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Comment by nineteen999 | Hacker News Reader

Preetham is the author of the paper that defines this algorithm from 1999:

  https://tommyhinks.com/2009/02/10/preetham-sky-model/

  https://tommyhinks.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/1999_a_practical_analytic_model_for_daylight.pdf

Rather than stolen from Mr. Preetham, it's much more likely this fragment is generated from a large number of Preetham algorithm implementations out there, eg. I know at least Blender and Unreal implement it and probably heaps of others was well.

Nobody is going to sue you for using their implementation of a skybox algorithm from 1999, give us break. It's so generic you can probably really only write it in a couple of different ways.

If youre worried about it you can always spend a day with Claude, ChatGPT and yourself looking for license infringements and clean up your code.

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> Nobody is going to sue you for using their implementation of a skybox algorithm from 1999, give us break.

For personal use maybe not, but that's not the point, the point is it's spitting out licensed code and not even letting you know. Now if you're a business who hire exclusively "vibe" coders with zero experience with enterprise software, now you're on the hook and most likely will be sued.

Do you have any evidence that it is spitting out licensed code? Did you locate an original that it was copied from?

This particular case appears to me to be a straight derivative at best but I'm by no means an expert on copyright laws.

That's not to say there hasn't already been more direct cases with set examples [1], from an author directly who would have a better right to claim than I [2], it's not even a stretch to see how it can happen.

[1] https://arxiv.org/html/2408.02487v3

[2] https://x.com/DocSparse/status/1581461734665367554

As discussed repeatedly in this thread already in this particular case the code at hand wasn't generated by an LLM at all, it was simply included from a dependency by the build system.

This seems like it could be the source: https://github.com/GPUOpen-LibrariesAndSDKs/Cauldron/blob/ma...

If true, then this usage could violate its MIT License: "The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software."

The file seems to have been copied verbatim, more or less. But without the copyright info

> implementation of a skybox algorithm from 1999

How would you know? Do you have another AI scan for copyright violations? In terms of a false negative how are disputes resolved?

Seems like a massive attack surface for copyright trolls.

> Seems like a massive attack surface for copyright trolls.

If you think any court system in the world has the capacity to deal with the sheer amount an LLM code can emit in an hour and audit for alleged copyright infringements ... I think we're trying to close the barn door now that the horse is already on a ship that has sailed.

This is a terrible argument, just because of the way the legal system works.

If MegaCorp has massive $$$$, but everyone else has small $, then MegaCorp can sue anyone else for using "their" code, that was supposedly generated by an LLM. Most of the time, it won't even get to court. The repo, the program, the whatever-they-want will get taken down way before that.

Courts don't work by saying, "oh, but everyone is doing it! Not much we can do now."

Someone brings a case and they, very laboriously, start to address it on its merits. Even before that, costs are accumulating on both sides.

Copyright trolls are mostly not MegaCorps, but they are abusers of the legal system. They won't target Google, but you, with your repo that does something that minorly annoys them? You are fair game.

> Courts don't work by saying, "oh, but everyone is doing it! Not much we can do now."

No, but they do recognise when their case registrations are filling up in a way that they cannot possibly process and make adjustments. Courts do not have an infinite capacity.

There's a really simple solution that you may not have considered:

1) don't put your vibe-coded source code in a public git repo, keep it in a local one, with y'know, authentication in front of it;

2) regularly ask your agents to review the code for potential copyright infringements if you either want to release the source or compiled code to the public at any point.

As long as you've followed best practices, I can't see why this is really going to become an issue. Most copyright infringements need to start with Cease & Desist anyway or they'll be thrown out of court. The alleged offender has to be given the opportunity to make good.

So "Claude, we received a C&D for this section of code you stole from https://.../ , you need to make a unique implementation that does not breach their copyright".

You will be surprised how easily this can be resolved.

Just to push the point further I was making about the courts, I came upon this article a couple hours later: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn5lxg2l0lqo

> Courts don't work by saying, "oh, but everyone is doing it! Not much we can do now."

They kind of do. If you fail to bring legal action to guard your intellectual property, and there’s a pattern of you not guarding it, then in future cases this can be used against you when determining damages etc. Weakens your case.

Downvoting won’t make it untrue lol.

This is only true of trademarks, not copyrights (which was the discussion here).

Trademarks can become 'generic' if you don't defend them. But JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter, whether she sues fanfic authors or not, and can selectively enforce her copyright as she likes.

In the US you can't sue without having obtained or applied for a registration. If the registration does not grant, you cannot sue. You cannot get a registration for code developed by AI.

It's taken from a threejs example: https://github.com/mrdoob/three.js/blob/dev/examples/jsm/obj...

Seems fine given the project is already using threejs and so will have to include license info for it already.

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