Copilot sells code other people wrote

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by marpstar on Thursday June 23, 2022 @02:13PM (#31853051)

> Copy my MIT licensed code without attribution? I don't give a shit, go ahead, I hope it helps

This is my feeling as well. I don't build stuff in the open so that I can get bent out of shape at someone not properly licensing it. It's in a public repository, FFS... I assume that if anyone even notices my repo, that they may copy/paste a few lines out of my solution if it helps them.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by cududa on Thursday June 23, 2022 @02:22PM (#31853191)

Exactly! Do they really think every single line of their code is so precious it requires attribution? If I publish code, I assume it might get pushed, pulled, refactored in a million ways and no one will ever know my name’s attached to it. And guess what? I DONT’T CARE. It’s code. Not a self-constructed monument to my own intelligence that needs a little placard with my name on it to follow around some clever async function I wrote

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by georgeecollins on Thursday June 23, 2022 @03:21PM (#31853989)

If its a couple lines of generic code, of course. That's also an indefensible copyright, btw. But if its hundreds of very specific likes of code written to do one thing under a license you don't follow, that's something else.

This isn't just an issue of code. You can write a program that combines songs, or combines novels creating a different work that has sections that are essentially the original protected work. I don't think the authors of those novels are going to be OK with you selling or giving away a version of their work just because an AI edited it or combined it somehow.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by sirsinsalot on Thursday June 23, 2022 @03:18PM (#31853949)

But this isn't everyone's feeling. And they have a right to choose how their work is used. Thats the basis of commerce being possible here.

The mechanised license ignorance and the way original authors are not compensated is the issue.

If you had a repo you'd worked really hard on, and offered a commercial license or GPL depending on the use (so you can be funded to work on it) ... do you think it is fair that copilot ingests that code and allows others to benefit from your work and knowledge without the commercial license as you intended?

Note how Microsoft always throws out the capitalism "rules of engagement" when it benefits them and undermines everything else. The fact we are even trusting the situation Microsoft are creating is dire, and speaks to the short memory of our industry.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by alar44 on Thursday June 23, 2022 @03:58PM (#31854410)

Saying an auto complete of a line of code is "using their work" is a massive stretch.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by bayindirh on Friday June 24, 2022 @03:27AM (#31858705)

When it's demonstrated that it can generate whole function bodies intact (fast inverse square root debacle), and autocomplete it with a wrong license, it's not a stretch anymore.

See: https://twitter.com/mitsuhiko/status/1410886329924194309

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Copilot sells code other people wrote by sirsinsalot on Thursday June 23, 2022 @05:31PM (#31855397)

It isn't autocompleting "a line of code", it completes whole function bodies.

[ Parent | on HN ]