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If you open-sourced code and allowed it to be used for commercial purposes, I don't see the point of being pissy about Github using it, I'm saying this as someo

If you open-sourced code and allowed it to be used for commercial purposes, I don't see the point of being pissy about Github using it, I'm saying this as someone who's written quite a lot of MIT code. (And charging for a product which adds value to your developer experience and needs money to be run is not a bad thing)

SamWhited 5y ago
If you write MIT code you expect them not to strip your license out in derivative works. This is exactly what license are for and GitHub is blatantly violating it while people applaud.
- dopaminefasting 5y ago
  Maybe read the MIT license before you grab the pitchforks: "The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all COPIES OR SUBSTANTIAL PORTIONS of the Software." Reusing a snippet doesn't require reproducing the MIT license. People who publish MIT software know they're basically giving their code out with basically no strings attached. However, GitHub should be careful with the GPL variety.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - JBorrow 5y ago
    SUBSTANTIAL PORTIONS can mean the core five lines of some key algorithm buried deep in a 1000 line wrapper library with a bunch of language wrappers.
  - arp242 5y ago
    What counts as a "substantial portion"? Personally I'd say that a function is substantial, whereas one or two lines would not be.
    - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
      We can argue that point, but it seems githib in no way is even aware of how substantial their copying is
    - jacobsenscott 5y ago
      I write a lot of one or two line functions though.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    The problem here is that a person using this automated tool is not being given the required information in order to decide whether the code they are re-using is a "substantial portion" of the software it's taken from; in fact, they aren't even being told they're re-using existing code at all. This does not relieve the person using the code of the responsibility to make that determination, so anyone who is re-using code shown to them by this automated tool is doing it without having fulfilled their responsibility under the license. The fact that they don't know they are doing this, because the tool is not telling them, doesn't change that. > People who publish MIT software know they're basically giving their code out with basically no strings attached. No, they aren't. The license has terms. Using an automated tool that doesn't tell you when you are re-using existing licensed code, or whether your re-use is within the terms of the license, doesn't mean you can just ignore the license. It means you're re-using code without knowing whether or not you're violating a license.
  - chx 5y ago
    > Reusing a snippet doesn't require reproducing the MIT license. In light of Google v. Oracle going as far as the Supreme Court I find your confidence in this quite astonishing.
  - eesmith 5y ago
    I don't interpret "substantial" here as affecting the 'de minimis' requirement for infringement, as that would require other language. I'm pretty sure every court will instead interpret the word "substantial" in the MIT license as referring to the concept of "substantial similarity", which must be demonstrated in any copyright infringement case - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substantial_similarity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substantial_similarity I distribute software under the MIT. "Basically no strings" != "no strings". I expect attribution for any derived program which has substantial similarity to my software. I regard the presence of the word 'substantial' to indicate that the license applies to even modified forms of the software. As that Wikipedia link points out: > Under the doctrine of substantial similarity, a work can be found to infringe copyright even if the wording of text has been changed or visual or audible elements are altered
hbz65 5y ago
“Free and open source, assuming I approve of the usage” is a common sentiment among people who paste Apache or MIT and don’t think about the ramifications. It’s increasingly common. I think this situation is slightly more complex but that sentiment is at the heart of a lot of pushback against things like this.
- dopaminefasting 5y ago
  All the people in this thread angry that GitHub is using MIT software in a way permitted by its license... depressing. The MIT license doesn't require attribution for small snippets, only for full copies or substantial portions.
  - fartcannon 5y ago
    As others have already told you in this thread, substantial portions can mean the few lines of significant algorithm wrapped in boiler plate. So either way, Microsoft would have to prove the MIT code was not substantial.
- iotku 5y ago
