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John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

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Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#51

Post by nomel »

truncate wrote: post #28
gruez wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think one of the more prominent issues folks take with mass training on OSS is that the companies doing it are now profiting for having done it. What makes this more objectionable than profiting off open source projects by using it directly? eg. tech giants using linux as a server OS, rather than having to pay microsoft thousands per server for a windows server license? With the original GPL, they don't even have…

More people use Linux, more recognition Linux itself get which directly or indirectly gets some more donations, developers etc. With AI, the link is not clear at all. Its just pure consumption. There is no recognition.

> There is no recognition

I've never written or contributed to open source code with this being the goal. I never even considered this is why people do it.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#52

Post by bombcar »

nkassis wrote: post #2

I've been wondering, Stallman was driven to create free software after an incident trying to get the code for firmware on his office printer. I'm wondering if today, would he have just reverse engineered it with AI? Edit: I'm also thinking of what he did rewriting all of Symbolics code for LISP machines (similar to the person that accidentally hacked all vacuum of a certain manufacturer trying to gain access to his r…

Stallman rarely cared about the rights of the writer, even reading the GPL makes it clear that it's all about the rights of the user.

In a world without copyright, code obfuscation, or compliers, where everything ran interpreted as it was written and nobody could do anything to you if you modified it, Stallman would be perfectly content.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#53

Post by barrowclift »

boredtofears wrote: post #13
OSaMaBiNLoGiN wrote: post #4

I think one of the more prominent issues folks take with mass training on OSS is that the companies doing it are now profiting for having done it. In his follow-up post he talks about him open sourcing old games as a gift, and he doesn't much care how people receive that gift, just that they do. He doesn't acknowledge that Anthropic, OpenAI, etc, are profiting while the original authors are not. The original authors…

Its a lot less odd when you remember that he's running an AI company himself.

I'm seeing your comment's downvoted, I'd like to hear from those that did as to why. Doesn't his current venture with his AGI startup Keen Technologies deserve being called out as a potential conflict of interest, here?

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#54

Post by contagiousflow »

dysoco wrote: post #41
gensym wrote: post #14

I find it pretty simple: - OSS is valuable for decentralizing power and influence - AI as it is being developed is likely to centralize it

> AI as it is being developed is likely to centralize it Depends on how you see it. I know many people building oss, local alternatives to enterprise software for specific industries that cost thousands of dollars all thanks to AI. If everyone can produce software now and at a much complex and bigger scale, it's much easier to create decentralized and free alternatives to long-standing closed projects.

You do understand that the above comment is talking about how the use and reliance on LLMs is what centralizes power right? It's great people can build these tools, but if the means to build these tools are controlled by three central companies where does that leave us?

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#55

Post by sowbug »

OSaMaBiNLoGiN wrote: post #4

I think one of the more prominent issues folks take with mass training on OSS is that the companies doing it are now profiting for having done it. In his follow-up post he talks about him open sourcing old games as a gift, and he doesn't much care how people receive that gift, just that they do. He doesn't acknowledge that Anthropic, OpenAI, etc, are profiting while the original authors are not. The original authors…

It's also odd to release software under a license allowing commercial use if the authors didn't want that.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#56

Post by 28304283409234 »

elteto wrote: post #37
moogly wrote: post #17

[flagged]

Attack the argument not the man. Whether he is set for life or not has nothing to do _in this context_, since, presumably, people who open source their code do not care about profit.

Open Sourcing software has _nothing_ to do with 'gratis'. Can't believe this still needs repeating in 2026.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#58

Post by john_strinlai »

nomel wrote: post #51
truncate wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More people use Linux, more recognition Linux itself get which directly or indirectly gets some more donations, developers etc. With AI, the link is not clear at all. Its just pure consumption. There is no recognition.

> There is no recognition I've never written or contributed to open source code with this being the goal. I never even considered this is why people do it.

it has never been my explicit goal. but i have certainly enjoyed the rewards of recognition (e.g. i was able to lean on a successful project of mine to help land a nice consulting gig) and it would be silly to ignore that.

(edit: the comment i replied to was edited to be more a statement about themselves rather than a question about other developers, so my comment probably makes less sense now)

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#59

Post by sobiolite »

OSaMaBiNLoGiN wrote: post #4

I think one of the more prominent issues folks take with mass training on OSS is that the companies doing it are now profiting for having done it. In his follow-up post he talks about him open sourcing old games as a gift, and he doesn't much care how people receive that gift, just that they do. He doesn't acknowledge that Anthropic, OpenAI, etc, are profiting while the original authors are not. The original authors…

Are you suggesting that authors didn't know or understand that commercial exploitation of their OSS contributions was possible? If so, that is a complete misrepresentation of history. There has always been open-source licenses that disallowed commercial use. Authors have chosen not to use them, and instead chose licenses, such as MIT/GPL, that allowed commercial use. And there has always been commercial use of OSS. Big companies, small companies, tech companies, oil and gas companies, weapons manufacturers, banks, hardware companies, etc. They all use OSS and they all make a profit from it, without giving anything back to the people who originally wrote it. That's not an edge case or an unexpected consequence, it a fundamental tenet of free (as in freedom) software: You do not get to choose who uses it, or how they use it.

Re: John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

#60

Post by radlad »

elteto wrote: post #37
moogly wrote: post #17

[flagged]

Attack the argument not the man. Whether he is set for life or not has nothing to do _in this context_, since, presumably, people who open source their code do not care about profit.

> people who open source their code do not care about profit

Not only are there businesses built around open-source work, but it used to be widely-accepted that publishing open-source software was a good way to land a paying gig as a junior.

I think that whether you need to continue working to afford to live is very relevant to discussions about AI.

Profits don't need to be direct - and licenses are chosen based on a user's particular open-source goals. AI does not respect code's original licensing.

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