4 ms·

A slight aside, but this is the subtitle: > A few devs versus the powerful forces of Redmond – who did you think was going to win? I hate that kind of obnoxio

A slight aside, but this is the subtitle: > A few devs versus the powerful forces of Redmond – who did you think was going to win? I hate that kind of obnoxious "journalism". Sometimes the little guy is actually wrong. To clarify, I'm not commenting on the specifics of this case, I just hate how fake our online discourse has been by appealing to "big guy evil" before even bringing up the specifics of the case.

epolanski 2y ago
I think you're misinterpreting the sentence. I think it merely implies MS has more resources to throw at the legal case.
- gpm 2y ago
  I don't think that's something you can take away from the little-guy big-guy narrative. Class actions are funded by courts awarding lawyers huge payouts if they win, not directly by the plaintiffs. There should be plenty of resources on both sides of this fight.
  - mcmcmc 2y ago
    You are sorely underestimating the legal resources available to one of the most powerful companies on earth
    - gpm 2y ago
      I don't believe I am. To flush out my statement more fully there are diminishing returns on investing more money into a lawsuit, and both sides in a class action with this much money at stake should be sufficiently funded to be far beyond the point of diminishing returns. I'm not claiming Microsoft doesn't have tons of resources, I'm claiming that the plaintiffs attorneys should be sufficiently funded that the difference in outcomes is negligible.
- megaman821 2y ago
  Maybe but lack of resources doesn't seem to be the main problem. A handful of devs claim copyright infringement, the Judge says show me and they can't. Maybe if they had millions of lawyers trying to get Copilot to produce their copyrighted code, their case would be stronger.
- yieldcrv 2y ago
  they also have more resources to ensure they covered their liability surface before any legal case materialized aka the plaintiffs were wrong and had no idea what they were talking about
- hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
  I strongly disagree. I don't see how you can interpret that sentence, especially given the "who did you think was going to win?" part, and ignore the implication that Microsoft won solely because of their size and money. There is actually zero evidence that the judge issued his ruling based on Microsoft's superior legal team, so why even put that sentence in there anyway?
deciplex 2y ago
> Sometimes the little guy is actually wrong. He is, sometimes. Also sometimes, the moon passes exactly between the sun and Earth, a new star appears in the sky, the magnetic field of our planet reverses, a proton decays (jury is still out on that one, actually). Etc. Tools like Copilot are plagiarism machines. We know the data they're being trained on, and a conclusion of "that's plagiarism" is not - or anyway should not be - controversial. I'm not terribly against the notion of a plagiarism machine but I am against the owners of such machines reaping profits from them to the exclusion of the people who provide the source material. This is theft. More importantly, getting back to big guys and little guys: big guys gang up on little guys all the time. It's usually how they get to be big. They tend to be the ones who realize that working together against the rest of us is to their benefit. So, in the interest of pushing back on that a little, and recognizing that I am after all a fellow "little guy" (figuratively speaking anyway), I tend to support the "little guy" unless I have overwhelming evidence confirming that they are, in fact, both wrong and that supporting them anyway would be against my best interest. Neither is the case, here. At any rate, the subtitle here references a pretty ubiquitous and, I'm happy to report, increasingly well-known and understood facet of our economic and social institutions, which is that they absolutely positively do not work for us or further our interests in any sense.
- tpmoney 2y ago
  One would think if these were "plagiarism machines", that one of the plaintiffs would have been able to produce even a single instance of the copying they alleged.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > big guys gang up on little guys all the time And obnoxious individuals gum up enterprises. It's lazy to the point of dismissal to conclude based on bigness.
  - Slyfox33 2y ago
    Won't someone PLEASE think about microsoft???
  - 2y ago
Bognar 2y ago
It's The Register, they are always like this. Especially when Microsoft is involved.

epolanski 2y ago

I think you're misinterpreting the sentence. I think it merely implies MS has more resources to throw at the legal case.

gpm 2y ago
I don't think that's something you can take away from the little-guy big-guy narrative. Class actions are funded by courts awarding lawyers huge payouts if they win, not directly by the plaintiffs. There should be plenty of resources on both sides of this fight.
- mcmcmc 2y ago
  You are sorely underestimating the legal resources available to one of the most powerful companies on earth
  - gpm 2y ago
    I don't believe I am. To flush out my statement more fully there are diminishing returns on investing more money into a lawsuit, and both sides in a class action with this much money at stake should be sufficiently funded to be far beyond the point of diminishing returns. I'm not claiming Microsoft doesn't have tons of resources, I'm claiming that the plaintiffs attorneys should be sufficiently funded that the difference in outcomes is negligible.
megaman821 2y ago
Maybe but lack of resources doesn't seem to be the main problem. A handful of devs claim copyright infringement, the Judge says show me and they can't. Maybe if they had millions of lawyers trying to get Copilot to produce their copyrighted code, their case would be stronger.
yieldcrv 2y ago
they also have more resources to ensure they covered their liability surface before any legal case materialized aka the plaintiffs were wrong and had no idea what they were talking about
hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
I strongly disagree. I don't see how you can interpret that sentence, especially given the "who did you think was going to win?" part, and ignore the implication that Microsoft won solely because of their size and money. There is actually zero evidence that the judge issued his ruling based on Microsoft's superior legal team, so why even put that sentence in there anyway?

deciplex 2y ago

> Sometimes the little guy is actually wrong. He is, sometimes. Also sometimes, the moon passes exactly between the sun and Earth, a new star appears in the sky, the magnetic field of our planet reverses, a proton decays (jury is still out on that one, actually). Etc. Tools like Copilot are plagiarism machines. We know the data they're being trained on, and a conclusion of "that's plagiarism" is not - or anyway should not be - controversial. I'm not terribly against the notion of a plagiarism machine but I am against the owners of such machines reaping profits from them to the exclusion of the people who provide the source material. This is theft. More importantly, getting back to big guys and little guys: big guys gang up on little guys all the time. It's usually how they get to be big. They tend to be the ones who realize that working together against the rest of us is to their benefit. So, in the interest of pushing back on that a little, and recognizing that I am after all a fellow "little guy" (figuratively speaking anyway), I tend to support the "little guy" unless I have overwhelming evidence confirming that they are, in fact, both wrong and that supporting them anyway would be against my best interest. Neither is the case, here. At any rate, the subtitle here references a pretty ubiquitous and, I'm happy to report, increasingly well-known and understood facet of our economic and social institutions, which is that they absolutely positively do not work for us or further our interests in any sense.

tpmoney 2y ago
One would think if these were "plagiarism machines", that one of the plaintiffs would have been able to produce even a single instance of the copying they alleged.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> big guys gang up on little guys all the time And obnoxious individuals gum up enterprises. It's lazy to the point of dismissal to conclude based on bigness.
- Slyfox33 2y ago
  Won't someone PLEASE think about microsoft???
- 2y ago

Bognar 2y ago

It's The Register, they are always like this. Especially when Microsoft is involved.