I have what may be a very ignorant question: if model-generated code may not be copyrighted due to a requirement of human authorship (current US Copyright Office policy), does it therefore follow that model-generated code may not be licensed under any terms whatsoever? Meaning anything from MIT to GPLv3?
I recognize no answers here would constitute legal advice, but I would love to hear from legal experts on this.




fhekland
in reply to Taggart • • •Licensing vs Copyright: Key Differences Creators Must Know
Rae Marie Manar (Copyright RPM)Taggart
in reply to fhekland • • •@fhekland
So if no copyright is possible, no license is possible?
Taggart
in reply to Taggart • • •@fhekland Hey @cwebber ☝️ this was really bothering me. If the current precedent stands, it's absolutely the case that no open source license is enforceable on generative code, as the copyright is a prerequisite for any license.
I imagine there's a test of amount still, like if most of the code is human-authored, you could still claim copyright. But for example, the tool I just made with Claude Code as an experiment? Full public domain, no terms available to me.
Christine Lemmer-Webber
in reply to Taggart • • •@fhekland Well, that's right, you can't *license* it, but the public domain is compatible with nearly every FOSS license
The problem is, *not every place has the public domain* and *we don't know that AI generated output will be considered in the public domain everywhere*
This was the motivation that lead to CC0, a public domain declaration with permissive fallback license
We simply *don't know* yet what the legal status of AIgen output is, sufficiently. If it was "public domain worldwide", you'd effectively be mixing its output with yours and contributing that, and it wouldn't likely be tthat big of a deal. For instance, it just might weaken some of the eligibility for coverage under copyleft, but not copyleft compatibility... same with propriettary licenses.
But we *don't know yet*!
Christine Lemmer-Webber
in reply to Christine Lemmer-Webber • • •Taggart
in reply to Christine Lemmer-Webber • • •@cwebber @fhekland Ah hey, thanks!
And yeah, this question was really to get at the "We don't know," related to your point a while ago about the danger of attempting to license generated code. Basically I wanted more citations on that claim, and it sure seems like the best case scenario is "We don't know," and the worst case scenario is "Almost certainly not licensable." Either way, definitely not safe for us in open source.
Violet Madder
in reply to Taggart • • •@cwebber @fhekland
Nothing is safe for anything or anybody!
And exactly WHO the heck is deciding to enforce WHAT these days, anyhow?
War crimes are fine, human trafficking is cool, but walking around in public not being white can get a person sent to some gulag-- and in the middle of this mess, megacorps making a complete mockery of fair use and what copyriggt shit we may or may not get hit with starts to feel like a circus act with spinning wheels and tossed knives...