Canadian fiddler sues Google after AI Overview wrongly claimed he was a sex offender

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2026/may/05/canadian-ashley-macisaac-fiddler-musician-singer-songwriter-sues-google-ai-sex-offender-ntwnfb

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/63748731

Ashley MacIsaac, who is seeking $1.5m in civil lawsuit, says inaccurate information led to concert cancellation

332 points · 35 comments · view on lemmy.world

35 Comments

Warl0k3@lemmy.world · 103 pts · 100d

Google’s AI Overview about MacIsaac now includes the statement: “In late 2025 and 2026, he made headlines for taking legal action against Google.”

lmao fuck off google.

BzzBiotch@lemmy.world · 78 pts · 100d (12 replies)

Got mixed up with his brother: Canadian Diddler

abbadon420@sh.itjust.works · 26 pts · 100d (2 replies)

Oh brother! I'm giving you the upvote, but I don't like it

BzzBiotch@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 99d (1 reply)

A reluctant upvote is still an upvote. Thusly I thank you 🙏🏻

QuincyPeck@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 99d

I upvoted without hesitation. That’s good commenting.

jimmy90@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 99d (3 replies)

is it only the uk that calls child abusers kiddy fiddlers hence the lingual confusion?

AbidanYre@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 99d (1 reply)

I thought the UK called them nonces?

fakeman_pretendname@feddit.uk · 4 pts · 99d

That too. We have loads of spare words for everything.

BzzBiotch@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 99d

As a Dutchie I would not know for sure

quack@lemmy.zip · 6 pts · 99d (4 replies)

Don't wanna be a Canadian diddler

🎸🎶

Mixed him up with his brother, the fiddler

🎸🎶

BzzBiotch@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 99d (3 replies)

Cause one thing was just not his style

🎸🎶

And that was being a pdf file

🎸🎶

quack@lemmy.zip · 4 pts · 99d (2 replies)

Welcome to a new kind of tension

All across the maple leaf nation

Where musicians are slanderd by the claaaaankers

ouRKaoS@lemmy.today · 2 pts · 99d (1 reply)

🎵🎶🎻EPIC SOLO🎻🎶🎵

BzzBiotch@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 99d

And when all of man was judged by a bot

Innocence became a thing of the past

Everyone was mixed up and noone was clean

There was nothing left to do…

Than to diddle the machine

🎶🎸🤖🍆

hOrni@lemmy.world · 62 pts · 100d (1 reply)

Now they will accuse random people, to draw attention away from the pedo in chief.

EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 99d

Satiation. If you say it enough it loses meaning, then becomes normalized to people, that’s part of the goal effect when they accuse others of what they’re doing.

OwOarchist@pawb.social · 32 pts · 100d (4 replies)

Hm... I wonder if I can get Google's AI to commit defamation against me as well? I could use a nice payday.

SilverCode@lemmy.ml · 22 pts · 100d (3 replies)

Step 1 - Learn to play the fiddle

Step 2 - Start raising baby goats

Step 3 - ???

Step 4 - Profit!

CeeBee_Eh@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 99d (2 replies)

Wait wait wait... what's step 3?

faintwhenfree@lemmus.org · 5 pts · 99d

Step 3 is cha cha. Because 1 2 cha cha cha

starik@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 99d
[ removed ]
ironhydroxide@sh.itjust.works · 9 pts · 99d

Diddler fiddler, what's the difference

Lexam@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 99d

Fiddler on the bench.

leadore@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 99d

Only $1.5 million? That's peanuts, especially to Google and especially for such heinous defamation. It should be for at least 100 million.

merc@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 99d

Internet companies have become way too used to hiding behind Section 230 of the Communications Act which allows them to say that anything on their sites was created by a user, not by them, and therefore they're not liable. This made sense when the Internet was just chronological forums and there was no way for the operator to know that something defamatory or illegal had been posted.

They've managed to maintain that fiction, even when hand-picking content they want to show. Now they have algorithms that scan all the content people post, even videos, decide which content is going to generate the most views, clicks and engagement, and choose to prioritize that content, even if it is illegal.

But, now, with AI, they're actually the ones generating that content. There's no user to hide behind anymore. Let's hope that the courts say that section 230 doesn't protect them here and that they're liable for all false claims made with AI, just as they'd be liable if it were an employee or the boss who posted it.

magnue@lemmy.world · -23 pts · 100d (10 replies)

Ok that's pretty amusing.

Neon_Carnivore@lemmy.zip · 45 pts · 100d (6 replies)

Yeah, corpo AI error bullshit potentially ruining your life and livelihood, totally hilarious.

/s

Zahille7@lemmy.world · 12 pts · 99d (3 replies)

Kinda reminds me of the fiasco with that Markiplier stream a few years ago.

Something happened with some emoji iirc, where if you reacted to something in the stream chat with said emoji Google used to have some sort of hidden bullshit policy where you couldn't "spam" emojis in stream chats (and that's what Mark was using as a voting method during his stream), because it triggered something in Google's automation that would flag your Google account (the ENTIRE FUCKING THING) as going against TOS and deleted/suspended indefinitely the whole account. Like, thousands of people's personal email accounts were just locked down with no way for the users to get into it. Mark had to make an entire separate video calling out YouTube/Google for being such fucking idiots and taking their sweet goddamn time trying to fix it.

EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 99d (2 replies)

Do we know what the emoji was?

Zahille7@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 99d (1 reply)

From my googling, it wasn't a specific emoji, but the fact that people were posting multiple in a row in a single message

Which is still utterly fucking stupid.

EmpathicVagrant@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 99d

Yeah that’s dumb as hell, talk about disconnected. There are all kinds of slang and folks tend to emoji in response to emoji.

When it’s not every third word I don’t find it as annoying, just string them all at the end or say something cryptic like 👴🏼🐌📸🌱♥️

magnue@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 99d

Not funny for him obviously

magnue@lemmy.world · -2 pts · 99d

It's not my life pal.

stoly@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 99d (1 reply)

Ruining someone's life is so funny to you I guess

magnue@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 99d

Yeah kinda like when Ian Huntley was caught for being a horrendous pedo and everyone thought it was H from 'Steps'.

Limonene@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 99d

It'll be amusing when he wins. It's just angering for now.