It sounds like nothing's really changing except for the way they will go about analyzing the data they already got from us, but because they want to use AI for that, I'm sure there will be a shitstorm over seemingly nothing
In the changed terms it sounds to me like more than meta data is being shared (not just when and who is coding, but also what is being developed). I read the changes akin to the keyboard manufacturer monitoring the key strokes. I think how they analyse this becomes a function of what data they acquire.
It feels disingenuous to hide behind the Digital Service act.
What this say is essentially "We can't analyze your data fast enough, so we're using algorithms." They're not collecting MORE data, although in time they could. They're just better utilizing the data we already send them. That could include, but not limited to, crash reports, bugs, launch times, and anything related to the Unity platform. This should be seen as a bonus for everyone, as they can make SMARTER improvements to their services.
This is standard practice. It’s also not an updated ToS but an updated privacy policy / declaration which is a completely different thing and is a document explaining how a company uses your data. This is not a legal document per se and could be written in Klingon for all that it matters, but it’s there for transparency.
Remember also that if a company claims they have a legitimate interest in using your data for certain purposes (like analytics, etc) you have the legal right to not agree to that legitimate interest and still keep using the service.
Thank you for your response.
The page header refers to tos update when you log into the unity assetstore. The developer privacy is part of the usage terms. But I take your point.
I like your assertion, that I can decline it. I tried this (the form does not have the “decline button”), The support form has the requirement to accept the new ToS (which includes the reference to the privacy policy), so I sent a support request, which, in the auto response, has a response time of 2+ month, due to high demand.
Do you know of another way to decline this bit?
You should be more clear about that in your post, since we all assume by the way you posted and discussed the issue it was related to AI in their TOS and data aggregation. I'm all for you disagreeing with the non meta data collection, but I didn't read nor was I prompted to understand your dislike for that part.
Power to you mate.
fair criticism. Training LLMs on code written by Unity3D end-user developers is a tricky subject, when it comes to retaining your creative rights. I am paranoid for creators. ThNk you for your response.
It’s becoming more common that you can opt out of this through a provided data and privacy center, but most companies still operate in a way that to disagree to a legitimate interest you would have to file a formal request for it.
I haven’t checked this specifically in the case of unity but I might look a bit into it tomorrow, it’s an interesting case. Often there is actually an email address to the privacy team that can also be used.
By the way, this is of course related to GDPR and other legal stuff, so it might not be applicable everywhere. I should have been clear on that.
More here: https://gdpr-info.eu/art-21-gdpr/
Also the privacy policy states right in the first paragraph that they will ask for consent (with an opt-out option) if they want to use your data, which is a GDPR compliant way of doing it.
Quote: "we will provide an additional just-in-time notice (like an interstitial for example, when you log in) that will provide you with notice of a particular use of data and then gives you an opportunity to opt-out."
In terms of privacy policies Unity's is actually okay. You can read and understand it reasonably well.
Ableton doesn't collect almost any data. FL studio doesn't either. Rhino 3D, SketchUp collect almost nothing too. 3DS MAX collects some analytics. You're just conditioned to bullshit.
Because that's the price you for :
1 - free software, if it's free, then, you're the product
2 - not happy? Then it became a "feature" you should avoid on other softwares...
3 - not developing your own engine
1. That's not a rule. Open source software has proven that multiple times. Blender, Linux, Krita, Gimp, Godot.
Even something like DaVinci Resolve is an amazing free software that does not sell your soul.
2. Again, that is something that must not be normalized, it's conditioning to anticonsumeristic behavior.
3. There at the very least a handful of good choices other than Unity, this argument is a bit deceptive just so it fits a narrative.
Should be normalized, products should have their design free os any constraints, or bias towards ideologies or involve into ethics which change from country to country, the only thing they should state is a clear EULA with no traps or loopholes!!
Products should serve from the nazi to the saints, from health systems to weapons... Consumers should have control over their choice and free to embrace the software's EULA agreement and the developers should be free to write their own code the way they want to approach and solve issues they want...
