Microsoft deletes blog telling users to train AI on pirated Harry Potter books
Following backlash in a Hacker News thread, Microsoft deleted a blog post that critics said encouraged developers to pirate Harry Potter books to train AI models that could then be used to create AI slop.
The blog, which is archived here, was written in November 2024 by a senior product manager, Pooja Kamath. According to her LinkedIn, Kamath has been at Microsoft for more than a decade and remains with the company. In 2024, Microsoft tapped her to promote a new feature that the blog said made it easier to "add generative AI features to your own applications with just a few lines of code using Azure SQL DB, LangChain, and LLMs."
What better way to show "engaging and relatable examples" of Microsoft's new feature that would "resonate with a wide audience" than to "use a well-known dataset" like Harry Potter books, the blog said.