  Dev: "Anyone can use my code for any purpose including commercial purposes." $BigCorp: "I want to use to use Dev's code for commercial purposes as he has explicitly granted me the right to do so." Dev: "Wait, no not like that." As much as I am a proponent of permissive licenses (my favorite is the wtfpl), you have to pick your license wisely especially if you're going to be picky about usage (Be it by $BigCorp, government agencies, or other companies that you might not be fond of). If you really want "full control" over your code you have to make it proprietary.
  - mcbits 5y ago
    This is why I think AGPL is a reasonable default for personal projects where the dev doesn't want to fuss over licenses or sue anyone, but would be uncomfortable with $BigCorp exploiting their work. Even though it doesn't explicity prohibit them from using it, it tends (or tended) to have that effect.
Retr0id 5y ago
MIT licensed code must still be distributed with a copy of the license.
chartreusek 5y ago
Sure, but there's still the license at play here. It's not like they trained it only on public domain/CC0 code. What happens when it verbatim outputs a significant amount of code that was originally MIT, or BSD, or GPL licensed without the appropriate attribution. It can create unintended copyright violations and potentially open people using it up to liability.
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  So sue them and a court opinion can demonstrate where the line is and how much code can be replicated before attribution is required (and the product can be refined to ensure compliance). Innovation should push boundaries.
  - detaro 5y ago
    They could push boundaries and publish one trained on all of Microsofts internal source code. Would for me be a great demonstration that they believe the "it's fair use and not violating copyright on the training data" argument.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - fartcannon 5y ago
      It's more likely they'd sue someone who used it to develop something that ate into their lunch by saying it infringed on one of their 'secret' Linux patents they sabre rattle about every now and then.
  - lc9er 5y ago
    Are you equipped to fight a protracted legal battle with Microsoft? Neither is anyone else.
  - joe_the_user 5y ago
    The product is already dead. It's not just Microsoft that would be violating the license but any company using the application and Microsoft can't shield them.
seph-reed 5y ago
Frankly, I think the reason people are upset is because a tool that once revolved around sharing work with others has been bought by a super giant corporation and then all of that sharing is being turned into a means of putting the people who shared out of work. Or in the very least, cutting their salaries dramatically.
- deleted 5y ago
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- deleted 5y ago
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- richardfey 5y ago
  How do you see this technology putting people out of work or having their salaries cut dramatically? I do not write any code that could be found and copy/pasted from somewhere online.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
hmfrh 5y ago
> If you open-sourced code and allowed it to be used for commercial purposes Uploading it to Github does not transfer ownership or imply allowances for any use. If you upload it without a license it is a copyright violation to copy the code. Even with an MIT license it is a copyright violation to copy the code without attribution. > I don't see the point of being pissy about Github using it, I'm saying this as someone who's written quite a lot of MIT code. People are probably angry because this is yet another case of a big multinational corporation abusing unclear or difficult to enforce legislation for profit.
- jwalton 5y ago
  > Even with an MIT license it is a copyright violation to copy the code without attribution. That was my take originally, but apparently this is not as cut and dry as you may think: https://www.technollama.co.uk/is-githubs-copilot-potentially-infringing-copyright https://www.technollama.co.uk/is-githubs-copilot-potentially...
  - neolog 5y ago
    > People share code for the betterment of society, and while copyleft used to be popular early on, the software industry has been moving towards less problematic and more permissive licences. The spirit of open source is to share code, and make it possible to use it to train machine learning. It sounds like this writer doesn't understand the point of the GPL or the distinction between free software and open source. Also quite a crude historical perspective given the increasing number of major projects licensed virally. Claiming that MITL's popularity justifies pirating GPL code makes no sense.
    - insulanus 5y ago
      > the software industry has been moving towards less problematic and more permissive licences [sic] ... less "problematic" for who, exactly? That is conveniently left out.
      - 5y ago
matsemann 5y ago
> If you.. But we didn't.
firebaze 5y ago
Downvoted. There's a difference between "commercial purpose" and "global player", and Microsoft crossed another line. One of many.
ghoward 5y ago
