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Give up GitHub: The time has come

sfconservancy.org

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Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#2

Post by indoorskier »

This GitHub Copilot thing is pretty polarizing. According to one of the expert papers they sollicited, it's unlikely MSFT/GitHub is breaking any copyright laws.

What they're doing does feel icky, and they could have mitigated a few concerns by a) making the inventory of the full training set public and b) at least attempt to attribute if there is a direct copy (which by their own admission happens about 0.1% of the time). These seem very simple steps they could take, and takes away the "shady behavior" argument.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#5

Post by travisgriggs »

> For its part, Git was designed specifically to make software development distributed without a centralized site.

Just yesterday I had to explain the basic premise/history of Git to a young intern. I had asked him if he was using Git to manage his little pet project the company gave him to play with. “No”, he replied, he didn’t know what the company’s policy was to posting code in public on GitHub. As I explained to him that “git init” was all he needed, no GitHub or even no repository on our local GitLab was necessary, his eyes grew wide: “But how does that work??”

I’ve had to explain this same thing to multiple novice devs of various ages. It baffles me. I consider it one of the greatest ironies of software development today.

It’s like explaining to people that they could just talk to each other using a thousand means, instead of having to communicate by netcasting at each other through some shared social media platform.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#7

Post by happymellon »

uberman wrote: post #3

The impetus for the post is apparently "co-pilot" being a commercial service. I have no dog in this fight, just giving an overview of their main argument.

The main point is that it's a commercial service that doesn't respect other people's licences.

Previously it was free and the noises that GitHub had given made it sound like it wasn't finished. Turns out it was.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#8

Post by happymellon »

Georgelemental wrote: post #4

Quoted post unavailable.

What is it with Americans and their dismissal of other people's concerns as always being "politics".

It totally does break licencing laws, just because Americans think they can change the terms of an agreement and relicense your code because you didn't remove it doesn't make that legal.

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#9

Post by Klathmon »

indoorskier wrote: post #2

This GitHub Copilot thing is pretty polarizing. According to one of the expert papers they sollicited, it's unlikely MSFT/GitHub is breaking any copyright laws. What they're doing does feel icky, and they could have mitigated a few concerns by a) making the inventory of the full training set public and b) at least attempt to attribute if there is a direct copy (which by their own admission happens about 0.1% of the t…

>at least attempt to attribute if there is a direct copy (which by their own admission happens about 0.1% of the time).

IIRC they just block that suggestion if they detect it's a copy now

Re: Give up GitHub: The time has come

#10

Post by pabs3 »

travisgriggs wrote: post #5

> For its part, Git was designed specifically to make software development distributed without a centralized site. Just yesterday I had to explain the basic premise/history of Git to a young intern. I had asked him if he was using Git to manage his little pet project the company gave him to play with. “No”, he replied, he didn’t know what the company’s policy was to posting code in public on GitHub. As I explained to…

Are you saying they use GitHub (via the web editor?) but have never heard of Git? or don't know how Git works? or just don't know the Git CLI? or something else?
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