I agree that that's a more consistent position for the people criticising the data slurping. But I don't see people advocating those open-data models in these threads? It's usually about defending the zero-licensing competitors.

My (limited, outsider) understanding is that due to the court cases US labs are pressured to be legal now (for instance, bulk scanning purchased books instead of Books3, and the licensing deals with media companies). But international labs are not. The "not licensing everything" statement is more about current copyright law not requiring licensing of everything. But that question is still up in the air as cases are ongoing.