South Central Ep 12 | Tamil Nadu’s Iron Age Discovery & AI Copyright Battle

Name: South Central Ep 12 | Tamil Nadu’s Iron Age Discovery & AI Copyright Battle
Uploaded: 2025-01-31T15:39:39Z
Description: Welcome to South Central, TNM’s podcast hosted by Dhanya Rajendran that puts southern India at the center of every conversation

Welcome to South Central, TNM’s podcast hosted by Dhanya Rajendran that puts southern India at the center of every conversation

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In this episode, hosts Dhanya Rajendran and Leena Reghunath are joined by Newslaundry’s Abhinandan Sekhri and independent journalist Sowmiya Ashok.

On the AI copyright battle between Indian news organizations and OpenAI, Dhanya points, “This is not the first time. We are seeing a lot of litigation like this across the world. The New York Times and others have gone to court over this. Leena adds, “New York Times and its newsroom have diligently and painstakingly put content together with significant monetary investment. But AI is saying that this is all fair use.”

Abhinandan highlights the OpenAI and large learning models crawl the web for content. “The catch-22 situation is when American AI companies accuse the Chinese, saying that your model has copied our model. Then the question is, how did you become what you became?”

As the conversation shifts to Tamil Nadu’s latest archaeological discovery that challenges the world’s Iron Age timeline, Sowmiya says, “This iron was found in the Harappan areas, and then we find it in southern India as well. So, were these two settlements communicating, or was there some movement between the two? it just seems very exciting that in this part of the region of India, there seems to have been some incredible technology at one point.”

Abhinandan adds, “There is so much other scientific research that needs to be done, which doesn't get any money. 60 percent funding has been allocated for cow dung and urine startups. The question is: What does the government choose to fund? Is it giving it to collect cow piss and sell it in bottles, or are they investing in excavations which have scientific robustness the world over? I think that is where politics enters— what is a priority, and the boast.