AI Training Data Giant Mercor Is Reportedly Looking to Buy the Work You Did at Your Old Job
Source: Gizmodo
If you feel like your previous employer didn't properly compensate you, there might be a way to cash in on that work -- though it seems legally (and, depending on how you feel about artificial intelligence, morally) dubious. According to a report from the Wall Street Journal, AI training data giant Mercor is offering people payment in exchange for selling their prior work materials.
Per the report, Mercor has been poking around a number of industries, including the entertainment space, and asking professionals if they'd be willing to sell stuff from previous jobs. Visual effects artists told the Journal that Mercor asked for production work like "4D physics scenes with camera data, depth and motion/point tracking" -- the kind of material that is specific to an industry and would be very difficult for the average person to get their hands on.
It'll probably be difficult for Mercor to get their hands on, too. As the WSJ pointed out, a lot of what the AI training data company is asking for likely belongs to the employer for whom the work was initially done. The employees and contractors who have worked on these types of domain-specific projects are usually subject to any number of contracts that prevent them from sharing information related to their work. Much of it is likely covered by intellectual property laws, and the workers themselves are often made to sign confidentiality agreements.
While the company said in a statement to the Journal that Mercor "does not buy intellectual property," the outlet also said that messages sent by Mercor to employers regarding their previous work did include the phrase "looking to purchase." Mercor could plausibly claim that it isn't specifically seeking IP in these requests, but it does seem like an inevitable outcome of such purchases.
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