Description
GitHub (GH), now under the ownership of Microsoft, uses all code (and probably everything else published to it, such as issue reports, etc.) to feed various machine learning models such as Copilot.
Researches have found Copliot to suggest legally significant amounts of code to its users verbatim, and without referencing where the code comes from. It neither attributes authorship nor links to the original code, although it often presents an identical copy of a given source code to the user. Doing so violates various free software licenses, such as the AGPL, which is what Music Blocks is licensed under.
So many projects on GH, Music Blocks included, began before Microsoft's purchase of GH (and their subsequent decision to feed the entire corpus of work published to it to a machine learning algorithm).
I have given this much thought over the past few months, and I really think that what GH+Microsoft did is unfair and would have been easily avoidable. They could have at the very least designed Copilot to cite sources of code for any code suggestions given to a user. But they didn't. Better yet, they could have asked the community whose code is published on GH for input prior to deploying such a "product." But they didn't.
At any rate, I wanted to express these thoughts here. I don't want anyone to get the idea that, by currently contributing to code on GH, I am giving some sort of implicit permission or endorsement of something like Copilot that exploits people's work without following the basic rules that govern our community. Just because something is "innovative" or "futuristic" or under the direction of some mega-business doesn't mean it can flout the rules.
I know that SugarLabs chose to put its code on GH with the hope that more new contributors may be able to join and learn programming, but I did have my doubts about suggesting a proprietary platform (especially to newcomers). Now that we have seen things like Copilot become manifest, I feel that my original doubts have unfortunately been justified.
Note: Opinions expressed here are my own, and do not necessary reflect opinions of any employer or group affiliation I have.