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If we are being honest as a community, open source developer are pretty far down the list of groups with valid grievances against this current wave of AI for ho

by slg 4y ago

If we are being honest as a community, open source developer are pretty far down the list of groups with valid grievances against this current wave of AI for how they are trained. There is at least a debatable case that these systems are operating in the spirit if not the exact letter of general open source licenses. It is a much harder argument to make for the AI trained on writing and art that is clearly copyrighted. If you have ethical questions about Copilot, you really should be against this entire crop of AI systems.

marcus_holmes 4y ago
So you're suggesting that developers shut up and let the artists talk first? I'm not sure what the "you're suffering less than these other people" thing is actually intended to translate into? What do we do with that? All software licences are based on copyright, same as writing, art, music, etc. Some software licences are permissive. Some writing is permissive (e.g. Cory Doctorow). Some music is permissive (e.g. Amanda Palmer). It entirely depends on what the author wants. The fact that more software is permissive is a good thing, right? I entirely agree that there are ethical problems with training AI on copyrighted training data. But please let's not start gatekeeping this. We need to have a serious discussion as a culture about it, and saying "you're way down the list of victims" isn't helping.
- slg 4y ago
  > So you're suggesting that developers shut up and let the artists talk first? I'm not sure what the "you're suffering less than these other people" thing is actually intended to translate into? What do we do with that? The tech community has a tendency to not care about issues like this until it effects us. I’m not telling people to shut up about this. I’m saying don’t be a hypocrite. If this is the wrong approach for GitHub, it is a problem with the way all these AI are trained.
  - _cenw 4y ago
    This is a pattern of argument I see all the time in minority communities, and it really irks me the wrong way. You are allowed to care about the things you care about and not have a concrete well-informed opinion on something related that might be more pressing. It only becomes hypocricy as soon as you actively dismiss the other thing as if you were well-informed. And I don't see anyone here doing that.
  - w4ffl35 4y ago
    > If this is the wrong approach for GitHub, it is a problem with the way all these AI are trained. Broken logic.
  - mftrhu 4y ago
    There is indeed a problem with the way all these models are trained, and too many people want to pretend that colour can be laundered out <https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23 https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23>
zelphirkalt 4y ago
What I agree with is the typical open source dev, who goes "I MIT license all my things, because I have seen it elsewhere and I don't want to think about licenses a lot." being pretty far down the list of groups of people to complain. What I disagree with is the idea, that they should therefore not complain, or that there could not be an AI system, that does not code laundering, but keeps licenses in place and does this ethically and in an honest way. Adding "ethically" and "honest way", because I am sure that companies will try to find a way around being honest, if they ever are forced to add back the licenses. In fact, artists might not be the group, that grasps the impact of training on that corpus as quickly as the dev communities. Perhaps it is exactly the devs, who need to complain loudest and first, to have a signal effect.

by slg 4y ago

marcus_holmes 4y ago

So you're suggesting that developers shut up and let the artists talk first? I'm not sure what the "you're suffering less than these other people" thing is actually intended to translate into? What do we do with that? All software licences are based on copyright, same as writing, art, music, etc. Some software licences are permissive. Some writing is permissive (e.g. Cory Doctorow). Some music is permissive (e.g. Amanda Palmer). It entirely depends on what the author wants. The fact that more software is permissive is a good thing, right? I entirely agree that there are ethical problems with training AI on copyrighted training data. But please let's not start gatekeeping this. We need to have a serious discussion as a culture about it, and saying "you're way down the list of victims" isn't helping.

slg 4y ago
> So you're suggesting that developers shut up and let the artists talk first? I'm not sure what the "you're suffering less than these other people" thing is actually intended to translate into? What do we do with that? The tech community has a tendency to not care about issues like this until it effects us. I’m not telling people to shut up about this. I’m saying don’t be a hypocrite. If this is the wrong approach for GitHub, it is a problem with the way all these AI are trained.
- _cenw 4y ago
  This is a pattern of argument I see all the time in minority communities, and it really irks me the wrong way. You are allowed to care about the things you care about and not have a concrete well-informed opinion on something related that might be more pressing. It only becomes hypocricy as soon as you actively dismiss the other thing as if you were well-informed. And I don't see anyone here doing that.
- w4ffl35 4y ago
  > If this is the wrong approach for GitHub, it is a problem with the way all these AI are trained. Broken logic.
- mftrhu 4y ago
  There is indeed a problem with the way all these models are trained, and too many people want to pretend that colour can be laundered out <https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23 https://ansuz.sooke.bc.ca/entry/23>

zelphirkalt 4y ago

What I agree with is the typical open source dev, who goes "I MIT license all my things, because I have seen it elsewhere and I don't want to think about licenses a lot." being pretty far down the list of groups of people to complain. What I disagree with is the idea, that they should therefore not complain, or that there could not be an AI system, that does not code laundering, but keeps licenses in place and does this ethically and in an honest way. Adding "ethically" and "honest way", because I am sure that companies will try to find a way around being honest, if they ever are forced to add back the licenses. In fact, artists might not be the group, that grasps the impact of training on that corpus as quickly as the dev communities. Perhaps it is exactly the devs, who need to complain loudest and first, to have a signal effect.