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Copilot edited an ad into my PR

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221–230 of 704 posts

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#221
post #182

I feel like there is an even more important crisis that is being masked over here: https://github.blog/changelog/2026-03-25-updates-to-our-priv... New Section J — AI features, training, and your data: We’ve added a dedicated section that brings all AI-related terms together in one place. Unless you opt out, you grant GitHub and our affiliates a license to collect and use your inputs (e.g., prompts and code context) a…

OpenAI/ChatGPT/Codex, Anthropic/Claude and Google/Gemini all do this.

> OpenAI/ChatGPT/Codex, Anthropic/Claude and Google/Gemini all do this.

1. Everyone doing this doesn't mean it's acceptable.

2. Google Gemini explicitly says right under the chat box if you are a paid subscriber (Workspace):

     Your  chats aren’t used to improve our models. Gemini is AI and can make mistakes.
Not sure about the others.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#222

This "ad" is not exactly new. Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this. https://github.com/PlagueHO/plagueho.github.io/pull/24#issue... Copilot has been adding "(emoji) (tip)" thing since May 2025. GitHub copilot was released in May 2025, so basically it has had an ad since beginning. There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. https://github.com/search?q=%…

If Microsoft is willing to put ads into your PRs via Copilot like this, imagine what they could put into your codebase itself with Copilot.

Or what Microsoft could do, run, install, etc on/from your computer while running their Copilot agents.

This is the same company that puts ads in your start menu and reinserts them with Windows updates even if you manually removed them.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Regarding Claude: As I have unticked the "Help improve Claude" checkbox, I was under the impression that Claude did not do this. https://privacy.claude.com/en/articles/10023555-how-do-you-u...

You can opt out with all three (Codex, Claude, Copilot) except for Gemini

> except for Gemini

This is incorrect. If you are a paid subscriber, Gemini explicitly states it doesn't use your data to train its models.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#225

This "ad" is not exactly new. Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this. https://github.com/PlagueHO/plagueho.github.io/pull/24#issue... Copilot has been adding "(emoji) (tip)" thing since May 2025. GitHub copilot was released in May 2025, so basically it has had an ad since beginning. There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. https://github.com/search?q=%…

If Microsoft is willing to put ads into your PRs via Copilot like this, imagine what they could put into your codebase itself with Copilot. Or what Microsoft could do, run, install, etc on/from your computer while running their Copilot agents. This is the same company that puts ads in your start menu and reinserts them with Windows updates even if you manually removed them.

Imagine just having the copilot extension installed will be an excuse at some point for them to steal our code to train their AI models. Not sure if they already do this.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#226
post #55

Well, you are not alone: https://github.com/search?q=%22%E2%9A%A1+Quickly+spin+up+cop...

Interesting indeed. I wonder how long GitHub as a platform will be there as a viable option. Anyone who remembers SourceForge?

It will probably remain as a platform for a very long time.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#227

This "ad" is not exactly new. Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this. https://github.com/PlagueHO/plagueho.github.io/pull/24#issue... Copilot has been adding "(emoji) (tip)" thing since May 2025. GitHub copilot was released in May 2025, so basically it has had an ad since beginning. There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. https://github.com/search?q=%…

> Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. No, they don't. > edit: I think it's an ad too. Everyone would think so, except for MS. You think a company with a $2.65 trillion market cap and an army of marketing professionals doesn't realize that what they're doing here is an ad, and didn't implement it intentionally as such? That's not even remotely plausible. In the quantum multiverse which contains all ph…

> company with a $2.65 trillion market cap and an army of marketing professionals

That's one reason I think they would argue it's not an ad. Another reasons are "recommendations" and "tips" and "suggestions" in my windows.

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#228

This "ad" is not exactly new. Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this. https://github.com/PlagueHO/plagueho.github.io/pull/24#issue... Copilot has been adding "(emoji) (tip)" thing since May 2025. GitHub copilot was released in May 2025, so basically it has had an ad since beginning. There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. https://github.com/search?q=%…

> I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this.

I'm part of Raycast, we didn't know about it, learnt about it here

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#229
post #187

This "ad" is not exactly new. Looks like MS thinks it's a "tip" rather than an ad. I don't know if Raycast team even knows about this. https://github.com/PlagueHO/plagueho.github.io/pull/24#issue... Copilot has been adding "(emoji) (tip)" thing since May 2025. GitHub copilot was released in May 2025, so basically it has had an ad since beginning. There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. https://github.com/search?q=%…

> There are 1.5m of these things in GitHub. You’re pointing to something entirely different: those are Copilot-created PRs. They can include anything Copilot wants to include. People using the Copilot PR feature know what they’re buying into. OP is about Copilot doing post-hoc editing of a human-created PR to include an ad, allegedly without knowledge or approval of the creator (well I assume they did give their team…

I wanted to say that they are same because they are "copilot-written self promotions", but I get your point.

Also I found this: https://github.com/Laravel-Backpack/medialibrary-uploaders/p... it seems like copilot added an ad on behalf of the user at Nov 2025(see last edit).

Re: Copilot edited an ad into my PR

#230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible they are safeguarding for possible future changes of copyright law that would give Microsoft copyright over all Copilot contributions. This may sound paranoid but, as far as I know, exactly who counts as an "AI operator", how much authorship an "AI operator" has, and who gets copyright, or whether AI contributions are even in the public domain, are legally untested and unclear issues.

The US Copyright Office has said that AI output from human prompting is not copyrightable. There are caveats, but iterating on prompts results in output that's nobody's IP. Because it's nobody's IP, Microsoft is already in a position where they could just use, remix and/or distribute that output however they want to today.

This is a wild misinterpretation of that ruling.
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