[gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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Hey all,

I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.

Basically, it appears to be a machine learning feature that trains
itself on all publically available code on github and provides
code suggestions to any public or private repository.

https://github.com/features/copilot

There appears to be a lot of controversy around it in foss groups, so I
thought it might be worth bringing up here. I added the council and
trustees because I thought it might be worth bringing to their attention
as well.  In particular, I see concerns about gpl projects being on github
if they can't opt out of this.

Thoughts?

William

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> Hey all,
> 
> I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> 
> Basically, it appears to be a machine learning feature that trains
> itself on all publically available code on github and provides
> code suggestions to any public or private repository.
> 
> https://github.com/features/copilot
> 
> There appears to be a lot of controversy around it in foss groups, so I
> thought it might be worth bringing up here. I added the council and
> trustees because I thought it might be worth bringing to their attention
> as well.  In particular, I see concerns about gpl projects being on github
> if they can't opt out of this.

It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
this.

https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/01/open-source-developers-urged-to-ditch-github-following-copilot-launch/

William


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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[James Le Cuirot]

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On Thu, 2022-07-14 at 16:43 -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > Hey all,
> > 
> > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > 
> > Basically, it appears to be a machine learning feature that trains
> > itself on all publically available code on github and provides
> > code suggestions to any public or private repository.
> > 
> > https://github.com/features/copilot
> > 
> > There appears to be a lot of controversy around it in foss groups, so I
> > thought it might be worth bringing up here. I added the council and
> > trustees because I thought it might be worth bringing to their attention
> > as well.  In particular, I see concerns about gpl projects being on github
> > if they can't opt out of this.
> 
> It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> this.
> 
> https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/01/open-source-developers-urged-to-ditch-github-following-copilot-launch/
> 
> William

Although I don't work for GitHub specifically, it would still not be
appropriate for me to wade far into this debate. In the interest of keeping
things balanced though, I'll start and finish by referencing this
counter-opinion.

https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/11/robots_open_source/

Chewi

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Ulrich Mueller]

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>>>>> On Fri, 15 Jul 2022, James Le Cuirot wrote:

> On Thu, 2022-07-14 at 16:43 -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
>> It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
>> this.
>> 
>> https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/01/open-source-developers-urged-to-ditch-github-following-copilot-launch/

> Although I don't work for GitHub specifically, it would still not be
> appropriate for me to wade far into this debate. In the interest of keeping
> things balanced though, I'll start and finish by referencing this
> counter-opinion.

> https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/11/robots_open_source/

I think the killer argument is that they apply double standards when it
comes to Microsoft's own codebases:

"Microsoft and GitHub’s public position is meanwhile clear: they claim to
have no copyleft obligations for training the model, the model itself,
and deploying the service. They also believe there are no licensing
obligations for the output.

[...] [T]hey believed [...] output produced by Copilot can be licensed
under any license. We further asked if there are no licensing concerns
on either side, why did Microsoft not also train the system on their
large proprietary codebases such as Office? They had no immediate
answer. Microsoft and GitHub promised to get back to us, but have not."

https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2022/feb/03/github-copilot-copyleft-gpl/

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[James Le Cuirot]

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On Thu, 2022-07-14 at 23:35 +0100, James Le Cuirot wrote:
> On Thu, 2022-07-14 at 16:43 -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > > Hey all,
> > > 
> > > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > > 
> > > Basically, it appears to be a machine learning feature that trains
> > > itself on all publically available code on github and provides
> > > code suggestions to any public or private repository.
> > > 
> > > https://github.com/features/copilot
> > > 
> > > There appears to be a lot of controversy around it in foss groups, so I
> > > thought it might be worth bringing up here. I added the council and
> > > trustees because I thought it might be worth bringing to their attention
> > > as well.  In particular, I see concerns about gpl projects being on github
> > > if they can't opt out of this.
> > 
> > It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> > this.
> > 
> > https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/01/open-source-developers-urged-to-ditch-github-following-copilot-launch/
> > 
> > William
> 
> Although I don't work for GitHub specifically, it would still not be
> appropriate for me to wade far into this debate. In the interest of keeping
> things balanced though, I'll start and finish by referencing this
> counter-opinion.
> 
> https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/11/robots_open_source/

Having slept on it, I'd like to add that I don't have any problem at all with
us moving to GitLab. I'm just as familiar with that as I am with GitHub. I
just want us to do it for the right reasons.

