I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark. [LWN.net]

I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark.

Posted Mar 27, 2026 20:48 UTC (Fri) by Kluge (subscriber, #2881)
In reply to: I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark. by koverstreet
Parent article: Vibe-coded ext4 for OpenBSD

> And here I was thinking open source and free software were about user freedom and just being able to tinker on things.

And yet "open source" and "free software" have different conceptions of those goals, different approaches to achieving them, and very often, different tactics, including software licenses.

For the life of me, I don't know why someone involved in a GPL'd project (and I appreciate your work in bringing a modern filesystem to Linux) would be dismissive of the idea that disregarding the license of other people's code (as happens in using a LLM) is unethical.

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I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark.

Posted Mar 27, 2026 20:56 UTC (Fri) by mb (subscriber, #50428) [Link] (2 responses)

>disregarding the license of other people's code (as happens in using a LLM) is unethical.

I frequently use knowledge obtained from Open Source and GPL code to implement functionality in proprietary software. I do not copy any code.

Is that unethical? If so, why?

I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark.

Posted Mar 28, 2026 9:19 UTC (Sat) by ceplm (subscriber, #41334) [Link] (1 responses)

Well, opinions may differ, about whether it is ethical or not, but at least it is certainly at least in general not illegal. Copyright protects only particular work not ideas behind that (for that we have patents and that’s yet another can of worms, but at least I can say that they are a way more limited exactly because of this).

To the above comment that somebody thought free software is all about freedom, not about copyright: I would suggest reading the “Free Culture” book by Lawrence Lessig (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Culture_%28book%29), even if you are not lawyer (or especially), it is very readable book, his style is very entertaining and encouraging. The main lesson from the book is I believe that appropriate copyright law greatly encourages and enables free culture, not the other way around.

Also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free-culture_movement

I can't help but feeling like if we're just going to be talking about copyright, we've jumped the shark.

Posted Mar 28, 2026 19:05 UTC (Sat) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

> Well, opinions may differ, about whether it is ethical or not, but at least it is certainly at least in general not illegal.

Actually, I'd argue the GPL itself says it's ethical. Not the black letter thereof, of course, but the surrounding stuff, the preamble and the four freedoms.

One of which is the freedom to study and learn ...

Cheers,
Wol