It's the Luddites vs the looms

I always thought using the term Luddite as an insult completely missed the point 😉

Future generations train on the creations of the past

I think that's a nuanced difference, or at least, I see it that way. Artists are inspired and influenced by what came before them, but they are also awarded both rights to and responsibility for what they create. If an artist plagiarises someone else's work, they can be held accountable.

Gen AI muddies that. An artist using a gen AI model has no knowledge of what that model was trained on. The organisation that provides the model does, but they are at a remove from any process that results in an output, and the major AI platforms are openly hostile to being held accountable for the output of their models. What about the model itself? if we accept it's using a creative process to produce output, should it be afforded rights and responsibilities to what it produces? that opens up a whole ethical debate too.