Chewi


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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Rich Freeman]

On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 5:43 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> >
> > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> >
>
> It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> this.
>

I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
there and will still end up being used to train copilot.

I'm not sure how strong the copyright argument even is.  Your own
brain is a neural network that has been trained on copyrighted
textbooks, lectures, code from every employer you ever worked at, and
so on.  Human beings don't even have the ability to avoid learning
from things they are exposed to; it is a completely involuntary
process.

In any case, it seems like the general preference has been to move
towards something else anyway, so it seems a bit of a moot point.
Most already want to move something else, and after we move basically
everything we have ever done and will ever do will still end up
embedded in the mind of copilot anyway.

-- 
Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[John Helmert III]

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On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 5:43 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > >
> > > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > >
> >
> > It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> > this.
> >
> 
> I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> there and will still end up being used to train copilot.

Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.

> I'm not sure how strong the copyright argument even is.  Your own
> brain is a neural network that has been trained on copyrighted
> textbooks, lectures, code from every employer you ever worked at, and
> so on.  Human beings don't even have the ability to avoid learning
> from things they are exposed to; it is a completely involuntary
> process.
> 
> In any case, it seems like the general preference has been to move
> towards something else anyway, so it seems a bit of a moot point.
> Most already want to move something else, and after we move basically
> everything we have ever done and will ever do will still end up
> embedded in the mind of copilot anyway.
> 
> -- 
> Rich
> 

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Rich Freeman]

On Sat, Jul 16, 2022 at 3:56 PM John Helmert III <ajak@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> >
> > I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> > If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> > there and will still end up being used to train copilot.
>
> Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
> why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.
>

Setting aside any concerns about pull requests/etc that are
effectively stored only there, even if we deleted it we're still
talking about git.  Sooner or later somebody will push a copy of
things there, so even if we aren't proactively mirroring repositories
anything anybody does that is GPL is pretty likely to end up there.  A
repo might be gitlab-only for years, and then somebody does a git
push, and now the entire history is on github the same as if we were
doing every push there the whole time.

Information wants to be free and all that...  (And in this case it is
completely legal.)

-- 
Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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On Sat, Jul 16, 2022 at 04:27:38PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 16, 2022 at 3:56 PM John Helmert III <ajak@gentoo.org> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > >
> > > I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> > > If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> > > there and will still end up being used to train copilot.
> >
> > Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
> > why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.
> >
> 
> Setting aside any concerns about pull requests/etc that are
> effectively stored only there, even if we deleted it we're still
> talking about git.  Sooner or later somebody will push a copy of
> things there, so even if we aren't proactively mirroring repositories
> anything anybody does that is GPL is pretty likely to end up there.  A
> repo might be gitlab-only for years, and then somebody does a git
> push, and now the entire history is on github the same as if we were
> doing every push there the whole time.

What someone else does is irrelivent. I'm just talking about the
cannonical places where we store repos and accept pull requests from.

Of course someone could push everything back to github; however, there
is nothing we can do about that so that is completely moot for this
discussion.

William

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Rich Freeman]

On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 3:19 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
> Of course someone could push everything back to github; however, there
> is nothing we can do about that so that is completely moot for this
> discussion.

Well, what exactly does copilot have to do with anything?  If the
concern is about copilot "misappropriating" Gentoo's code, then it
seems we agree that moving off of Github won't change anything.

The social contract talks about how "Gentoo will never depend upon
[proprietary software]."  It doesn't mention anything about Gentoo not
enabling it/etc.  In fact our policies allow proprietary software to
be in our repository (obviously with restrictions on mirroring/etc).
Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
we're not breaking any promises.

-- 
Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 03:42:52PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 3:19 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> >
> > Of course someone could push everything back to github; however, there
> > is nothing we can do about that so that is completely moot for this
> > discussion.
> 
> Well, what exactly does copilot have to do with anything?  If the
> concern is about copilot "misappropriating" Gentoo's code, then it
> seems we agree that moving off of Github won't change anything.
> 
> The social contract talks about how "Gentoo will never depend upon
> [proprietary software]."  It doesn't mention anything about Gentoo not
> enabling it/etc.  In fact our policies allow proprietary software to
> be in our repository (obviously with restrictions on mirroring/etc).
> Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
> we're not breaking any promises.

Rich,

The question is around the GPL specifically.

the point is, are we as a project ok with copylot re-appropriating
our GPL code, possibly to proprietary projects, which could be argued
violates the GPL?

http://giveupgithub.org

If we are ok with this as a project, I guess that's fine, but I brought
it up to get thoughts about that angle.

William


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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 03:33:13PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 03:42:52PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 3:19 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > Of course someone could push everything back to github; however, there
> > > is nothing we can do about that so that is completely moot for this
> > > discussion.
> > 
> > Well, what exactly does copilot have to do with anything?  If the
> > concern is about copilot "misappropriating" Gentoo's code, then it
> > seems we agree that moving off of Github won't change anything.
> > 
> > The social contract talks about how "Gentoo will never depend upon
> > [proprietary software]."  It doesn't mention anything about Gentoo not
> > enabling it/etc.  In fact our policies allow proprietary software to
> > be in our repository (obviously with restrictions on mirroring/etc).
> > Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
> > we're not breaking any promises.
> 
> Rich,
> 
> The question is around the GPL specifically.
> 
> the point is, are we as a project ok with copylot re-appropriating
> our GPL code, possibly to proprietary projects, which could be argued
> violates the GPL?

heh, that was a typo, s/copylot/copilot/, but I guess it fits; that's
what it does. ;-)

William

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Michał Górny]

On Sun, 2022-07-17 at 15:33 -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 03:42:52PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 3:19 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > > 
> > > Of course someone could push everything back to github; however, there
> > > is nothing we can do about that so that is completely moot for this
> > > discussion.
> > 
> > Well, what exactly does copilot have to do with anything?  If the
> > concern is about copilot "misappropriating" Gentoo's code, then it
> > seems we agree that moving off of Github won't change anything.
> > 
> > The social contract talks about how "Gentoo will never depend upon
> > [proprietary software]."  It doesn't mention anything about Gentoo not
> > enabling it/etc.  In fact our policies allow proprietary software to
> > be in our repository (obviously with restrictions on mirroring/etc).
> > Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
> > we're not breaking any promises.
> 
> Rich,
> 
> The question is around the GPL specifically.
> 
> the point is, are we as a project ok with copylot re-appropriating
> our GPL code, possibly to proprietary projects, which could be argued
> violates the GPL?
> 
> http://giveupgithub.org
> 
> If we are ok with this as a project, I guess that's fine, but I brought
> it up to get thoughts about that angle.
> 

...and if we were not, we should make a pointless gesture that makes no
difference except for causing harm to our contributors?

-- 
Best regards,
Michał Górny

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Roy Bamford]

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On 2022.07.17 21:33, William Hubbs wrote:

[snip]

> The question is around the GPL specifically.
> 
> the point is, are we as a project ok with copylot re-appropriating
> our GPL code, possibly to proprietary projects, which could be argued
> violates the GPL?
> 
> http://giveupgithub.org
> 
> If we are ok with this as a project, I guess that's fine, but I
> brought
> it up to get thoughts about that angle.
> 
> William
> 
> 

William,

The GPL permits use code use under certain conditions.
It places the onus on code users to respect the licence.

Attempts at pre-emptive enforcement takes us down the 
route of (DRM) Digital Restrictions Management. That's
hardly in the spirit of the GPL. 

There are no good solutions. The least worst is 'no change'

Wherever our public repo is, it's public, so Github can 
help themselves anyway.  

-- 
Regards,

Roy Bamford
(Neddyseagoon) a member of
elections
gentoo-ops
forum-mods
arm64

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Matthias Maier]

On Sun, Jul 17, 2022, at 14:42 CDT, Rich Freeman <rich0@gentoo.org> wrote:

> Well, what exactly does copilot have to do with anything?  If the
> concern is about copilot "misappropriating" Gentoo's code, then it
> seems we agree that moving off of Github won't change anything.

I completely agree.


I think this is the main point.

There is no way of preventing our publicly available source repository
to be used for machine learning - at least if we want to make it
available at all...


It is just a coincidence that Github is using public git repositories
hosted at Github and that Github *is informing us about the fact*. For
example, Amazon has launched/is launching a competitor [1] that had been
trained on an undisclosed number of public open source code.

Best,
Matthias

[1] https://aws.amazon.com/codewhisperer/faqs/

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Ulrich Mueller]

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>>>>> On Sun, 17 Jul 2022, Rich Freeman wrote:

> The social contract talks about how "Gentoo will never depend upon
> [proprietary software]."  It doesn't mention anything about Gentoo not
> enabling it/etc.  In fact our policies allow proprietary software to
> be in our repository (obviously with restrictions on mirroring/etc).

