Mira Moldawer (Peres Academic Center, Israel) has posted “The Time Is Out of Joint”: How Generative AI Drives the Digital Desuetude of Copyright on SSRN. Here is the abstract:
This article argues that the rise of generative AI has triggered a form of digital desuetude: the quiet erosion of copyright law’s authority not through repeal, but through obsolescence accelerated by market practice, technological speed, and non-enforcement. Traditionally, copyright legitimacy has relied on time, both to establish custom and to erode outdated norms. Yet generative AI compresses these processes, disrupting the slow temporal logic upon which legal stability depends.
The result is a structural misalignment: legal norms conceived in the Enlightenment now struggle to remain relevant in a digital environment shaped by instantaneous change and machine-generated outputs. Rooted in the rationalist ideals of Kant, Fichte, and Hegel, copyright’s foundational concept of authorship no longer reflects the postmodern cultural ethos.
As a corrective, this article proposes a shift toward David Hume’s philosophy, which situates legal legitimacy in evolving custom, habit, and sentiment rather than immutable reason. Hume recognizes that when custom breaks, belief dissolves, an insight that illuminates today’s normative breakdown. His thought provides a more flexible jurisprudential framework, one capable of reconciling the time-disjointed realities of generative AI with the social foundations of copyright law.
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