All of my open source licenses require attribution, but Copilot does not give that attribution. So while my code is open source, Copilot is still violating the open source license. Just because it's open source doesn't mean there are not any terms that must be abided by. I believe that gives me the right to be mad and to demand they fix their violations, one way or another.
bphogan 5y ago
I think you're missing my point. I have tons of MIT code out there, including a node.js project used by lots of companies. I don't care about people using my code for money because I open sourced it under a permissive license. So I'm not really objecting to that. But what's bothering me about this is that it's not a small company doing this. It's a company that's got crazy amounts of cash, who has been trying to trade on a "we're nice now and we love open source" image in the last few years, now taking all the open source code and balling it up in a closed-source app they will charge us for. I'd be fine if I got to use it for free, extend it to whatever editing platform I like through its open API, and it was a part of an open project. But right now it looks like they'll charge, and that bugs me.
jeroenhd 5y ago
Open source code still has a license. That license may or may not require distributing the license along with the code. MIT may allow distribution without a license unless the code share is significant, but reusing GPL3 is a no-go for commercial companies. The Apache 2 license allows for commercial use, but has implications for the way you can enforce your software patents. It also requires distributing the license file along with your application. Complaining that companies use the software you told the world was free to use without restriction is dumb. However, not everyone gives away their software for free without restrictions. The fact that Github isn't respecting those licenses is a much bigger problem. The tool autocompleting some random guy's personal information because he uploaded his blog to Github is highly problematic. The idea of using permissively licensed code to train an AI is not bad, but some human with knowledge of software licenses would need to pre-select those projects. If all code came from one of those "do whatever the fuck you want" licenses, then there wouldn't be a problem. I'd consider it to be a great product and have no issue paying a fee. There's a huge market for a Copilot product, but this iteration just.. isn't it.
- jefftk 5y ago
  > reusing GPL3 is a no-go for commercial companies The GPL is completely compatible with commercial use. You just need to share modifications to the source with anyone you share the binary with. Many tech companies make extensive use of GPL software, and since they are not providing binaries to their end users they don't even have to share their changes to the source. Even the AGPL, which does require you to share the source with users, still completely allows commercial use (though not compatible with as many business models).
  - jeroenhd 5y ago
    If you include GPL3 code, your code also effectively also becomes GPL3 licensed. This isn't a problem for companies producing GPL3 software, of course, but most companies keep their source code to themselves. True, the web loophole is a way around this, assuming the GPL'd code isn't part of the compiled/minified/integrated frontend Javascript libraries that gets sent to the client (because then you have the exact same problem). It's not that commercial use is prohibited by GPL3, it's more that most businesses do not want to risk accidentally releasing a version of their software that requires them to share all source code to that version. And even if you're producing open source software, GPL3 might still be a problem because of incompatible licenses (see ZFS for an example) if you don't own _all_ the copyright so you can dual-license your software.
brutal_chaos_ 5y ago
Let's say your code on GitHub is not opensourced. Do we know it wasn't used for training?
jrm4 5y ago
Once again, Stallman (will have been) right. Github/Microsoft is going to take your code, and then cut off your access to it. This is what the GPL was designed to fight, so they're going to try it this way instead. Those who do not learn history yadda yadda.
- jefftk 5y ago
  How does this cut off our access to the code?
  - jrm4 5y ago
    Someone's GPL'd code will "strongly inspire" someone elses proprietary (or otherwise "controlled") code down the line, and there won't be much recourse. Remember, the GPL isn't fundamentally about "enforcing licenses," it's a tool that reverses the usual power of copyright for a higher goal of "software freedom."
licenseauth 5y ago
> quite a lot of MIT code Where is this MIT licensed codes of yours, because it definitely is not on your github.
Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
Has GitHub agreed that it scraps based on license of the repository? If so then what about private repositories with a permissible license but not been made public for what ever reason. What about those projects whose dependencies has permissible license but main repo doesn't? Can GitHub just go oops! I think the point that so much confusion exists regarding their product & possible violation of user's trust is a valid reason to be pissy about.