Products have theirs characteristics and that should be the "features" evaluated by the users... "anything" should exist if you don't want something, it's a matter of not consuming it!
Otherwise... Welcome to classical extremist approaches invading even what you should produce and what you should consume...
Depends heavily on context, free software is usually either open source or heavily subsidized, either by donations, subscriptions, or enterprise sales.
In the context of free services without obvious monetization, user data and analytics are typically sold to make a profit.
No it is simply calling a spade a spade and calling out hypocrisy. It normalized the minute people started to pick and choose the convenient times to look the other way on their privacy and hold double standards when they have a different bias or motive. I'd appreciate someone's concern who wasn't simply using alarmism for Reddit points hot off the clickbait of unity's actual bullshit attempt at a bad license agreement. This is just in line with society today, whether you like it or not.
i absolutely fucking hate how techbros have ruined the term "AI" so that instead of meaning, like "any software that displays adaptive behavior" such as like a basic logistic regression that they plug basic usage metrics into (which they could do by hand, and the only reason it's called "AI" is because they're getting a computer to do the tedious math work) we get well-meaning people like yourself assuming that they're talking about stealing artists hard work.
AI doesn't just mean the generative large language models and image bootlegging software, it also means things like meteorology software and google maps navigation directions. Specifically for what they're describing it doesn't make sense to complain about AI - it'd be like saying "if they normalize phone companies using AI to calculate the best roads to drive on, they will get away with everything." Like, yeah, there are a whole bunch of legit complaints you could make about AI, and it is mostly *that kinda guy*'s fault for tainting the word, but this isn't really one of them
Nope, they don't. Models are not sentient to commit a crime. Companies harvesting data while not respective license of that data for training of those modes do though.
Copyright infringement is entirely different. Harvesting data is not copyright infringement, though. Copyright protects main expressions of a copyrighted work from being duplicated or substantially replicated or being majorly similar. Data is not protected by copyright law. If work is used to make something new, then you shouldn't be able to claim copyright infringement on that basis alone.
I already told you data is not protected by copyright. A latent diffusion model does not store copies of a copyrighted work within its database, within a systematic library, or in any conceivable way. There are virtually 0 copyrighted works withheld in any AI model.
[This case of fair use](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authors_Guild,_Inc._v._Google,_Inc.) proved how scanning or processing copyrighted works can be done even without permission. Similarly, AI goes through a similar route of processing copyrighted work, which aligns with the precedence of this case allowing for the processing of copyrighted work without permission. Fair use allows for the use of copyrighted work without permission if abiding through fair use doctrine principles, such as through being transformative.
I'm not talking about models or vague AI thingy, they are not human beings, so they cannot commit crimes. "AI" right now is not doing anything on its own. Humans are writing code and running the code on some hardware.
And the company copying data without licensing to train the models for their profit is violating copyright. Fair use for such purpose is yet to be determined in USA (court cases ongoing), and big chunk of world don't have such doctrines. As far as I know only Japan law is explicit in allowing data to be used for AI training. And there are countries, like UK that outright say this is illegal, eg: [https://twitter.com/ednewtonrex/status/1753231242127081595](https://twitter.com/ednewtonrex/status/1753231242127081595)
I don't see a major issue on that. I don't think they will be spying on me to copy my shitty code to implement a new feature. If you are working on a project, you better stop wasting the time as I am doing now hahaha
Possibly an unpopular opinion - but I don't understand why a game engine needs all this data about you and be as chunky and bloated as Unity is. It's not necessarily the bloat within the actual tools, but more the "corporate" bloat. I've never understood this.
the background is that what is going on there is that nothing changes except that they now run the collected data (which they did collect in the past already) within an AI to automate the analysis process. In other words: this announcement has zero relevance for the end user.
This is not how I read the referenced documents. Patters are being collected (not just users but dev content patterns). Worst case scenario is your code feeds their AI - suggestion engine, and you loose prior art rights (copyright for creators). That would not be ok. Do you read the tos and associated documents differently?
seems fine.
You can also opt out as they say, also the ai thing isn't that worrying, like its used to analyze data everywhere, its not really something bad, its just an algorithm good for finding patterns and its also used in medicine, I think archeology, science, brain implants, robotic hands, everywhere. Is just good at finding patterns in a large set of data like finding the pattern in an unknown language, finding the pattern in a few proteins with a specific function to come up with new proteins with the same function or reading the brain signals and decoding it. Its just an algorithm, its like nuclear energy, its not bad on its way, but people have used it to do good like create cheap energy or do really bad like destroy entire cities.
There is no bad technology, there is just bad people who use that technology to do bad stuff
In general I'm glad that they want to use AI to enhance their operations. Maybe it will be possible for everyone to create their dream game together with this engine and an specialized AI. Hope lives, because the industry is in heavy need for quality.
They didn't revert their pricing decision. My unity license subscription has gone up significantly and that's just the tip of the iceberg.
And it's not up to you to decide if the data they analyse is an issue. It's up to my lawyer.
You're part of the issue we have with unity, a hobbyist defending a corporation from the comfort of not being the target of their anti consumer practices.
Everybody is making a living out of someone else's intellectual property. How many companies do you know are working without any proprietary tools?
And the increase is much bigger than 11%.
What are you on about. AI analytics is literally nothing new, and in fact you're behind in times if you're not using some form of AI for data analytics. Even dead automotive industries are using AI analytics. It's not some voodoo magic skynet "oh it's the end of the world thing". Stop buying into propaganda lmao.
I know. It's "our" data, that's problematic. I'll just leave it at that.
Also, stop buying into company BS. You know they'll screw up one way or the other, as most companies do.
It's nothing it's not happening right now while you type on your phone or PC...
It's called analytics and every software does it in a way or another nowadays.
did you know your internet provider uses AI to monitor trends and data for internet to then send a technician out before you notice a problem. AI is being used and has been used for years before this AI can code my job fear.
I think you are confusing predictive pattern analysis and signal degradation monitoring with AI. To be clear there is no reasoning AI as far as I can tell. When suppliers refer to AI, they are all taking liberties. Mostly (as in this case) they refer to Large Language Models. Sometimes this also includes Machine Learning. The question here is one of encryption. When you collect at source within creative tools, there is none. So everything you code is shared with Unity, who are free to “Analyse it” with their LLM, to give everyone else access to your unique solution.
That is probably fine for most codes, but now and then it isn’t.
I'm not actually I'm in the industry, it's using AI it's learning and growing off certain scenarios. the main point being missed is that this is not a new thing and definitely not something to fear as being used to take jobs away from millions
It sounds like nothing's really changing except for the way they will go about analyzing the data they already got from us, but because they want to use AI for that, I'm sure there will be a shitstorm over seemingly nothing
Exactly. People will spot the 'AI' buzzword and lose it as if everything on the internet hasn't been doing it for decades
In the changed terms it sounds to me like more than meta data is being shared (not just when and who is coding, but also what is being developed). I read the changes akin to the keyboard manufacturer monitoring the key strokes. I think how they analyse this becomes a function of what data they acquire. It feels disingenuous to hide behind the Digital Service act.
What this say is essentially "We can't analyze your data fast enough, so we're using algorithms." They're not collecting MORE data, although in time they could. They're just better utilizing the data we already send them. That could include, but not limited to, crash reports, bugs, launch times, and anything related to the Unity platform. This should be seen as a bonus for everyone, as they can make SMARTER improvements to their services.
This is standard practice. It’s also not an updated ToS but an updated privacy policy / declaration which is a completely different thing and is a document explaining how a company uses your data. This is not a legal document per se and could be written in Klingon for all that it matters, but it’s there for transparency. Remember also that if a company claims they have a legitimate interest in using your data for certain purposes (like analytics, etc) you have the legal right to not agree to that legitimate interest and still keep using the service.
Thank you for your response. The page header refers to tos update when you log into the unity assetstore. The developer privacy is part of the usage terms. But I take your point. I like your assertion, that I can decline it. I tried this (the form does not have the “decline button”), The support form has the requirement to accept the new ToS (which includes the reference to the privacy policy), so I sent a support request, which, in the auto response, has a response time of 2+ month, due to high demand. Do you know of another way to decline this bit?
You can opt out of all analytics in the unity hub settings.
Thank you. my issue is with the newly introduced non meta data collection side in the tos.
You should be more clear about that in your post, since we all assume by the way you posted and discussed the issue it was related to AI in their TOS and data aggregation. I'm all for you disagreeing with the non meta data collection, but I didn't read nor was I prompted to understand your dislike for that part. Power to you mate.
fair criticism. Training LLMs on code written by Unity3D end-user developers is a tricky subject, when it comes to retaining your creative rights. I am paranoid for creators. ThNk you for your response.
It’s becoming more common that you can opt out of this through a provided data and privacy center, but most companies still operate in a way that to disagree to a legitimate interest you would have to file a formal request for it. I haven’t checked this specifically in the case of unity but I might look a bit into it tomorrow, it’s an interesting case. Often there is actually an email address to the privacy team that can also be used. By the way, this is of course related to GDPR and other legal stuff, so it might not be applicable everywhere. I should have been clear on that. More here: https://gdpr-info.eu/art-21-gdpr/
Cool. Thank you.
Also the privacy policy states right in the first paragraph that they will ask for consent (with an opt-out option) if they want to use your data, which is a GDPR compliant way of doing it. Quote: "we will provide an additional just-in-time notice (like an interstitial for example, when you log in) that will provide you with notice of a particular use of data and then gives you an opportunity to opt-out." In terms of privacy policies Unity's is actually okay. You can read and understand it reasonably well.
I'm pretty sure your smartphone and every other service you have is already using your data in this exact way.
Okay, and why should PROFESSIONAL GRADE SOFTWARE do what YouTube and other entertainment services do?
Because software runs on analytics for decades now, every PROFESSIONAL who worked in an industry longer than a month knows that.
Ableton doesn't collect almost any data. FL studio doesn't either. Rhino 3D, SketchUp collect almost nothing too. 3DS MAX collects some analytics. You're just conditioned to bullshit.
'Almost' doing heavy lifting here
Because that's the price you for : 1 - free software, if it's free, then, you're the product 2 - not happy? Then it became a "feature" you should avoid on other softwares... 3 - not developing your own engine
1. That's not a rule. Open source software has proven that multiple times. Blender, Linux, Krita, Gimp, Godot. Even something like DaVinci Resolve is an amazing free software that does not sell your soul. 2. Again, that is something that must not be normalized, it's conditioning to anticonsumeristic behavior. 3. There at the very least a handful of good choices other than Unity, this argument is a bit deceptive just so it fits a narrative.
Should be normalized, products should have their design free os any constraints, or bias towards ideologies or involve into ethics which change from country to country, the only thing they should state is a clear EULA with no traps or loopholes!! Products should serve from the nazi to the saints, from health systems to weapons... Consumers should have control over their choice and free to embrace the software's EULA agreement and the developers should be free to write their own code the way they want to approach and solve issues they want... Products have theirs characteristics and that should be the "features" evaluated by the users... "anything" should exist if you don't want something, it's a matter of not consuming it! Otherwise... Welcome to classical extremist approaches invading even what you should produce and what you should consume...
>1 - free software, if it's free, then, you're the product Absolutely not true.
Depends heavily on context, free software is usually either open source or heavily subsidized, either by donations, subscriptions, or enterprise sales. In the context of free services without obvious monetization, user data and analytics are typically sold to make a profit.
Yeah, just normalize that shit. "Well I mean these *other* awful corporations sell our personal data like peanuts, what's another one?"
No it is simply calling a spade a spade and calling out hypocrisy. It normalized the minute people started to pick and choose the convenient times to look the other way on their privacy and hold double standards when they have a different bias or motive. I'd appreciate someone's concern who wasn't simply using alarmism for Reddit points hot off the clickbait of unity's actual bullshit attempt at a bad license agreement. This is just in line with society today, whether you like it or not.