I believe that's not accurate. Policy says that all our works must be
released under a free software license [1]. Ebuilds can _refer_ to
proprietary software, but everything committed to the Gentoo repository
(with the exception of license documents) must be free software.

> Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
> we're not breaking any promises.

Any proprietary distfiles referred to by ebuilds are irrelevant for this
discussion. We don't host that code on github.

[1] https://www.gentoo.org/glep/glep-0076.html#licensing-of-gentoo-projects

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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Rich Freeman]

On Mon, Jul 18, 2022 at 7:52 AM Ulrich Mueller <ulm@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
> >>>>> On Sun, 17 Jul 2022, Rich Freeman wrote:
>
> > Some argue that this is enabling proprietary software, but even if so
> > we're not breaking any promises.
>
> Any proprietary distfiles referred to by ebuilds are irrelevant for this
> discussion. We don't host that code on github.
>

You missed my point.

We aren't hosting any proprietary software on github if we use github
to store our FOSS repositories either.

My point is that we support the use of proprietary software by
providing 100% FOSS ebuilds in our official repositories that assist
users in installing proprietary software.  Some purists object to
this.  IMO this is a similar basis for objection as the objection to
using github because of copilot.

From a principle matter I can see why some object, just as some object
to having a FOSS ebuild in our repo for installing a non-FOSS software
application.

However, from a practical standpoint, I think the absence of an ebuild
or an inability to submit work on github are more likely to result in
people avoiding using Gentoo than people avoiding the use of github or
their proprietary software.

So this is a pragmatics vs principles question.  And of course letting
people decide for themselves is also a principle.

--
Rich

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Anna]

On 2022-07-16 14:56, John Helmert III wrote:
> On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 5:43 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > > >
> > >
> > > It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> > > this.
> > >
> > 
> > I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> > If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> > there and will still end up being used to train copilot.
> 
> Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
> why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.

Very bad idea. That would break sync mirrors for hundreds of users.

Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[William Hubbs]

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On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 11:27:56AM +0500, Anna wrote:
> On 2022-07-16 14:56, John Helmert III wrote:
> > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 5:43 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > > > >
> > > >
> > > > It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> > > > this.
> > > >
> > > 
> > > I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> > > If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> > > there and will still end up being used to train copilot.
> > 
> > Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
> > why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.
> 
> Very bad idea. That would break sync mirrors for hundreds of users.

The last time I checked, we only rely officially on *.gentoo.org (gentoo
infra) per our social contract as primary infrastructure. I think we
need to be sure users understand that github.com/gentoo is secondary and
could go away any time.

William


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Re: [gentoo-project] rfc: github's copilot feature

[Anna]

On 2022-07-17 15:08, William Hubbs wrote:
> On Sun, Jul 17, 2022 at 11:27:56AM +0500, Anna wrote:
> > On 2022-07-16 14:56, John Helmert III wrote:
> > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 06:35:32PM -0400, Rich Freeman wrote:
> > > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 5:43 PM William Hubbs <williamh@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > On Thu, Jul 14, 2022 at 04:33:43PM -0500, William Hubbs wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I just found out while I was on vacation about Github's copilot feature.
> > > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > It looks like the SFC is urging foss developers to ditch github over
> > > > > this.
> > > > >
> > > > 
> > > > I get the sentiment, but I don't see what direct impact it will have.
> > > > If Gentoo stops using Github all our code will inevitably still be on
> > > > there and will still end up being used to train copilot.
> > > 
> > > Inevitably? If most of our activity moves somewhere else, I don't see
> > > why we couldn't blow away all of https://github.com/gentoo.
> > 
> > Very bad idea. That would break sync mirrors for hundreds of users.
> 
> The last time I checked, we only rely officially on *.gentoo.org (gentoo
> infra) per our social contract as primary infrastructure. I think we
> need to be sure users understand that github.com/gentoo is secondary and
> could go away any time.

If you just sync from GitHub, you don't use any proprietary software
(only non-free JavaScript is problematic).

And there are reasons to use GitHub mirror instead of our anongit, which
is like 100 times slower (since it doesn't use any CDN).

Ditching GitHub is complicated since it requires to solve both technical
and humanitarian problems (how would you change people's habits if you
are just one FOSS community, and your opponent is a multi-billion
transnational corporation that can do literally anything in its
interests and avoid persecution?).

This stream of consciousness leads me to politics (our interests cannot
be protected if all important decisions are made by CEOs rather than
democratically), which doesn't really fit this list's topic, so I'll
stop here. I'd be happy to discuss it in private tho :)