SamWhited 5y ago

If you write MIT code you expect them not to strip your license out in derivative works. This is exactly what license are for and GitHub is blatantly violating it while people applaud.

dopaminefasting 5y ago
Maybe read the MIT license before you grab the pitchforks: "The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all COPIES OR SUBSTANTIAL PORTIONS of the Software." Reusing a snippet doesn't require reproducing the MIT license. People who publish MIT software know they're basically giving their code out with basically no strings attached. However, GitHub should be careful with the GPL variety.
- deleted 5y ago
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- JBorrow 5y ago
  SUBSTANTIAL PORTIONS can mean the core five lines of some key algorithm buried deep in a 1000 line wrapper library with a bunch of language wrappers.
- arp242 5y ago
  What counts as a "substantial portion"? Personally I'd say that a function is substantial, whereas one or two lines would not be.
  - ClumsyPilot 5y ago
    We can argue that point, but it seems githib in no way is even aware of how substantial their copying is
  - jacobsenscott 5y ago
    I write a lot of one or two line functions though.
- pdonis 5y ago
  The problem here is that a person using this automated tool is not being given the required information in order to decide whether the code they are re-using is a "substantial portion" of the software it's taken from; in fact, they aren't even being told they're re-using existing code at all. This does not relieve the person using the code of the responsibility to make that determination, so anyone who is re-using code shown to them by this automated tool is doing it without having fulfilled their responsibility under the license. The fact that they don't know they are doing this, because the tool is not telling them, doesn't change that. > People who publish MIT software know they're basically giving their code out with basically no strings attached. No, they aren't. The license has terms. Using an automated tool that doesn't tell you when you are re-using existing licensed code, or whether your re-use is within the terms of the license, doesn't mean you can just ignore the license. It means you're re-using code without knowing whether or not you're violating a license.
- chx 5y ago
  > Reusing a snippet doesn't require reproducing the MIT license. In light of Google v. Oracle going as far as the Supreme Court I find your confidence in this quite astonishing.
- eesmith 5y ago
  I don't interpret "substantial" here as affecting the 'de minimis' requirement for infringement, as that would require other language. I'm pretty sure every court will instead interpret the word "substantial" in the MIT license as referring to the concept of "substantial similarity", which must be demonstrated in any copyright infringement case - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substantial_similarity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substantial_similarity I distribute software under the MIT. "Basically no strings" != "no strings". I expect attribution for any derived program which has substantial similarity to my software. I regard the presence of the word 'substantial' to indicate that the license applies to even modified forms of the software. As that Wikipedia link points out: > Under the doctrine of substantial similarity, a work can be found to infringe copyright even if the wording of text has been changed or visual or audible elements are altered

hbz65 5y ago

“Free and open source, assuming I approve of the usage” is a common sentiment among people who paste Apache or MIT and don’t think about the ramifications. It’s increasingly common. I think this situation is slightly more complex but that sentiment is at the heart of a lot of pushback against things like this.

dopaminefasting 5y ago
All the people in this thread angry that GitHub is using MIT software in a way permitted by its license... depressing. The MIT license doesn't require attribution for small snippets, only for full copies or substantial portions.
- fartcannon 5y ago
  As others have already told you in this thread, substantial portions can mean the few lines of significant algorithm wrapped in boiler plate. So either way, Microsoft would have to prove the MIT code was not substantial.
iotku 5y ago
Dev: "Anyone can use my code for any purpose including commercial purposes." $BigCorp: "I want to use to use Dev's code for commercial purposes as he has explicitly granted me the right to do so." Dev: "Wait, no not like that." As much as I am a proponent of permissive licenses (my favorite is the wtfpl), you have to pick your license wisely especially if you're going to be picky about usage (Be it by $BigCorp, government agencies, or other companies that you might not be fond of). If you really want "full control" over your code you have to make it proprietary.
- mcbits 5y ago
  This is why I think AGPL is a reasonable default for personal projects where the dev doesn't want to fuss over licenses or sue anyone, but would be uncomfortable with $BigCorp exploiting their work. Even though it doesn't explicity prohibit them from using it, it tends (or tended) to have that effect.

