OpenAI, Microsoft, GitHub hit with lawsuit over Copilot

OpenAI, Microsoft, and GitHub have been named in a class-action lawsuit claiming its AI-code generating software Copilot violates copyright laws. Lawyer and developer Matthew Butterick announced last month that he'd teamed up with the Joseph Saveri Law Firm to investigate Copilot. They wanted to know if and how the software …

[heyrick]

If I were to quote a couple of words from a song in a book, I'd need to ask permission and, depending on the whims of the copyright holder, pay a fee or some sort of royalties (or, of course, have the request denied).

With this in mind, is it not logical that an "AI" that absorbs huge swathes of code and regurgitates parts of that on demand also respect the rights of the authors and the licence obligations of the code it has read?

[Tom7]

Yes, absolutely it is. However, the GitHub terms of service include the grant of a license to GitHub "to store, archive, parse, and display Your Content, and make incidental copies, as necessary to provide the applications, software, products, and services provided by GitHub, including any Beta Previews" (note this is a synthetic quote, generated by substituting definitions from the "Definitions" section of the ToS for the terms so defined). I expect the Microsoft / GitHub will simply rely on this part of the terms of service; by posting your code, you gave them a license to use it pretty much however they like in the course of their business; the fact that Co-Pilot wasn't conceived at the time the code was posted is irrelevant, as this section of the ToS also includes "including improving the Service [the applications, software, products and services provided by GitHub] over time."

What will be very interesting is how the court treats people who posted someone else's copyleft-licensed code. Such a person has every right to make copies of the code, make derivative works, post it all on the internet etc etc; what they don't have a right to do is to grant a non-copyleft license to GitHub, which they implicitly purport to do when they post it on the site.

It's worth noting that GitHub has separate terms of service for corporate customers. Those terms have a similar license grant, but crucially define "the Service" much more narrowly, as "GitHub's hosted service and any applicable documentation" instead of "the applications, software, products and services provided by GitHub, including any Beta Previews."

[Falmari]

@heyrick If I were to quote a couple of words from a song in a book, I'd need to ask permission and, depending on the whims of the copyright holder, pay a fee or some sort of royalties (or, of course, have the request denied).

Exaggerate much?

There is no way you would have to ask for permission for just 2 words. Even quoting* a whole line would in most instances be considered fair use. Definitely would be if the quote was attributed to someone like the performer or songwriter.

* I assume you meant the couple words were written as a quote from a song. If you meant just using a couple of words from a song, no one would be able to write a book without infringing some song's copyright.

[amanfromMars 1]

Take Care, Beware .... Sociopathic Virtual Machinery at ITs Work in REST* and Play ‽

"AI needs to be fair & eth­i­cal for every­one. If it's not, then it can never achieve its vaunted aims of ele­vat­ing human­ity. It will just become another way for the priv­i­leged few to profit from the work of the many." .... Lawyer and developer Matthew Butterick

How very perverse and bizarre that the usual way the priv­i­leged few profit from the work of the many does not appear to warrant such novel attention. New kids on the block disrupting and taking over status quo new world order turf, eh?

Methinks you don't really want to be messing around with spooky AI systems, for as many will surely warn you, they can tend to be almightily unstable and have strange minds all of their own and be both rumoured and feared more than just easily capable of looking out for the welfare and protection of their own.

* https://www.codecademy.com/article/what-is-rest

[ColonelDare]

I wondered why M$ paid $7.5 billion for it. I should have guessed.

[icon] leaves Github

[Anonymous Coward]

[icon] leaves Github

Don't forget to upload your large database of dangerously dodgy code examples before you leave. Sometimes, "bad code" examples can be just as instructive to the learner as "best practise" examples are.

[Il'Geller]

Microsoft and OpenAI shouldn’t take this seriously!

[amanfromMars 1]

Re: Ambulance Chasing Lawyers ‘R’ Us

Microsoft and OpenAI shouldn’t take this seriously! ..... Il’Geller

Is there any Microsoft or OpenAI company statement suggesting that they do, and are willing to necessarily contest the crass class action lawsuit?

[Il'Geller]

Re: Ambulance Chasing Lawyers ‘R’ Us

They shouldn't worry too much: I bet they are already close to finishing work on replacing all programming languages with natural language. GitHub will soon be a thing of the past.

[amanfromMars 1]

Prepare for Explosive Fireworks and Hosts of Casualties

replacing all programming languages with natural language. ..... Il’Geller

An AI Work long in Stealthy Deep Secret Dark Web Progress, Il’Geller, and some who would know would not mistell you, already indeed highly active in deeds safe and securely and silently delivered, receiving and transmitting surreal instruction sets for Virtual Machine Intelligence Agents.

And it would not be hyperbolic to render, with particular and peculiar regard to what can be looked forward to in immediate futures, a televised quote from Blair “Paddy” Mayne accurately portraying the essence of what is to come crashing and crushing down through established traditional and conventional lines of telecommunicative command and remote practical control, .....

“Oh, ... I see ..... let the games begin”