5 ms·

I honestly just don't see how all this will work legally, in the future. I don't know anything an LLM (or "AI") can do that a human couldn't, with enough time.

by robswc 2y ago

I honestly just don't see how all this will work legally, in the future. I don't know anything an LLM (or "AI") can do that a human couldn't, with enough time. If it can get a human in trouble, it should get the operators of the AI in trouble too. Likewise, if a human can do it, I don't see why an AI is any different.

qup 2y ago
Which operators? The ones running it, or the ones asking it to do troublesome things?
- kbenson 2y ago
  Depends on whether you have a service relationship with a third party and they are providing a service or you rolled your own. If, for example, I paid a third party company for consultants to write some code for me but they provided source code they didn't have the right to, I think I should be able to hold them accountable for that. Whether it's a person or some automated process doesn't change that IMO. I expect a court case would be used to determine what a normal person could expect, what was represented buy the consultant company, and what exactly I requested to determine how much fault each party has.
  - qup 2y ago
    > I think I should be able to hold them accountable for that You should? Or the owners of the copyrighted code should?
    - tialaramex 2y ago
      Everybody whose rights were infringed. The GPL often technically makes that "everybody else" by granting what were otherwise exclusive rights (to make and distribute copies) to everybody and then taking them away from infringers. So e.g. Company X makes a GPL'd program to do A, but Company Y just copy pastes it into famous product P and acts as though they made it and obviously doesn't give out source. As a random person who doesn't even own P, the argument would be that technically the GPL says you should be able to get source code for the program from Y, even though you didn't buy their product P - you were harmed by their refusal to do what the GPL requires, so you can sue them. Now, suing is probably not a good idea in this case, a court is likely to either insist you aren't really injured or that they can't help you, or both, but I think it could work at least in theory.
      - kelnos 2y ago
        > the argument would be that technically the GPL says you should be able to get source code for the program from Y, even though you didn't buy their product P - you were harmed by their refusal to do what the GPL requires, so you can sue them. I don't think that's the case. Whenever I see discussion about GPL violations, the copyright holder is the one who has to go after the violator (and often getting them to do something is difficult, because legal challenges can be expensive); the consensus seems to be that users who receive the software in a manner not compliant with the GPL don't have standing to sue. I'm not sure if a user has ever tried, though, so not sure if this has been tested in court.
        tialaramex 2y ago
        SFC versus Vizio is exactly what you say doesn't exist. The SFC deliberately brought a case where they don't own the copyright, and says they are harmed and here's why the court should find for them.
        kbenson 2y ago
        I assume that's because even if they aren't the original rights holder, they still have standing because they (as the public) were given rights under the GPL implicitly by anyone using the GPL, for the GPL covered items. Since they were denied those rights, they were harmed, and thus have standing. At least that would be my "layman that finds court cases and discussions of them interesting so consumes that as entertainment fairly regularly" best guess.
    - kbenson 2y ago
      I mean if you are held accountable for using copyrighted code by the owner, you should then in turn be able to hold the consultant accountable for being the source of it, and the blame and responsibility may be shifted in part or in whole. I don't think it's all that different than if I'm an employer and my employee does something illegal. An investigation can be made as to whether the acted on their own acted based on what the directions or prevailing understanding was at the company. That may change who is responsible in part or in whole and what steps need to be taken to provide recompense to those impacted by that illegal activity. Every situation will be complex and unique in its own way. That's what courts are for, determining the unique aspects of a case and making specific ruling based on the law and the situation, as the judge (in determining what is acceptable and willing to be seen) and jury (to determine whether someone needs to be held accountable and to a degree how) see fit.
- robswc 2y ago
  That's for someone with legal experience and knowledge to answer. I can only offer my opinion and more questions. For example; if you're a punk rock band and hire an artist to create promo material, and they draw a "vulgar Mickey Mouse" without your knowledge, who is in trouble? Seems you should just work backwards until you get to a human or org and have them tried in court on a case by case basis. Maybe that's a bad idea for reasons others can explain, its just my current opinion.
shagie 2y ago
The entity with agency claiming copyright of the code being written (machines can't claim copyright) is responsible for ensuring that the code that they are writing is free of license encumbrance. This is not any different than a person copying a code snippet from Stack Overflow that is under the GPL and used on Stack Overflow as part of fair use for educational purposes. You, the person, writing the code are responsible for making sure that your code is yours.
- robswc 2y ago
  Well, that's essentially what I'm saying. If you use an AI to "get around" copyright, you should face the consequences. Same if you hired a "consultant" that did the infringing.
- blibble 2y ago
  I don't see how copilot is any different than napster, kazaa, etc it's only purpose is to permit the user to infringe others copyright, and its creator (Napster Inc before, Microsoft now) is enriched by this without the ability to produce infringing works it is nothing
  - kelnos 2y ago
    > it's only purpose is to permit the user to infringe others copyright I'm not a fan of Copilot, but this is an absurd take. Direct comparisons to Napster etc. make very little sense. > without the ability to produce infringing works it is nothing I don't really agree. While Copilot certainly trains on a lot of data it doesn't have the legal right to redistribute, its output is often (nearly always, according to this judge's opinion) not similar enough to any specific copyrighted work to be considered infringement. I do think, when the output is similar enough to a specific copyrighted work, there should be consequences.
- BeefWellington 2y ago
  > This is not any different than a person copying a code snippet from Stack Overflow that is under the GPL and used on Stack Overflow as part of fair use for educational purposes. Code snippets and answers on Stack Overflow also have their own license[1] and the terms[2] specifically outline that they're not responsible if you go posting things you aren't permitted to (s.8). Where it differs is that the various chatbots are removing this attribution. Even the permissive licenses require attribution. I've no doubt OpenAI's terms are such that the end user is ultimately responsible but do you not think that creates a problematic situation wherein they can effecively obscure and violate license terms? Copyright refers to copying. No matter how complex the scenario you create, ultimately if the output is a copy of what someone else holds copyright on, you are liable. Or at least I would be as some random developer. Is the argument here that OpenAI is free to do the same and because they made a complicated enough system of smoke and mirrors they shouldn't be held responsible? [1]: https://stackoverflow.com/help/licensing https://stackoverflow.com/help/licensing [2]: https://stackoverflow.com/legal/terms-of-service/public https://stackoverflow.com/legal/terms-of-service/public
titzer 2y ago
> with enough time If a textbook is a megabyte (2^20) and might take a week to read and grok, then then it would take 2^20 weeks to read one terabyte (2^40), which is 20 thousand years. ChatGPT-3 was trained on 570GB of text data, according to reports. So if you have 10,000 years, yeah, sure, a human could read it all. But memorize and recall?
- wvenable 2y ago
  That's kind of why we have computers, though. To do things beyond our natural capabilities.
- robswc 2y ago
  Well, I'm thinking more specialized. I mean, how often do people come up with the same riff or melody and end up in court? You don't need an AI to either purposely or accidentally skirt copyright.

