No one cared because there was no scale. Everyone spoke a different language, and if you were going to lift someone's ideas you had to put in so much effort you might as well mix in your own ideas at the same time.

If this conversation is really about IP laws being used against AI then my take is a little different because I don't think AI is a derivative work any more than a human who has read a book is a derivative work. If someone prompts the AI to produce something obviously infringing, that's on the prompter. Corporations don't want this because it's too difficult to enforce, but their protections have grown too strong over time and are past due for a correction