Is it free software?

Are you worried that somebody could use an LLM to "vibe-code" a competitor to PostgreSQL while it not looking like PostgreSQL, purely because the source is in the training set? What FOSS is out there that people would like to copy, don't feel like they can just get away with it but figure they can use an LLM to get around it?

What you are referring to with big companies I do see as a thing for purely creative works. To prevent LLMs and Stable Diffusion from producing video clips with X-Wing fighters and Mickey Mouse. Though to me it this feels more trademark than copyright related. ISTM non-commerical stuff should be allowed anyway.

But the value of copyright on source code has always been a bit weird. Code is mostly functional. For any given problem there really are only a few good solutions. Sure, you can split the functions up in different ways, the variables can have different names, you can use a different language. If you want to write a new program, in almost always you are not doing anything new, just doing what other people have done before, but framed in a different way.

The GPL is mostly a political tool. We don't care if the FreeBSD guys want to take the source of some driver the make a better driver for FreeBSD. Most of the code in the kernel is useless in any other context. We care that someone takes the Linux kernel as a whole. The tool we are given is copyright law, so we have the GPL.

If someone takes an algorithm in the Linux kernel and uses it in their own product, that's not copyright infringement. ISTM LLMs will mostly take the functional structure and ignore the literal text. There where their value is after all.

But maybe there is some risk to FOSS from LLMs that I'm missing. I'm just not seeing it.