by robswc 2y ago

qup 2y ago

Which operators? The ones running it, or the ones asking it to do troublesome things?

kbenson 2y ago
Depends on whether you have a service relationship with a third party and they are providing a service or you rolled your own. If, for example, I paid a third party company for consultants to write some code for me but they provided source code they didn't have the right to, I think I should be able to hold them accountable for that. Whether it's a person or some automated process doesn't change that IMO. I expect a court case would be used to determine what a normal person could expect, what was represented buy the consultant company, and what exactly I requested to determine how much fault each party has.
- qup 2y ago
  > I think I should be able to hold them accountable for that You should? Or the owners of the copyrighted code should?
  - tialaramex 2y ago
    Everybody whose rights were infringed. The GPL often technically makes that "everybody else" by granting what were otherwise exclusive rights (to make and distribute copies) to everybody and then taking them away from infringers. So e.g. Company X makes a GPL'd program to do A, but Company Y just copy pastes it into famous product P and acts as though they made it and obviously doesn't give out source. As a random person who doesn't even own P, the argument would be that technically the GPL says you should be able to get source code for the program from Y, even though you didn't buy their product P - you were harmed by their refusal to do what the GPL requires, so you can sue them. Now, suing is probably not a good idea in this case, a court is likely to either insist you aren't really injured or that they can't help you, or both, but I think it could work at least in theory.
    - kelnos 2y ago
      > the argument would be that technically the GPL says you should be able to get source code for the program from Y, even though you didn't buy their product P - you were harmed by their refusal to do what the GPL requires, so you can sue them. I don't think that's the case. Whenever I see discussion about GPL violations, the copyright holder is the one who has to go after the violator (and often getting them to do something is difficult, because legal challenges can be expensive); the consensus seems to be that users who receive the software in a manner not compliant with the GPL don't have standing to sue. I'm not sure if a user has ever tried, though, so not sure if this has been tested in court.
      - tialaramex 2y ago
        SFC versus Vizio is exactly what you say doesn't exist. The SFC deliberately brought a case where they don't own the copyright, and says they are harmed and here's why the court should find for them.
        kbenson 2y ago
        I assume that's because even if they aren't the original rights holder, they still have standing because they (as the public) were given rights under the GPL implicitly by anyone using the GPL, for the GPL covered items. Since they were denied those rights, they were harmed, and thus have standing. At least that would be my "layman that finds court cases and discussions of them interesting so consumes that as entertainment fairly regularly" best guess.
  - kbenson 2y ago
    I mean if you are held accountable for using copyrighted code by the owner, you should then in turn be able to hold the consultant accountable for being the source of it, and the blame and responsibility may be shifted in part or in whole. I don't think it's all that different than if I'm an employer and my employee does something illegal. An investigation can be made as to whether the acted on their own acted based on what the directions or prevailing understanding was at the company. That may change who is responsible in part or in whole and what steps need to be taken to provide recompense to those impacted by that illegal activity. Every situation will be complex and unique in its own way. That's what courts are for, determining the unique aspects of a case and making specific ruling based on the law and the situation, as the judge (in determining what is acceptable and willing to be seen) and jury (to determine whether someone needs to be held accountable and to a degree how) see fit.
robswc 2y ago
That's for someone with legal experience and knowledge to answer. I can only offer my opinion and more questions. For example; if you're a punk rock band and hire an artist to create promo material, and they draw a "vulgar Mickey Mouse" without your knowledge, who is in trouble? Seems you should just work backwards until you get to a human or org and have them tried in court on a case by case basis. Maybe that's a bad idea for reasons others can explain, its just my current opinion.