Retr0id 5y ago

MIT licensed code must still be distributed with a copy of the license.

chartreusek 5y ago

Sure, but there's still the license at play here. It's not like they trained it only on public domain/CC0 code. What happens when it verbatim outputs a significant amount of code that was originally MIT, or BSD, or GPL licensed without the appropriate attribution. It can create unintended copyright violations and potentially open people using it up to liability.

toomuchtodo 5y ago
So sue them and a court opinion can demonstrate where the line is and how much code can be replicated before attribution is required (and the product can be refined to ensure compliance). Innovation should push boundaries.
- detaro 5y ago
  They could push boundaries and publish one trained on all of Microsofts internal source code. Would for me be a great demonstration that they believe the "it's fair use and not violating copyright on the training data" argument.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - fartcannon 5y ago
    It's more likely they'd sue someone who used it to develop something that ate into their lunch by saying it infringed on one of their 'secret' Linux patents they sabre rattle about every now and then.
- lc9er 5y ago
  Are you equipped to fight a protracted legal battle with Microsoft? Neither is anyone else.
- joe_the_user 5y ago
  The product is already dead. It's not just Microsoft that would be violating the license but any company using the application and Microsoft can't shield them.

seph-reed 5y ago

Frankly, I think the reason people are upset is because a tool that once revolved around sharing work with others has been bought by a super giant corporation and then all of that sharing is being turned into a means of putting the people who shared out of work. Or in the very least, cutting their salaries dramatically.

deleted 5y ago
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deleted 5y ago
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richardfey 5y ago
How do you see this technology putting people out of work or having their salaries cut dramatically? I do not write any code that could be found and copy/pasted from somewhere online.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

hmfrh 5y ago

> If you open-sourced code and allowed it to be used for commercial purposes Uploading it to Github does not transfer ownership or imply allowances for any use. If you upload it without a license it is a copyright violation to copy the code. Even with an MIT license it is a copyright violation to copy the code without attribution. > I don't see the point of being pissy about Github using it, I'm saying this as someone who's written quite a lot of MIT code. People are probably angry because this is yet another case of a big multinational corporation abusing unclear or difficult to enforce legislation for profit.

jwalton 5y ago
> Even with an MIT license it is a copyright violation to copy the code without attribution. That was my take originally, but apparently this is not as cut and dry as you may think: https://www.technollama.co.uk/is-githubs-copilot-potentially-infringing-copyright https://www.technollama.co.uk/is-githubs-copilot-potentially...
- neolog 5y ago
  > People share code for the betterment of society, and while copyleft used to be popular early on, the software industry has been moving towards less problematic and more permissive licences. The spirit of open source is to share code, and make it possible to use it to train machine learning. It sounds like this writer doesn't understand the point of the GPL or the distinction between free software and open source. Also quite a crude historical perspective given the increasing number of major projects licensed virally. Claiming that MITL's popularity justifies pirating GPL code makes no sense.
  - insulanus 5y ago
    > the software industry has been moving towards less problematic and more permissive licences [sic] ... less "problematic" for who, exactly? That is conveniently left out.
    - 5y ago

matsemann 5y ago

> If you.. But we didn't.

firebaze 5y ago

Downvoted. There's a difference between "commercial purpose" and "global player", and Microsoft crossed another line. One of many.

ghoward 5y ago

All of my open source licenses require attribution, but Copilot does not give that attribution. So while my code is open source, Copilot is still violating the open source license. Just because it's open source doesn't mean there are not any terms that must be abided by. I believe that gives me the right to be mad and to demand they fix their violations, one way or another.

