Why I use the GPL and not cuck licenses | Hacker News Reader

Why I use the GPL and not cuck licenses

lukesmith.xyz

Don’t think my opinion has changed much since the last time this was posted on HN…

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46624402

Since the comment you linked to blatantly violates guidelines but is too old to moderate, I'm flagging this one instead.

The GPL isn't strict enough now that everyone has a copyright laundering machine at their disposal.

I've been experimenting with adding a "translation" clause in accordance with the GPL paragraph 7, where if by means of automatically translating the project to a different language (by transpiling or machine learning) the license is retained, but not necessarily the copyright.

So far I'm not happy with the results by Claude and ChatGPT. Probably I should talk to a lawyer.

The GPLv3 was largely invented to prevent tivoization, we need GPLv4 now to prevent copyright laundering.

If copyright isn't retained you have absolutely no rights relating to copyright. You can't make someone do something by writing a line in a contract they don't have to follow.

Fair point. Probably I should assert copyright on the translated work. In any case it ought to be part of the GPL. The current text is rather ambiguous.

I'm not a lawyer but I'd guess it has no legal effect. Either you hold a copyright in the translated work and telling someone of this fact doesn't change anything, or you don't and telling someone that you do is a silly lie.

However, it might stop some people from doing it anyway.

GPL allows you to attach additional permission notices and require them to be carried downstream. This is often used to carry MIT license notices when MIT software is used inside GPL, but you could also put something about how AI violates copyright if it's a "reasonable legal notice"...

What’s wrong with MIT?

Usually it's paired with an Apache license to prevent patent lawsuits but the problem was that anyone could make a proprietary fork and then actively steal your labor. For example Apple yoinking the BSD packet filter and wrapping their own proprietary license around enhancements.

With LLMs can we even legally license software because some projects like OpenBSD claim there is no international law yet for code not written by humans.

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