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Academia, AI, and Over the Garden Wall

Faculty and students sometimes advise each other to upload articles downloaded from library-licensed databases into AI tools for summarization, or for study purposes, such as generating study questions and dialogs about the materials. These are not public domain articles that happened to be indexed in a library database.

Many of our faculty have access to ChatGPT EDU, which creates a "walled garden" around the files, preventing them from being used for AI training and treating them as institutional data. However, our students do not yet have access to the EDU account. In addition, many students and faculty are experimenting widely with other free AI tools on the Internet and are most likely uploading all types of files. I realize we cannot stop all of this, but if we have a statement to let library patrons know the proper uses, we are hopefully at least covering our obligations here.

Could you suggest a reasonable policy statement that libraries could publicize to their patrons regarding this issue to help ensure that patrons respect author and publisher rights and that libraries will not end up in legal trouble down the road?

Can Use of AI Impact Ownership and Citations in Academic Work?

I am aware that students are engaging with generative AI inside and outside of the academic setting. If they enter their own work (an essay, research paper, etc.) into Chat-GPT or CoPilot for editing, or other purposes, do they forfeit any of their intellectual property rights in doing so in ways that would affect the future publication of their work?

Additionally, are there any current legal ramifications for failing to declare the use of generative AI or failing to cite AI usage? I am aware of policy, and reputation, ramifications that can vary depending on the exact situation, so I’m specifically curious about if there are any legal repercussions for doing so.

Thank you so much for your help!