nothing about your big, numinous, irreducible feeling ... and so after a while, this starts to lose its novelty ... it’s literally soulless.” (Cory, [93:13])

• Materialism vs. Mysticism: A meta-convo about whether people are just fancy Turing machines—Doctorow: “I’m a materialist. I think that there’s nothing about us that is immaterial ... but that’s like saying filet mignon is a very fancy pile of dirt.” ([98:06])

Notable Quotes & Moments

• On OpenAI & Anthropic CEOs:

  “Are they cynical? Are they corrupt? Are they evil?”
  “Porque no los dos.” (Cory, [21:25])

• On AI-Enabled Cameras:

  “Never buy an AI enabled camera that tries to keep your head in the shot because it will just do that.” (Cory, [05:56])

• On Corporate Punishment Tools:

  “Whenever you create a kind of super punishment ... like being struck off supply chain risks or no-fly lists, they become just a way of ... hurting anyone you don’t like.” (Cory, [18:17])

• On Tech Worker Power:

  “The failure to consolidate that power led to supply catching up with demand ... and they just don’t give a damn anymore.” (Cory, [26:30])

Bonus Segments and Lighthearted Tangents

• Chicken Mating Harnesses & Chaff Scripts [155:15]:
  Joey describes using a chaff script to confuse ad trackers, leading to humorous ads for “chicken mating harnesses” and costume diapers.

• Meta Glasses Privacy Fiasco [122:27]:
  Meta RayBan users’ bathroom and bedroom moments are being reviewed by Kenyan data labelers.

  “You bought Zuck’s RayBans, now someone in Nairobi is watching you poop.” (Cory)

• Department of TMI: X-ray Shoe Fitting to Vein Finders [106:29]:
  Stories of bygone consumer technologies causing accidental exposure—and the wild proliferation of new ones.

• Accordion Antics:
  Joey regales the audience with tales of playing AC/DC on accordion for Toronto bikers and suggests that “when life gives you AI, make aioli.”

Other Quick Hits (Rapidfire Round)

• Charter tries to buy Cox, becoming America’s largest ISP; Cory lambasts Charter’s anti-worker, pandemic-era policies [172:08].
• Supreme Court refuses copyright to AI art [62:32].
• British Summer Time’s quirky origin story: 20-minute incremental DST shifts, proposed by Coldplay’s singer’s ancestor [147:12].
• Google/Meta’s non-disparagement contracts, data brokers fueling surveillance, ProtonMail’s privacy caveats, and way, way more.

Summary Takeaway

This episode is a rich buffet of tech skepticism, historical context, and wit. If you want to understand why AI’s current trajectory is financially precarious, why copyright and labor laws will need rewriting, and how tech’s promise and peril intersect everywhere from international law to your bathroom, this is your episode. Laporte, Doctorow, and de Villa keep things human: insightful, funny, and occasionally a bit nostalgic (and snarky).