Shouldn't Copilot technically be FOSS since it trains on open source?
Yes, it is a derived work and should be GPL if it was trained on GPL code.
GitHub Copilot is generally available
251–260 of 796 posts
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#252Earlier quoted context omitted.
The time savings win is really that marginal. I'm not sure I can save more than 3 hours per year with Copilot. And this isn't saving 3 hours in a single week, this is saving a few seconds here and there accumulated over a year. Saving time with Copilot is itself a learning process and a probabilistic affair. Copilot can win you a few seconds at a time, but can easily set you back minutes if you aren't careful or expe…
Just to clarify: are you saying you'd pay $20 for an hour saved, but not $33.33 for an hour saved?
I'm saying that at $100 yearly I'm on the fence of maybe yes or no. At $60 yearly I'm auto-yes without having to think in rational terms. I guess I'm just not at that place in life where $100 is the tier in which I think emotionally.
Also, if I magically knew that I could save you 3 hours yearly, but it were spread out over the course of a year, and that your savings would occasionally spike down into negative and then slowly climb up, I just wouldn't entertain such a complex offer at such low numbers. People pay insurance just to avoid such incidental downward spikes.
Copilot's biggest limitation right now is that you can't dare to allow minutes of savings per day without inviting the risk of a severe spike in debugging time, the kind that wipes out all your savings. This means you cannot spike up.
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#253Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#254It would be nice if people stopped giving Microsoft all their code to use to then sell back to them.
Since this is derived from code Microsoft did not write, or ask permission to use, it should be at the very least free to use.
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#255Should we add a badge or something, indicating that project is using code generated by machine?
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is logic to ensure that copilot does not emit exact duplicates of code in the training set... but that logic is significantly newer than that tweet.
Was that decision informed by legal or product? Because derivative works are still derivitative works even if you don't replicate the original verbatim.
I mean, it was informed by both, but basically everyone thinks it's a good idea.
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#257Earlier quoted context omitted.
Github Copilot is on the fence for me between yes/no at $100 per year. I agree that you should rarely if ever allow Copilot to write multiple lines, as your double-checking or debugging time is going to exceed your time savings — the probability of good-looking but bad code is just that high right now. In order to experience a net time-win you'll likely want to be an intermediate at whatever you're doing. If it were…
Your decision making delta is really $40 a year? How much is your time worth?
40$ can go a long way. In my personal scenario:
- Money is worth more to me than the average US dev because I earn less than US developers, and therefore my time is definitely worth less.
- I cannot use this for work at my current workplace and I'm willing to bet a lot of other companies aren't fine with it either. I'm not saving time where it makes me money, so I would classify as a luxury, not a tool (spending-wise).
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#258It has saved me a lot of time writing trivial shit that I usually have to copy/paste from the internet anyway. Is it worth $10 per month? I dunno. But they get me a kick-ass IDE, I get to store my project (privately) for free, and they save me a lot of time.
So I'm probably taking it.
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#259Wild guess: The pricing is such that when big enterprise contracts are signed, they can throw in Copilot, claiming extra value for the whole package.
Re: GitHub Copilot is generally available
#260Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yep. The only reason it hasn't been utterly dogpiled by lawyers is that far fewer people care about code than other forms of IP. If I made an AI assistant called PhotoStar to help with digital art and it just attaches Big Bird's face onto a character in my children's book I'm going to get sued. "Hey now, I just hit paste , the software pressed copy by itself" is not going to hold up.
Or the fact that you grant GitHub an implicit license as outlined in the ToS.
GitHub has never asked for representation to provide an unlimited-rights license to GitHub themselves for any purpose. Further, the person posting GPLed code to GitHub is not necessarily the only or sole copyright holder, and GitHub has never represented that there was a problem with this.