shagie 2y ago

The entity with agency claiming copyright of the code being written (machines can't claim copyright) is responsible for ensuring that the code that they are writing is free of license encumbrance. This is not any different than a person copying a code snippet from Stack Overflow that is under the GPL and used on Stack Overflow as part of fair use for educational purposes. You, the person, writing the code are responsible for making sure that your code is yours.

robswc 2y ago
Well, that's essentially what I'm saying. If you use an AI to "get around" copyright, you should face the consequences. Same if you hired a "consultant" that did the infringing.
blibble 2y ago
I don't see how copilot is any different than napster, kazaa, etc it's only purpose is to permit the user to infringe others copyright, and its creator (Napster Inc before, Microsoft now) is enriched by this without the ability to produce infringing works it is nothing
- kelnos 2y ago
  > it's only purpose is to permit the user to infringe others copyright I'm not a fan of Copilot, but this is an absurd take. Direct comparisons to Napster etc. make very little sense. > without the ability to produce infringing works it is nothing I don't really agree. While Copilot certainly trains on a lot of data it doesn't have the legal right to redistribute, its output is often (nearly always, according to this judge's opinion) not similar enough to any specific copyrighted work to be considered infringement. I do think, when the output is similar enough to a specific copyrighted work, there should be consequences.
BeefWellington 2y ago
> This is not any different than a person copying a code snippet from Stack Overflow that is under the GPL and used on Stack Overflow as part of fair use for educational purposes. Code snippets and answers on Stack Overflow also have their own license[1] and the terms[2] specifically outline that they're not responsible if you go posting things you aren't permitted to (s.8). Where it differs is that the various chatbots are removing this attribution. Even the permissive licenses require attribution. I've no doubt OpenAI's terms are such that the end user is ultimately responsible but do you not think that creates a problematic situation wherein they can effecively obscure and violate license terms? Copyright refers to copying. No matter how complex the scenario you create, ultimately if the output is a copy of what someone else holds copyright on, you are liable. Or at least I would be as some random developer. Is the argument here that OpenAI is free to do the same and because they made a complicated enough system of smoke and mirrors they shouldn't be held responsible? [1]: https://stackoverflow.com/help/licensing https://stackoverflow.com/help/licensing [2]: https://stackoverflow.com/legal/terms-of-service/public https://stackoverflow.com/legal/terms-of-service/public

titzer 2y ago

> with enough time If a textbook is a megabyte (2^20) and might take a week to read and grok, then then it would take 2^20 weeks to read one terabyte (2^40), which is 20 thousand years. ChatGPT-3 was trained on 570GB of text data, according to reports. So if you have 10,000 years, yeah, sure, a human could read it all. But memorize and recall?

wvenable 2y ago
That's kind of why we have computers, though. To do things beyond our natural capabilities.
robswc 2y ago
Well, I'm thinking more specialized. I mean, how often do people come up with the same riff or melody and end up in court? You don't need an AI to either purposely or accidentally skirt copyright.