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Cake day: 2023年7月4日

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  • The reasons it's a problem (spoiler, click to expand)

    The Licensing Problem:

    Unknowingly using potentially copyrighted code from an LLM in a FLOSS project opens it up to being sued for infringement, which most FLOSS devs can’t afford to fight, especially in the US’s current extremely pro-corporate courts.

    It’s putting a target on your back for down the road when it becomes profitable for patent trolls to use AI to try to scan for copyrighted code on public code bases. Big tech companies could do the same to squash an open source competitor.

    Both Haiku OS and BSD are not allowing AI code contributions for this very reason.

    The Ethical problem:

    Simply using an AI that’s run on a corporate data centers encourages the construction of yet more data centers, with all of the environmental/climate negatives they bring, as well as local harms they induce on the people living near them, such as increased electricity rates.

    Using corporate AI directly helps the financial situations of the big tech companies that host them (by boosting usage/user numbers, they are able to attract more investment capital), most of which are owned by right-wing CEO’s who are more than willing to collaborate with and fund fascist governments to ensure that they are not regulated in search of both maximum profits. Some of these companies, such as Nvidia, Palantir and Oracle, genuinely appear to be seeking to use these tools for what would previously be considered crackpot conspiracy theory levels of public control and surveillance.

    But if someone is absolutely determined to use them regardless, I would hope they either use a locally run LLM, or use a distributed model like AI Horde, as at the very least that does not encourage the construction of corporate data centers nor boost their financial prospects.



  • The problem is both using LLM code in an open-source project due to the threat that poses to unknowing copyright infringement, as as well as the very real ethical concerns inherent to using corporate owned and hosted LLM models.

    The problems in detail (spoiler, click to expand)

    The Licensing Problem:

    Unknowingly using potentially copyrighted code from an LLM in a FLOSS project opens it up to being sued for infringement, which most FLOSS devs can’t afford to fight, especially in the US’s current extremely pro-corporate courts.

    It’s putting a target on your back for down the road when it becomes profitable for patent trolls to use AI to try to scan for copyrighted code on public code bases. Big tech companies could do the same to squash an open source competitor.

    The Ethical problem:

    Simply using an AI that’s run on a corporate data centers encourages the construction of yet more data centers, with all of the environmental/climate negatives they bring, as well as local harms they induce on the people living near them, such as increased electricity rates.

    Using corporate AI directly helps the financial situations of the big tech companies that host them (by boosting usage/user numbers, they are able to attract more investment capital), most of which are owned by right-wing CEO’s who are more than willing to collaborate with and fund fascist governments to ensure that they are not regulated in search of both maximum profits. Some of these companies, such as Nvidia, Palantir and Oracle, genuinely appear to be seeking to use these tools for what would previously be considered crackpot conspiracy theory levels of public control and surveillance.

    But if someone is absolutely determined to use them regardless, I would hope they either use a locally run LLM, or use a distributed model like AI Horde, as at the very least that does not encourage the construction of corporate data centers nor boost their financial prospects.







  • It’s definitely worth buying used wherever possible, and to repair electronics whenever possible to avoid unnecessary consumption (part of why Right to Repair is so important). Similarly, it’s quite beneficial to switch to plant-based meats to avoid both unnecessary animal suffering and the carbon emissions and resource wastage that goes with industrial animal production (especially as those resources become more and more scarce due to poor crop yields and drought from climate change).

    It’s often not possible to do either of those things 100%, such as it not being possible to be completely vegan/vegetarian due to a family member that isn’t on board with it, but it’s still beneficial to do what they can, even if it’s only 20, 30, or 50%.

    Corporate AI usage, on the other hand, is one of those things that truly is completely avoidable with virtually no effort, and was something we all got along fine without just a few years ago. There are even more ethical self-hosted or decentralized non-corporate alternatives.

    Someone deciding to ignore the harmful externalities of corporate AI is making a choice to prioritize their own convenience over helping prevent our planet from becoming extremely unpleasant for billions of people and animals to live on, or the financing of a fascist surveillance state.











  • Besides the potential risk of unknowable copyright infringement and the dangers that poses to FLOSS projects as I mentioned in another comment here:

    Simply using an AI that’s run on a corporate data centers encourages the construction of yet more data centers, with all of the environmental/climate negatives they bring, as well as local harms they induce on the people living near them, such as increased electricity rates.

    Using corporate AI directly helps the financial situations of the big tech companies that host them (by boosting usage/user numbers, they are able to attract more investment capital), most of which are owned by right-wing CEO’s who are more than willing to collaborate with and fund fascist governments to ensure that they are not regulated in search of both maximum profits. Some of these companies, such as Nvidia, Palantir and Oracle, genuinely appear to be seeking to use these tools for what would previously be considered crackpot conspiracy theory levels of public control and surveillance.

    But if someone is absolutely determined to use them regardless, I would hope they either use a locally run LLM, or use a distributed model like AI Horde, as at the very least that does not encourage the construction of corporate data centers nor boost their financial prospects.