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Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

theregister.com

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Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#421

Post by Aeolun »

dspillett wrote: post #369
ADeerAppeared wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where it gets ethnically dubious is that: 1. The copilot team rushed to slap a copyright filter on top to keep these verbatim examples from showing up, and now claims they never happen. 2. LLMs are prone to paraphrasing. Just because you filter out verbatim copies doesn't mean there isn't still copyright infringement/plagiarism/whatever you want to call it. The copyright filter is only a legal protection, not a pract…

> The copilot team rushed to slap a copyright filter on top to keep these verbatim examples from showing up, and now claims they never happen. More than that: the fact that they claimed it wasn't possible before adding the filter, to filter out the thing that said wasn't possible. This doesn't help me trust anything else they might say or have already said. My take on that was always: if it isn't possible, then why a…

How do you know they aren’t training it on their internal code?

Since you really need to work hard to make the AI spit out anything verbatim, and you have no knowledge of their internal code, how could you ever prove or deny it?

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#422

Post by Aeolun »

kelnos wrote: post #168
nl wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just because you filter out verbatim copies doesn't mean there isn't still copyright infringement/plagiarism/whatever you want to call it. Actually, it does. The production of the output is what matters here.

If you copy someone else's copyrighted work and then rearrange a few lines and rename a few things, you're probably still infringing.

If you’ve copied three lines and rearrange and reword them, there’s little infringement left.

If you copy a whole book and do the same, there’s still lines-3 infringement left.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#423

Post by Aeolun »

8organicbits wrote: post #78
falcolas wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the value of an "authentic" painting of the Starry Night (or more realistically the value of something forged in, say, Samwise Didier's style) I can't agree with "no one". I have to imagine that it's likely quite popular to sell AI generated art that mimics or copies existing works.

I guess there's always a greater fool, but forging an oil painting using AI digital images seems pretty far fetched.

You can paint over the printed image?

Not that it’d look anything like the artist you are copying, but it’s a fun idea.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#424

Post by archontes »

bawolff wrote: post #134
archontes wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not in copyright. The work speaks for itself, and the function of code is not a copyrightable aspect.

The intent of the work can matter when determining if de minimis applies as well as fair use.

Part of my point is that fair use doesn't apply.

Training a model doesn't involve reproducing a copyrighted work, preparing a derivative work, distributing that work, or performing that work.

Fair use isn't required because none of the exclusive rights afforded by copyright apply.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#425

Post by archontes »

giamma wrote: post #285
archontes wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might not get your ass kicked. Copyright doesn't protect function, to the point where the court will assess the degree to which the style of the code can be separated from the function. In the even that they aren't separable, the code is not copyrightable. https://www.wardandsmith.com/articles/supreme-court-announce... https://easlerlaw.com/software-computer-code-copyrighted#:~:...

Software like Blackduck or Scanoss is designed to identify exactly that type of behaviour. It is used very often to scan closed source software and to check whether it contains snippets that are copied from open source with incompatible licenses (e.g. GPL). To be able to do so, these softwares build a syntax tree of what your code snippet is, and compare the tree structure with similar trees in open source software w…

And that's all well and good, but that code that asserts to be protected by GPL still has to stand the abstraction-filtration-comparison test.

The plain fact is that you can claim copyright on plenty of stuff that isn't copyrightable.

Consider AI model weights at all: they're the result of an automatic process and contain no human expression; almost by definition, model weights shouldn't be copyrightable, but people are still releasing "open source" models with supposed licenses.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#426

Post by Qwertious »

davrosthedalek wrote: post #339
Qwertious wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not the person you responded to, but: >So I'm asking genuinely: what's your plan? What's the A to B if you could pass a law tomorrow? Patreon (or liberapay etc). Take a look at youtube: so many creators are actively saying "youtube doesn't pay the bills, if you like us then please support us on Patreon". Patreon works. Some of the time, at least - just like copyright. Also crowdsourcing (e.g. Kickstarter), which work…

How many subscribers on patreon are there because the creators provides pay-walled extra content? How many would remain if that pay-walled content would be mirrored directly by youtube or on youtube? Crowdsourcing might work better, but how many would donate to a game where, instead of getting it cheaper as a kickstarter supporter, they could get free after it is released?

I completely forgot about Patreon's paywalled content. Plenty of channels don't have any, though, so I don't think it's that important.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#427

Post by ranger_danger »

cmcaleer wrote: post #419
giamma wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software like Blackduck or Scanoss is designed to identify exactly that type of behaviour. It is used very often to scan closed source software and to check whether it contains snippets that are copied from open source with incompatible licenses (e.g. GPL). To be able to do so, these softwares build a syntax tree of what your code snippet is, and compare the tree structure with similar trees in open source software w…

But there has to be a threshold. If a GPL project contains a function which takes two variables and returns x+y, and I have functionally identical code in a project I made with an incompatible license, it is obviously absurd to sue me.

You're right, there is. The threshold is whatever a court decides is "substantial similarity" in that particular case. But there's no way to know that ahead of time as the interpretation/decision is subjective.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#428

Post by freejazz »

copywrong2 wrote: post #323
adra wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without copyright, entire industries would've been dead a long time ago, including many movies, games, books, tv, music, etc. Just because their lobbies tend to push the boundary of copyright into the absurd doesn't mean these industries aren't worth saving. There should be actually respectful lawmakers who seek for a balance of public and commercial interests.

Yeah many industries like: - Big Corps that buy IP - Patent Trolls - Companies that fuck over artists

Why would anyone make video games if they couldn't make money from selling them?

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#429

Post by freejazz »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #281
eropple wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all true, and in a vacuum I agree with it. There's a pretty core problem with these kinds of assertions, though: people have to make rent. Never have I seen a substantiative, pass-the-sniff-test argument for how to make practical this system when your authors and your artists need to eat in a system of modern capital. So I'm asking genuinely: what's your plan? What's the A to B if you could pass a law tomorro…

> What's the A to B if you could pass a law tomorrow? Top priority: UBI, together with a world in which there's so much surplus productivity that things can survive and thrive without having "how does this make huge amounts of money" as its top priority to optimize for. Apart from that: Conventions/concerts/festivals (tickets to a unique live event with a crowd of other fans), merchandise (pay for a physical object),…

> UBI, together with a world in which there's so much surplus productivity that things can survive and thrive without having "how does this make huge amounts of money" as its top priority to optimize for.

The poster didn't posit it as "how does this make huge amounts of money," they asked how copyright authors are supposed to pay their rent in your scenario. Your solution of course, has nothing to do with copyright policy.

Re: Judge dismisses DMCA copyright claim in GitHub Copilot suit

#430

Post by freejazz »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #381
eropple wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, this is what I was expecting. I have no love for Disney et al but I think that this is dire (aside from UBI, which would be great but is fictional without a large-scale shift in American culture). "Everybody else gets paid for the work they do; you get paid for things around the work you do, if you're lucky " is a way to expect creatives to live that, to put a point on it, always ends up being "for thee, but no…

The current model is "most people get paid for the work they do, but you get paid for people copying work you've already done", which already seems asymmetric. This would change the model to "people get paid for the work they do, and not paid again for copying work they've already done".

They don't have to copy work, they can make their own work!
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