undefined | Better HN

0 pointsjefftk8mo ago0 comments

Weather training on code is fair use is still an open legal question, and it may well be fair use. The way a license works is by saying "you have my permission to use this code as long as you follow these conditions", but if no license is required than the conditions are irrelevant.

There is an active case on this, where Microsoft has been sued over GitHub copilot, and it has been slowly moving through the court system since 2022. Most of the claims have been dismissed, and the prediction market is at 11%: https://manifold.markets/JeffKaufman/will-the-github-copilot...

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godelski8mo ago

> The way a license works is

Let's actually look at the MIT license, a very permissive license

  > Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to ***use***, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

  > The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

So, you can use it but need to cite the usage. It's not that hard. Fair use if you just acknowledge usage.

Is it really that difficult to acknowledge that you didn't do everything on your own? People aren't asking for money. It's just basic acknowledgement.

Forget the courts for a second, just ask yourself what is the right thing to do. Ethically.

jefftkOP8mo ago

> Forget the courts for a second, just ask yourself what is the right thing to do

Forgetting the courts, whether reading the source code and learning from it is intended to count as "use" is not clear to me, and I would have guessed no. Using a tool and examining a tool are pretty different.

godelski8mo ago

Context matters, right?

Human reading code? Ambiguous. But I think you're using it. Running code? Not ambiguous.

Machine processing code? I don't think that's ambiguous. It's using the code. A person is using the code to make their machine better.

This really isn't that hard.

Let's think about it this way. How do you use a book?

I think you need to be careful that you're not justifying the answer you want and instead are looking for what the right answer is. I'm saying this because you quoted me saying "what is right" and you just didn't address it. To quote Feynman (<- look, I cited my work. I fulfilled the MIT license obligations!)

  > The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.

1 more reply

mattl8mo ago

I can't see how it can be fair use. Just follow the license, it's not that difficult. Microsoft will forever be a pariah if they get away with this.

I'm putting my new code somewhere private anyway.

jefftkOP8mo ago

> I can't see how it can be fair use.

The key question is whether it is sufficiently "transformative". See Authors Guild vs Google, Kelly vs Arriba Soft, and Sony vs Universal. This is a way a judge could definitely rule, and at this point I think is the most likely outcome.

> Microsoft will forever be a pariah if they get away with this.

I doubt this. Talking to developers, it seems like the majority are pretty excited about coding assistants. Including the ones that many companies other than Microsoft (especially Anthropic) are putting out.

mattl8mo ago

Yeah, this is just sad to hear.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

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godelski8mo ago

> The way a license works is

Let's actually look at the MIT license, a very permissive license

  > Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the “Software”), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to ***use***, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

  > The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

So, you can use it but need to cite the usage. It's not that hard. Fair use if you just acknowledge usage.

Is it really that difficult to acknowledge that you didn't do everything on your own? People aren't asking for money. It's just basic acknowledgement.

Forget the courts for a second, just ask yourself what is the right thing to do. Ethically.

jefftkOP8mo ago

> Forget the courts for a second, just ask yourself what is the right thing to do

godelski8mo ago

Context matters, right?

Human reading code? Ambiguous. But I think you're using it. Running code? Not ambiguous.

Machine processing code? I don't think that's ambiguous. It's using the code. A person is using the code to make their machine better.

This really isn't that hard.

Let's think about it this way. How do you use a book?

  > The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.

1 more reply

mattl8mo ago

I can't see how it can be fair use. Just follow the license, it's not that difficult. Microsoft will forever be a pariah if they get away with this.

I'm putting my new code somewhere private anyway.

jefftkOP8mo ago

> I can't see how it can be fair use.

> Microsoft will forever be a pariah if they get away with this.

mattl8mo ago

Yeah, this is just sad to hear.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse