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We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

githubcopilotlitigation.com

531–540 of 824 posts

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#531
post #270

I’m not a lawyer, but here is why I believe a class action lawsuit is correct; “AI” is just fancy speak for “complex math program”. If I make a program that’s simply given an arbitrary input then, thought math operations, outputs Microsoft copyright code, am I in the clear just because it’s “AI”? I think they would sue the heck out of me if I did that, and I believe the opposite should be true as well. I’m sure my ow…

I read most of the complaint. The only examples of supposed copyright infringement are isEven and isPrime functions. Here's what Copilot gives me in a Typescript file: function isPrime(n: number): boolean { for (let i = 2; i 1; } function isEven(n: number): boolean { return n % 2 === 0; } These are clearly not covered by copyright in the first place. This case is really quite pathetic.

You didn't read the relevant part of the complaint. It starts on document page 14 (PDF page 17). There's a clear footnote:

> Due to the nature of Codex, Copilot, and AI in general, Plaintiffs cannot be certain these examples would produce the same results if attempted following additional trainings of Codex and/or Copilot.

The offending solution from the AI included extra lines that are reasonably understood to come straight from Eloquent JavaScript:

    console.log(isEven(50));
    // → true
    console.log(isEven(75));
    // → false
    console.log(isEven(‐1));
    // → ??

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#532
post #437

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't heard anyone saying that copilot is legal "just because it's AI." That's a pretty bad faith, reductive, and disingenuous representation. The core argument I've seen is that the output is sufficiently transformative and not straight up copying.

> The core argument I've seen is that the output is sufficiently transformative and not straight up copying. An argument that isn't made about any other type of algorithm.

Suppose you own the rights to a jpeg. And I apply a simple algorithm that increments every hex value. So 00 becomes 01 and so on. The gibberish images it spits out would be so different then your original image that you wouldn't have any claim to them at all.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#533
post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't feel like you're being represented, you're free to choose not to be a member of class in the lawsuit.

> If you don't feel like you're being represented, you're free to choose not to be a member of class in the lawsuit. I think you missed this part: > Sure, I personally could opt out of the suit, but that would be utterly meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

That I did, thanks for pointing it out. Phone posting does that.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read most of the complaint. The only examples of supposed copyright infringement are isEven and isPrime functions. Here's what Copilot gives me in a Typescript file: function isPrime(n: number): boolean { for (let i = 2; i 1; } function isEven(n: number): boolean { return n % 2 === 0; } These are clearly not covered by copyright in the first place. This case is really quite pathetic.

You didn't read the relevant part of the complaint. It starts on document page 14 (PDF page 17). There's a clear footnote: > Due to the nature of Codex, Copilot, and AI in general, Plaintiffs cannot be certain these examples would produce the same results if attempted following additional trainings of Codex and/or Copilot. The offending solution from the AI included extra lines that are reasonably understood to come…

Sure, those comments might be considered infringement, but that's from an earlier version of Codex. Copilot does not return that code. The complaint even says so.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think this lawsuit would hinder innovation but it would greatly change it and who owns it. If an AI model is the joint property of all the people who contributed IP to it, it’s a pretty hugely democratic and decentralizing force. It also will incentivise a huge amount of innovation on better, richer data sources for AI. If an AI model isn’t joint property of the IP it learned then it’s a great way to build ex…

If the resource is free and non-rivalrous, what is being extracted?

The resource is not "free": it is provided under a license that attempts to lay out the terms the entity using the resource must comply with in order to get the benefit of using their product; just because this is a non-monetary compensation doesn't mean it is "free".

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#536
I hope MS used a lot of AGPL code to train Copilot… This would be fun.

But no matter how this goes, in case training AI with copyrighted inputs is "fair use" that'll end up as the ultimate "copyright laundry machine" like this "joke" project here:

https://web.archive.org/web/20220104214929/https://fairuseif...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27796124 (302 points, 151 comments)

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You didn't read the relevant part of the complaint. It starts on document page 14 (PDF page 17). There's a clear footnote: > Due to the nature of Codex, Copilot, and AI in general, Plaintiffs cannot be certain these examples would produce the same results if attempted following additional trainings of Codex and/or Copilot. The offending solution from the AI included extra lines that are reasonably understood to come…

Sure, those comments might be considered infringement, but that's from an earlier version of Codex. Copilot does not return that code. The complaint even says so.

There are many public examples of that same effect happening (for example https://twitter.com/mitsuhiko/status/1410886329924194309 ), and the legal team has been soliciting for more examples. Those examples are likely to come out if it does go to trial.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#538
post #270

I’m not a lawyer, but here is why I believe a class action lawsuit is correct; “AI” is just fancy speak for “complex math program”. If I make a program that’s simply given an arbitrary input then, thought math operations, outputs Microsoft copyright code, am I in the clear just because it’s “AI”? I think they would sue the heck out of me if I did that, and I believe the opposite should be true as well. I’m sure my ow…

The problem with the class action lawsuit against GitHub is this: if you host your code on GitHub, it doesn't matter what license you use. Microsoft can do whatever they want with it. You agreed to this by agreeing to their terms and conditions.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#539
post #518
post #270

I’m not a lawyer, but here is why I believe a class action lawsuit is correct; “AI” is just fancy speak for “complex math program”. If I make a program that’s simply given an arbitrary input then, thought math operations, outputs Microsoft copyright code, am I in the clear just because it’s “AI”? I think they would sue the heck out of me if I did that, and I believe the opposite should be true as well. I’m sure my ow…

I agree with you, buy what if you share 1% of a copyright binary file that is completely useless when shared partially, is that infringement?

“Any reproduction in part or as a whole…”

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#540
post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Farmers plant their crops out in the open too. Should Boston Dynamics be allowed to have their robots rob those fields empty and sell the produce without having to at least pay the farmer? They'd be walking and plucking just like any human would be. Some source code might be published but not open source licensed. At least some such code has been taken with complete disregard of their licenses and/or other legal prot…

This is literally the "you wouldn't steal a car" meme. To spell it out: No, this analogy does not hold. "Stealing" data does not deprive the owner of anything, so it should not be treated remotely the same as physical stealing (usually not even of potential revenue, as piracy studies show).

I partially have to concede on that point. The anology could have been better, and I should have put greater emphasis on the massive scale and the lack of recourse for those affected.

Nevertheless, stealing remains illegal so at the very least they have deprived the source code owners of their rights.

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