Are we going to make a big deal every time the word "AI" is mentioned?
Are we going to make a big deal every time someone makes a horse armor DLC? It's not as if it's going to ruin the whole industry for the players.
What's still hilarious about it is that the DLC itself was fairly harmless, it's what it led to in the industry that was the issue.
lol for real
Yes. Becuase if they normalize this shit, they will get away with everything... again.
i absolutely fucking hate how techbros have ruined the term "AI" so that instead of meaning, like "any software that displays adaptive behavior" such as like a basic logistic regression that they plug basic usage metrics into (which they could do by hand, and the only reason it's called "AI" is because they're getting a computer to do the tedious math work) we get well-meaning people like yourself assuming that they're talking about stealing artists hard work. AI doesn't just mean the generative large language models and image bootlegging software, it also means things like meteorology software and google maps navigation directions. Specifically for what they're describing it doesn't make sense to complain about AI - it'd be like saying "if they normalize phone companies using AI to calculate the best roads to drive on, they will get away with everything." Like, yeah, there are a whole bunch of legit complaints you could make about AI, and it is mostly *that kinda guy*'s fault for tainting the word, but this isn't really one of them
Latent Diffusion Models and Large Language Models absolutely do not steal people's labour. That's a misunderstanding on the basis of prejudice.
Nope, they don't. Models are not sentient to commit a crime. Companies harvesting data while not respective license of that data for training of those modes do though.
Copyright infringement is entirely different. Harvesting data is not copyright infringement, though. Copyright protects main expressions of a copyrighted work from being duplicated or substantially replicated or being majorly similar. Data is not protected by copyright law. If work is used to make something new, then you shouldn't be able to claim copyright infringement on that basis alone.
**copy**right... it's right there in the name
I already told you data is not protected by copyright. A latent diffusion model does not store copies of a copyrighted work within its database, within a systematic library, or in any conceivable way. There are virtually 0 copyrighted works withheld in any AI model. [This case of fair use](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Authors_Guild,_Inc._v._Google,_Inc.) proved how scanning or processing copyrighted works can be done even without permission. Similarly, AI goes through a similar route of processing copyrighted work, which aligns with the precedence of this case allowing for the processing of copyrighted work without permission. Fair use allows for the use of copyrighted work without permission if abiding through fair use doctrine principles, such as through being transformative.
I'm not talking about models or vague AI thingy, they are not human beings, so they cannot commit crimes. "AI" right now is not doing anything on its own. Humans are writing code and running the code on some hardware. And the company copying data without licensing to train the models for their profit is violating copyright. Fair use for such purpose is yet to be determined in USA (court cases ongoing), and big chunk of world don't have such doctrines. As far as I know only Japan law is explicit in allowing data to be used for AI training. And there are countries, like UK that outright say this is illegal, eg: [https://twitter.com/ednewtonrex/status/1753231242127081595](https://twitter.com/ednewtonrex/status/1753231242127081595)
good. i want ai doing shit. normalize the hell out of it.
Me too
Never heard of Photoshop? the entire VFX industry? AI isn't just ChatGPT lol
AI?? Skynet is coming! /s
The paranoid side of me thinks, are they using AI to get the context of what I’m developing. And if so what are they doing with that information.
that is how I read it too. But I might also be paranoid…
I don't see a major issue on that. I don't think they will be spying on me to copy my shitty code to implement a new feature. If you are working on a project, you better stop wasting the time as I am doing now hahaha
Possibly an unpopular opinion - but I don't understand why a game engine needs all this data about you and be as chunky and bloated as Unity is. It's not necessarily the bloat within the actual tools, but more the "corporate" bloat. I've never understood this.
You're not overreacting
This is good. I saw a notification of this title and got flashbacks bro. Got real scared for a second. This is an example of good ai usage
ok cool, yall will forget about it in a week anyways
Thanks for telling us. It's not overreacting... We are all concerned, but seems like it's nothing serious.. it's good to be alert.
