Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

John Carmack about open source and anti-AI activists

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 515 posts

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

#61

Post by j-bos »

bombcar wrote: post #38
toast0 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no Carmack, but everything I've released as open source is a gift with no strings (unless it was to a project with a restrictive license). A gift with strings isn't exactly a gift. If you take my gift and profit, it doesn't hurt me, there were no strings. Your users presumably benefit from the software I wrote, unless you're using it for evil, but I don't have enough clout to use an only IBM may use it for evil l…

It's interesting that the "natural reaction" to releasing an open source project, have it be successful, and have some Amazon "steal" it (leave the argument aside, that's how people will feel, big company makes money using the gift) is somehow worse than if you work for Big Company, they pay you, and then later use your code to make billions.

Yeah, it's rhymes with people getting mad about pharmacos charging outrageous prices for life saving drugs they developed in order to charge outrageous prices. In both cases (drugs and OSS) it's an ugly process that produces great and greatly uneven value to humanity, but the alternatives are less value overall, even to those on the losing side of the uneven value.

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

#62

Post by SlinkyOnStairs »

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.

> 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.

What's your point here? Because whether or not someone needs income to pay their bills is MASSIVELY relevant to whether or not they have to care about the profit on their work.

The bulk of Open Source maintainers aren't "set for life", and need to get a real job in order to not be homeless.

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

#63

Post by BoredPositron »

GaryBluto wrote: post #23
moogly wrote: post #17

[flagged]

> But Carmack isn't wired for empathy; he has never been. What an utterly pretentious and rude thing to say.

I mean it's the truth. It wasn't necessary to base your argument on it in the context given but still disregarding it with a hand wave is strange. Everyone who worked with him knows people skills and altruism are really not his strongest character traits.

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

#64

Post by nomel »

SirensOfTitan wrote: post #46

In my mind, AI is making a lot of engineers, including Carmack, seem fairly thoughtless. At the other moments in recent history where technology has displaced workers, labor has either had to fight some very bloody battles or had stronger labor organization. Tech workers are highly atomized now, and if you have to work to live, you're negotiating on your own. It seems like Carmack, like a lot of tech people, have for…

> in recent history where technology has displaced workers, labor has either had to fight some very bloody battles or had stronger labor organization

what examples are you thinking of?

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

#65

Post by truted2 »

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.

I agree with you. One counterargument is that producing software was never a path to adoption unless you had distribution and the big companies (OpenAI, Anthropic) have distribution on a scale that individuals will not.

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

#67

Post by fresh_broccoli »

Well, if Carmack wants to give gifts to AI companies then he's free to do it, but it doesn't mean that other people want it too.

I think this debate is mainly about the value of human labor. I guess when you're a millionaire, it's much easier to be excited about human labor losing value.

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

#68

Post by jcmfernandes »

> and the GPL would prevent outright exploitation by our competitors, but those were to allay fears of my partners to allow me to make the gift.

I can understand his stance on AI given this perspective. I have a harder time empathizing his frustrations. Did he also have a hard time coming to terms with the need for AGPL?

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

#69

Post by waynesonfire »

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 source their code do not care about profit.

Ah, how naive. You're not squinting hard enough.

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

#70

Post by ryandvm »

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…

If folks don't want LLMs scanning their codebases we should just make some new OSS licenses. Basically, "GPL/BSD/MIT + You pinky promise not to scan this for machine learning".

Either it works and the AI makers stop stop slurping up OSS or it doesn't hold up in court and shrinkwrap licenses are deemed bullshit. A win/win scenario if you ask me.

Post reply on HN