The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
1–10 of 314 posts
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#2The article repeatedly treats license and contract as though they are the same, even though the sidebar links to a post that discusses the difference.
A lot of it boils down to whether training an LLM is a breach of copyright of the training materials which is not specific to GPL or open source.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#3GPL and copyright in general don't apply to billionaires, so pretty much a non-topic.
It's just a side cost of doing business, because asking for forgiveness is cheaper and faster than asking for permission.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#4The article repeatedly treats license and contract as though they are the same, even though the sidebar links to a post that discusses the difference. A lot of it boils down to whether training an LLM is a breach of copyright of the training materials which is not specific to GPL or open source.
And the current norm that the trillion dollar companies have lobbied for is that you can train on copyrighted material all you want so that's the reality we are living in. Everything ever published is all theirs.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#5I thought the whole concept of a viral license was legally questionable to begin with. There haven't been cases about this, as far as I know, and GPL virality enforcement has just been done by the community.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#6The article goes deep into these two cases deemed most relevant but really there are a wide swath of similar cases all focused around defining sharper borders than ever around what is essentially the question "exactly when does it become copyright violation" with plenty of seemingly "obvious" answers which quickly conflict with each other.
I also have the feeling it will be much like Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc., much of this won't really be clearly resolved until the end if the decade. I'd also not ve surprised if seemingly very different answers ended up bubbling up in the different cases, driven by the specifics of the domain.
Not a lawyer, just excited to see the outcomes :).
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#7What triggers me is how insistant Claude Code is on adding "co-authored by Claude" in commits, in spite of my settings and an instruction in CLAUDE.md. I wish all these tech bros were as willing to credit the human shoulders on which their products are built. But they'd be much less successful in our current system if they were that kind of people.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#8I thought the whole concept of a viral license was legally questionable to begin with. There haven't been cases about this, as far as I know, and GPL virality enforcement has just been done by the community.
The GPL was tested in court as early as 2006 [1] and plenty of times since. There are no serious doubts about its enforceability.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#9What triggers me is how insistant Claude Code is on adding "co-authored by Claude" in commits, in spite of my settings and an instruction in CLAUDE.md. I wish all these tech bros were as willing to credit the human shoulders on which their products are built. But they'd be much less successful in our current system if they were that kind of people.
Try changing the system prompt or switch to opencode [0] - they allegedly reverse engineered Claude Code, and so the performance you get with Claude models should be very similar to Claude Code.
Re: The current state of the theory that GPL propagates to AI models
#10I thought the whole concept of a viral license was legally questionable to begin with. There haven't been cases about this, as far as I know, and GPL virality enforcement has just been done by the community.
If you don't like the license, then don't accept it.
You are then restricted by copyright just like with any other creation.
If I include the source code of Windows into my product, I can't simply choose to re-license it to say public domain and give it to someone else, the license that I have from Microsoft to allow me to use their code won't let me - it provides restrictions. It's just as "viral" as the GPL.