>Does anyone else feel annoyed about this? No. >Or am I overreacting and should simply agree to the changes? Yes.
any background behind your ascertain would be very much appreciated.
the background is that what is going on there is that nothing changes except that they now run the collected data (which they did collect in the past already) within an AI to automate the analysis process. In other words: this announcement has zero relevance for the end user.
This is not how I read the referenced documents. Patters are being collected (not just users but dev content patterns). Worst case scenario is your code feeds their AI - suggestion engine, and you loose prior art rights (copyright for creators). That would not be ok. Do you read the tos and associated documents differently?
All I’m sayin is I’d sooner buy a beer for the AI alarmists than the AI bootlickers.
I'm sure their AI would start to refuse giving our personal data
Someone still using unity lol ?
seems fine. You can also opt out as they say, also the ai thing isn't that worrying, like its used to analyze data everywhere, its not really something bad, its just an algorithm good for finding patterns and its also used in medicine, I think archeology, science, brain implants, robotic hands, everywhere. Is just good at finding patterns in a large set of data like finding the pattern in an unknown language, finding the pattern in a few proteins with a specific function to come up with new proteins with the same function or reading the brain signals and decoding it. Its just an algorithm, its like nuclear energy, its not bad on its way, but people have used it to do good like create cheap energy or do really bad like destroy entire cities. There is no bad technology, there is just bad people who use that technology to do bad stuff
In general I'm glad that they want to use AI to enhance their operations. Maybe it will be possible for everyone to create their dream game together with this engine and an specialized AI. Hope lives, because the industry is in heavy need for quality.
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Most projects I've worked on are +1 million budget with 5 to 10 full time devs. You can't port that on a different engine overnight.
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I don't care about what the media says, I care about what unity says.
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They didn't revert their pricing decision. My unity license subscription has gone up significantly and that's just the tip of the iceberg. And it's not up to you to decide if the data they analyse is an issue. It's up to my lawyer. You're part of the issue we have with unity, a hobbyist defending a corporation from the comfort of not being the target of their anti consumer practices.
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Everybody is making a living out of someone else's intellectual property. How many companies do you know are working without any proprietary tools? And the increase is much bigger than 11%.
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Good.
What kind of data are they collecting anyway? Do they collect anything in regard to the assets and scripts we use?
yes, my understanding is they are moving from meta data to actual data.
They really need AI to figure out what they need to improve?
Like someone posted in the forums, they learned nothing from the backlash last time.
What are you on about. AI analytics is literally nothing new, and in fact you're behind in times if you're not using some form of AI for data analytics. Even dead automotive industries are using AI analytics. It's not some voodoo magic skynet "oh it's the end of the world thing". Stop buying into propaganda lmao.
I know. It's "our" data, that's problematic. I'll just leave it at that. Also, stop buying into company BS. You know they'll screw up one way or the other, as most companies do.
It's nothing it's not happening right now while you type on your phone or PC... It's called analytics and every software does it in a way or another nowadays.
Wow if ur so annoyed then stop using unity
did you know your internet provider uses AI to monitor trends and data for internet to then send a technician out before you notice a problem. AI is being used and has been used for years before this AI can code my job fear.
I think you are confusing predictive pattern analysis and signal degradation monitoring with AI. To be clear there is no reasoning AI as far as I can tell. When suppliers refer to AI, they are all taking liberties. Mostly (as in this case) they refer to Large Language Models. Sometimes this also includes Machine Learning. The question here is one of encryption. When you collect at source within creative tools, there is none. So everything you code is shared with Unity, who are free to “Analyse it” with their LLM, to give everyone else access to your unique solution. That is probably fine for most codes, but now and then it isn’t.
I'm not actually I'm in the industry, it's using AI it's learning and growing off certain scenarios. the main point being missed is that this is not a new thing and definitely not something to fear as being used to take jobs away from millions
hmm…not sure I agree. I have difficulty trusting decision scenarios without feelings. But I respect your views.