Re: Help building Pen.el (GPT for emacs)

[Jean Louis <bugs@gnu.support>]

* Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> [2021-07-24 10:33]:
> > I have never said nor implied "you work for me" and I cannot see how
> > is that relevant to the question.
> 
> You consistently take the stance that implies, and many times
> explicitly states, that (a) you represent the views of the GNU
> project

I have never in my life said so, you please stop with it.

> and (b) the GNU project should or should not do this and that.

I have always beeing following GNU project as such because I agree to
its principles and guidances as published on GNU website. I will
definitely compare issues at hand with the already well known GNU
guidelines just as you and other people do.

For example when there is recommendation of proprietary software I
will say that GNU project does not endorse such.

> Then, when people like me object, you demand that they prove
> something to you, or else.

The issues are totally unrelated. I am sorry for your
misunderstandings. 

I was interested to find out how is legality solved when re-using the
code generated by AI. Nothing else beyond that. And I have found
references and made conclusions. 

> > If you participate in discussion and respond to my question relating
> > to licensing compliance, then provide a reference justifying its
> > legality. Or simply say you don't have such. Your employment is not
> > subject of my question nor relevant.
> 
> I could ask you to do the same.  You never provided any reference
> justifying the legality, just a lot of blogs that spread FUD (whose
> motivation, which many times is struggle against Free Software, I
> described in my previous message).

Take it easy. 

I asked simple question, refined the question, and found references,
made conclusions of legality justification in US jurisdiction and that
there are unsolved global problem. 

There is no need to expand discussion into directions which is purely
irrelevant to the question about licensing compliance.

> > 2. OpenAI_RFC-84-FR-58141.pdf
> > https://www.uspto.gov/sites/default/files/documents/OpenAI_RFC-84-FR-58141.pdf
> > 
> > Conclusions are:
> > 
> > - legal justifications exists for US jurisdiction as the companies
> >   providing the AI are strong enough to find their ways, they are
> >   playing on the card as given in references above; as somebody
> >   already said, I doubt they would use "fair use" doctrine if the AI
> >   would be trained on proprietary software such as Windows;
> > 
> > - conflict is serious and it is out there among the people and remains
> >   unsolved; AI has been trained on GPL and other free software and is
> >   used by corporations to generate new code without attributions;
> >   people complain that it is misuse of intentions of authors; 
> > 
> > - overall international legal situation is thus unclear, especially
> >   considering that free software spans the whole world, not just the
> >   US jurisdiction, as what may work within US is not same among all
> >   jurisdictions;
> 
> That's not what the above document concludes.  Quote:

My conclusions are not what document conclude. I never said so. The
document is related exclusively to US jurisdiction and its final
determination is vague. It is their proposal, and not a court
decision. They have openly said that they are financially strong
enough and will try to defend any cases by using "fair use" doctrine
in the US.

This however, does not solve all jurisdictions. "fair use" doctrine is
also not finally solved in the US.

>   Conclusion
> 
>   We submit that:
> 
>   I. Under current law, training AI systems constitutes fair use.

That is their opinion, as that is a corporation that has the strength
to submit such document and of course that they found some legal
defense. If anybody starts complaining it will be a court case that
will give final judgments.

>   II. Policy considerations underlying fair use doctrine support the
>   finding that training AI systems constitute fair use.
> 
>   III. Nevertheless, legal uncertainty on the copyright implications
>   of training AI systems imposes substantial costs on AI developers
>   and so should be authoritatively resolved.

Everything from that document relates to US jurisdiction only. It is
one-sided thus biased document, clearly opposing the views of many GPL
authors. 

It is the corporations defense argument for ripping off the GPL
software. They found the way and wish to play on that card. 

It is document of conflict, not document of friendship or
collaboration.  It is document of one-sidede defense, not a document
that contributes to free software. 

It is document that defend proprietary software, not document that
fosters free software.

Thus it does not resolve anything in the community. It serves to one
party only.

Would that corporation release all software as free software that
would bring or make a new leap forward. They are making one big step
backwards. One can see that by number of aware free software
developers canceling the Github accounts.

> > Conclusion as of 2021-07-24 is that authors cannot be sure as there
> > are legal uncertainties.
> 
> Those are your personal conclusions.

Personal definitely, but not as the only one with the same opinion,
which should be clear from references which left probably unread.

Legality of free software on the planet was ensured by the GPL
license. Maybe the license was never planned to be international, but
it does function well internationally. 

Legality of AI generated code and "free use" doctrine in the US is at
this point of development yet far from functioning well
internationally. 

> (Full disclosure: part of my daytime job is development of
> sophisticated AI-based algorithms that use machine learning
> technologies for various practical purposes, including analysis of
> "natural language" text.)

That is great, it is technical part of software. Keep doing.



Jean

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