Hacker Timesnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

We have seen Co-Pilot directly output (https://docs.github.com/en/github/copilot/research-recitatio...) the zen of python when prompted - there's no reason it wouldn't write the Psalms exactly when prompted in the right manner.


That's super cool. As long as you do the things you specify at the bottom of that doc (provide attribution if copied so people can know if it's OK to use) then a lot of the concerns of people on these threads are going to be resolved.


Pretty much! There's only three major fears remaining

* Co-pilot fails to detect it, and you have a potential lawsuit/ethical concern when someone finds out. Although the devil on my shoulder says that if Co-pilot didn't detect it, what's to say another tool will?

* Co-pilot reuses code in a way that still violates copyright, but is difficult to detect. I.e. If you checked via a syntax tree, you'd notice that the code was the same, but if you looked at it as raw text, you wouldn't.

* Purely ethical - is it right to take licensed code and condense it into a product, without having to take into account the wishes of the original creators? It might be treated as normal that other coders will read it, and pick up on it, but when these licenses were written no one saw products like this coming about. They never assumed that a single person could read all their code, memorise it, and quote it near-verbatim on command.


> Purely ethical - is it right to take licensed code and condense it into a product, without having to take into account the wishes of the original creators? It might be treated as normal that other coders will read it, and pick up on it, but when these licenses were written no one saw products like this coming about. They never assumed that a single person could read all their code, memorise it, and quote it near-verbatim on command.

It's gonna be really interesting to see how this plays out.




Consider applying for YC's Summer 2026 batch! Applications are open till May 4

Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: