Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by layer8 on Monday April 03, 2023 @03:41AM
(#35419895)
One possible problem is if Copilot gets good enough that you can rather easily sidestep GPL (or any other license) by having Copilot implement functionality X for you instead of using a license-bound library providing X. Not only may this be questionable regarding the license, but it would also be tend to reduce contributions to the library which otherwise would have been used.
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Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by the_gipsy on Monday April 03, 2023 @04:03AM
(#35420096)
Shouldn't be different from a human ripping or regurgitating parts of the code.
If it's not a hard derivation, then it's difficult to prove or even notice.
Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by feanaro on Monday April 03, 2023 @04:39AM
(#35420369)
It shouldn't matter. If your model touched X during training, it should be seen as producing derivative work. This is the reason humans use clean room implementation techniques.
Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by the_gipsy on Monday April 03, 2023 @08:32AM
(#35422419)
The opposite of clean room is probably much more common.
Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by usrbinbash on Monday April 03, 2023 @08:33AM
(#35422432)
> If your model touched X during training, it should be seen as producing derivative work.
I as a programmer touched X during training (learning how to code). Is all my work now derivative because of that?
Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by feanaro on Saturday April 08, 2023 @05:10AM
(#35491756)
If you examined the source code of a library for a specific purpose Y, then shortly afterwards went implementing another library for purpose Y, there's a high probability of your code being infringing. That's the entire premise and purpose of clean room design (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_room_design).
Now factor in that machine models don't have a fallible or degrading memory and I think the answer is quite clear.
Re:Saying Goodbye to GitHub – Ersei 'N Stuff
by layer8 on Monday April 03, 2023 @04:17AM
(#35420206)
My point was more about the possible negative effects than about the legality.
An important difference is that AIs are much cheaper than a human. Having a library reimplemented by a human usually isn’t cost-effective, but having it done by an AI may become viable. That could cause a major change in the open-source dynamics, while possibly also reducing average software quality (because less code is publicly scrutinized).