Ok...

So as a black person should I demand that all books written before the civil rights act be destroyed?

The past is messy. But it's the only way to learn anything.

All an LLM does it's take a bunch of existing texts and rebundle them. Like it or not, the existing texts are still there.

I understand an LLM that won't tell me how to do heart surgery. But I can't fear one that might be less enlightened on race issues. So many questions to ask! Hell, it's like talking to older person in real life.

I don't expect a typical 90 year old to be the most progressive person, but they're still worth listening too.

Of course, I have to assume that you have considered more outcomes than I have. Because, from my five minutes of reflection as a software geek, albeit with a passion for history, I find this the most surprising thing about the whole project.

I suspect restricting access could equally be a comment on modern LLMs in general, rather than the historical material specifically. For example, we must be constantly reminded not to give LLMs a level of credibility that their hallucinations would have us believe.

But I'm fascinated by the possibility that somehow resurrecting lost voices might give an unholy agency to minds and their supporting worldviews that are so anachronistic that hearing them speak again might stir long-banished evils. I'm being lyrical for dramatic affect!

I would make one serious point though, that do I have the credentials to express. The conversation may have died down, but there is still a huge question mark over, if not the legality, but certainly the ethics of restricting access to, and profiting from, public domain knowledge. I don't wish to suggest a side to take here, just to point out that the lack of conversation should not be taken to mean that the matter is settled.

This is understandable and I think others ITT should appreciate the legal and PR ramifications involved.

There's no such risk so you're not going to get any sensible ideas in response to this question. The goals of the project are history, you already made that clear. There's nothing more that needs to be done.

We all get that academics now exist in some kind of dystopian horror where they can get transitively blamed for the existence of anyone to the right of Lenin, but bear in mind:

1. The people who might try to cancel you are idiots unworthy of your respect, because if they're against this project, they're against the study of history in its entirety.

2. They will scream at you anyway no matter what you do.

3. You used (Swiss) taxpayer funds to develop these models. There is no moral justification for withholding from the public what they worked to pay for.

You already slathered your README with disclaimers even though you didn't even release the model at all, just showed a few examples of what it said - none of which are in any way surprising. That is far more than enough. Just release the models and if anyone complains, politely tell them to go complain to the users.

What are the legal or other ramifications of people misrepresenting the goals of your project? What is it you're worried about exactly?

You are a fraud, information is not misuse just because it might mean a negative news story about you. If you don't want to be real about it you should just stop, acting like there is any authentic historical interest then trying to gatekeep it is disgusting.

A disclaimer on the site that you are not bigoted or genocidal, and that worldviews from the 1913 era were much different than today and don't necessarily reflect your project.

Movie studios have done that for years with old movies. TCM still shows Birth of a Nation and Gone with the Wind.

Edit: I saw further down that you've already done this! What more is there to do?