bphogan 5y ago

I think you're missing my point. I have tons of MIT code out there, including a node.js project used by lots of companies. I don't care about people using my code for money because I open sourced it under a permissive license. So I'm not really objecting to that. But what's bothering me about this is that it's not a small company doing this. It's a company that's got crazy amounts of cash, who has been trying to trade on a "we're nice now and we love open source" image in the last few years, now taking all the open source code and balling it up in a closed-source app they will charge us for. I'd be fine if I got to use it for free, extend it to whatever editing platform I like through its open API, and it was a part of an open project. But right now it looks like they'll charge, and that bugs me.

jeroenhd 5y ago

Open source code still has a license. That license may or may not require distributing the license along with the code. MIT may allow distribution without a license unless the code share is significant, but reusing GPL3 is a no-go for commercial companies. The Apache 2 license allows for commercial use, but has implications for the way you can enforce your software patents. It also requires distributing the license file along with your application. Complaining that companies use the software you told the world was free to use without restriction is dumb. However, not everyone gives away their software for free without restrictions. The fact that Github isn't respecting those licenses is a much bigger problem. The tool autocompleting some random guy's personal information because he uploaded his blog to Github is highly problematic. The idea of using permissively licensed code to train an AI is not bad, but some human with knowledge of software licenses would need to pre-select those projects. If all code came from one of those "do whatever the fuck you want" licenses, then there wouldn't be a problem. I'd consider it to be a great product and have no issue paying a fee. There's a huge market for a Copilot product, but this iteration just.. isn't it.

jefftk 5y ago
> reusing GPL3 is a no-go for commercial companies The GPL is completely compatible with commercial use. You just need to share modifications to the source with anyone you share the binary with. Many tech companies make extensive use of GPL software, and since they are not providing binaries to their end users they don't even have to share their changes to the source. Even the AGPL, which does require you to share the source with users, still completely allows commercial use (though not compatible with as many business models).
- jeroenhd 5y ago
  If you include GPL3 code, your code also effectively also becomes GPL3 licensed. This isn't a problem for companies producing GPL3 software, of course, but most companies keep their source code to themselves. True, the web loophole is a way around this, assuming the GPL'd code isn't part of the compiled/minified/integrated frontend Javascript libraries that gets sent to the client (because then you have the exact same problem). It's not that commercial use is prohibited by GPL3, it's more that most businesses do not want to risk accidentally releasing a version of their software that requires them to share all source code to that version. And even if you're producing open source software, GPL3 might still be a problem because of incompatible licenses (see ZFS for an example) if you don't own _all_ the copyright so you can dual-license your software.

brutal_chaos_ 5y ago

Let's say your code on GitHub is not opensourced. Do we know it wasn't used for training?

jrm4 5y ago

Once again, Stallman (will have been) right. Github/Microsoft is going to take your code, and then cut off your access to it. This is what the GPL was designed to fight, so they're going to try it this way instead. Those who do not learn history yadda yadda.

jefftk 5y ago
How does this cut off our access to the code?
- jrm4 5y ago
  Someone's GPL'd code will "strongly inspire" someone elses proprietary (or otherwise "controlled") code down the line, and there won't be much recourse. Remember, the GPL isn't fundamentally about "enforcing licenses," it's a tool that reverses the usual power of copyright for a higher goal of "software freedom."

licenseauth 5y ago

> quite a lot of MIT code Where is this MIT licensed codes of yours, because it definitely is not on your github.

Abishek_Muthian 5y ago

Has GitHub agreed that it scraps based on license of the repository? If so then what about private repositories with a permissible license but not been made public for what ever reason. What about those projects whose dependencies has permissible license but main repo doesn't? Can GitHub just go oops! I think the point that so much confusion exists regarding their product & possible violation of user's trust is a valid reason to be pissy about.