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We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

githubcopilotlitigation.com

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Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#581

Post by odessacubbage »

adlpz wrote: post #189
nrb wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does anyone have a problem with it, so long as the material it trained on was with explicit permission/license and not potentially in violation of copyright? That's where the line is for it to be suspect IMO.

I guess I'm just afraid that it might not be as good as it is that way. It's a bit like how GPT-3, Stable Diffusion and all those generative models use extensive amounts of copyrighted material in training to get as good as they do. In those cases however the output space is so vast that plagiarism is very unlikely. With code, not so much.

there are literally thousands of years of artwork that fall under public domain, the idea that the dataset isn't big enough to make good images without copyright infringement and attribution laundering is frankly laughable.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#582

Post by charcircuit »

pessimizer wrote: post #510
Aeolun wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe researchers that are used to hunting for publications and attributions. If I’m sharing my code publicly, it’s because I want it to be _used_.

People share proprietary code publicly. And the fact that you're allowed to read a book doesn't (currently) give you the right to copy it and redistribute the copy.

Almost everyone has learned some amount of English by reading copyrighted books.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#583

Post by chillfox »

blackbrokkoli wrote: post #469

I am sorry for not bringing any kind of legal perspective here, but: *Jesus Christ*, I hope I live long enough to see copyright die. Here we are at the cusp of a new paradigm of commanding computers to do stuff for us, right at the beginning of the first AI development which actually impresses me. And we are fucking bickering about how we were cheated out of $0.00034 because our repo from 2015 might have been used fo…

I don't think this is really about the money at all. To me, it looks like this is about consent.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#584

Post by [deleted] »

williamcotton wrote: post #541
TAForObvReasons wrote: post #537

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

If this legal team was interested in this going to trial you think they would have put together a stronger case instead of risking that it won’t be heard. There’s not even a single mention of any established legal doctrines around copyright and software, such as abstract-filter-compare, idea-expression dichotomy, etc.

[deleted]

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#585

Post by bloppe »

zhfliz wrote: post #575
bloppe wrote: post #538

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

anyone can upload someone else's code to GitHub, not just people who can grant such permission.

The end user agreement also says you must have the authority to grant these epic rights to GitHub, i.e. you cannot upload someone else's code. They could probably absolve themselves from responsibility due to your having committed wire fraud in this case. But, alas, IANAL.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#586

Post by anikom15 »

Filligree wrote: post #574
an1sotropy wrote: post #565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You haven’t actually thought through what kind of world it would be if there was no copyright law, have you? I don’t know what your political leanings are, but I’ve met some libertarians who are blissfully naive about the extent to which their world and worldview is buttressed by laws and the governments that enforce them, and your comment reminds me of that.

I'm game. What terrible outcome will we see from a lack of copyright law?

Someone with more money and more resources than you profiting off your work.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#587

Post by chillfox »

obiefernandez wrote: post #485
blackbrokkoli wrote: post #469

I am sorry for not bringing any kind of legal perspective here, but: *Jesus Christ*, I hope I live long enough to see copyright die. Here we are at the cusp of a new paradigm of commanding computers to do stuff for us, right at the beginning of the first AI development which actually impresses me. And we are fucking bickering about how we were cheated out of $0.00034 because our repo from 2015 might have been used fo…

Amen. This lawsuit is sickening me at a “fuck this entire industry” magnitude.

The general attitude of AI researchers/developers is fuck as many other industries as possible, they generally don't care about consent at all. So it's hardly surprising that someone eventually decides to challenge that.

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#588

Post by adriand »

heavyset_go wrote: post #426
metadat wrote: post #404

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To play devil's advocate: Co-Pilot can't reproduce copyrighted work without appropriate user input. Just trying to demonstrate a point- this analogy seems flawed.

If I draw some eyes in Photoshop, it won't automatically draw the Mona Lisa around it for me.

So the problem you have with it is the UI?

Re: We've filed a lawsuit against GitHub Copilot

#589

Post by cheriot »

heavyset_go wrote: post #172
cheriot wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that then reproduces near replica's of my code Copying a few lines is not the same as copying the whole thing. Sharing quotes from a book is not copyright infringement.

If your intent is to create a competing product for profit, chances are that won't be found as fair use, given that determining fair use depends on intent and how the content is used. Using clips from a movie in a movie review is probably fair use. Using clips from a movie in knock-off of that movie for profit? Probably not fair use if it's not a parody. Copilot is not like a movie reviewer using clips to review a mo…

> Copilot is like a production team for a movie taking clips from another movie to make a ripoff of that movie and selling it.

I can't think of a 5 line snippet I've written or read that makes sense to claim ownership of. They don't stand on their own in the way even a 30s movie clip does.

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