Don’t get me wrong, GitHub Copilot sounds awesome. I love the idea of an AI giving me code suggestions (how cool). What’s not awesome is that free/open code was used to create a closed/proprietary data model and tools that will once again enrich Big Tech douchebags like Musk.
@aral GPL'd code.

Collected into a giant data set.

Fed through Machine Learning.

Output by Copilot.

To generate proprietary software.

It's a new formula for value extraction from the commons. In the old days GPL violations were common, but blatant. Now they will be much more obfuscated, so that there's a lot less legal risk for extractors.
@bob Yeah, it’s just old school enclosure. The same old reason Big Tech loves open source to begin with (and hates “share alike”). Now with added Machine Learning™.

@aral I would never ever trust an AI to write code. This most likely will introduce more headache for maintainers than inexperienced contributors because they usually at least know what they are doing. Now there's convenient way to get snippets that you might not even understand.

Other thing is that it vendor locks you on GH, if people at Github/Microsoft really wanted to help, it would be better to release this as a self-contained (preferably FOSS) tool.

@aral Isn't this kind of thing exactly what could be expected after GitHub was bought by Big Tech?

#ChooseYourHost #GithubIsMicrosoft #Codeberg

@mray Yeah. And before. Remember, GitHub was always Big Tech.

@aral
I can hear Kent Beck vomiting in his mouth ... across the pond 🤮

I thought the Bullshit-Bingo-Card could NOT get any bigger ... I was wrong ... again :-/

@aral I have been years trying to understand why a lot of people are working on "AI & Machine Learning" just to lose their job... 🤔
Aral Balkan (@[email protected])

13.6K Posts, 3.21K Following, 8.35K Followers · I make Small Tech.