# GitHub & other LLM-gen-AI Companies Urge You to Misdirect California Legislature on FOSS Licensing!

> Source: <https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2026/jul/03/github-gen-ai-california-22757-ok-for-foss-license/>
> Published: 2026-07-03 17:06:36+00:00

*A blog post from Software Freedom Conservancy.*

*Blog post by Bradley M. Kühn. Please email any comments on this entry to <bkuhn@sfconservancy.org>.*

Last week, Microsoft's GitHub[ 1](https://sfconservancy.org/feeds/omnibus/#return-microsoft-wholly-owns-github-anti-copyleft) announced they'd joined a coalition of other
LLM-gen-AI
for-profit entities who oppose updates to the California Artificial Intelligence Transparency Act (“Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 22757”). In

Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code §22757 (and its updates currently under debate in [the current session's SB 1000](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billCompareClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260SB1000&showamends=false)) are — like most legislation we see around new technologies in
USA State and Commonwealth legislatures — well meaning and seeks reasonable
goals, but remains confused about some details that are obvious to those who deeply understand the technology.
Regardless, the law's aim is good policy. Definitely
[read through its interesting terms](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billCompareClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260SB1000&showamends=false)
found in the amended
§§22757.{1,2,3(a)} proposed in SB 1000. I suspect anyone who
uses a for-profit, proprietary
LLM-gen-AIs
(perhaps by choice, or perhaps under mandate from their employer) would strongly prefer
LLM-gen-AI vendors to provide the tools and information that §22757
mandates.

These policy goals — mandating transparency and allowing users to
“trust but verify” these systems — are precisely the
requirements that we want deployed widely for any LLM-gen-AI. SFC's
[own recommendations on LLM-gen-AI](https://sfconservancy.org/llm-gen-ai/llm-backed-generative-ai-recommendations.html), in fact, correlate with and encourage “after market” implementation of some of §22757's requirements. While this law is of course not written the way
technology policy wonks would likely write it, on balance, the law
is a good one.

Of course, GitHub, Mozilla, Hugging Face, Black Forest Labs, (and likely other companies) hate this law. It requires them to do work to treat their users better. No one in the business of proprietary technology wants to do any more of that than is absolutely necessary to keep the customer. After all, it cuts into profits if companies do anything nice for their users that the customers have not directly demanded through a contractual requirement.

These for-profit corporations use
misdirection and disinformation to convince the public that this
law is bad for
FOSS. Cal. Bus. &
Prof. Code §22757 (both as on-the-books now, and as proposed for amendment)
is **not bad for FOSS**, and, is generally *good* for the software right to repair.

Complaints regarding SB 1000 from Big Tech (and their cronies) focus on a narrow point in the amendments (found in §22757.3(b)(1-3)). Herein, I analyze this clause, and refute these companies' falsehoods about how it impacts FOSS. The key portion found in the proposed-amended §22757.3(b)(1-3) reads:

[22757.3](b)On the surface, their argument that claims that text contradicts the irrevocability of FOSS licenses has truthiness. Nevertheless, their argument is sophistry. Here's why:

- If a covered provider licenses its GenAI system to a third party, the covered provider shall require both of the following as terms of the license:

- That the system remains in compliance with this chapter, to the extent it is technically feasible.
- That the covered provider may revoke, suspend, or terminate the licensee’s authorization to use the GenAI system if the licensee modifies the GenAI system such that it no longer complies with this chapter.

- If a covered provider knows that an identifiable third-party licensee modified a licensed GenAI system such that it no longer complies with this chapter, the covered provider shall terminate the licensee’s authorization to use the GenAI system within 72 hours of discovering the licensee’s action.
- A third-party licensee shall cease using or making available a licensed GenAI system, including a copy or modified version of the GenAI system, after the licensee’s authorization to use the GenAI system has been terminated by the covered provider pursuant to paragraph (2).
- This subdivision does not require a covered provider to monitor, investigate, or otherwise inquire into a third-party licensee’s use or modification of a licensed GenAI system.

SFC called
our [statement seeking a FOSS-friendly LLM-gen-AI system](https://sfconservancy.org/news/2024/oct/25/aspirational-on-llm-generative-ai-programming/)
**aspirational** *precisely because none of the currently deployed LLM-gen-AIs
in wide use are anywhere near FOSS*. The portions installed on the
users' computers are of course, proprietary. Those on-system UIs are thin layers that
access a service (via an API) — which lives on some server running trade-secret software.
Unsurprisingly, GitHub's statement gives not a single example of a
specific LLM-gen-AI whose distribution is already thwarted by the
existing Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code §22757, nor one that
was *not* thwarted by the existing law but *would be
thwarted* if the amendments in SB
1000 are adopted. They didn't name one **because there isn't one!**.

While non-copyleft licenses such as the MIT and 3-Clause-BSD licenses are
indeed irrevocable, they also permit redistributors of the software to
impose additional terms that are not accounted for in the upstream license text.
Therefore, *even if* Microsoft's GitHub were to release all of Copilot (model, server-side code, on-system UI) under the MIT
license, they could do so with an additional term that complied with either formulation of
Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 22757.

I highly doubt that Microsoft, GitHub or the other entities (who deploy these systems in California) would ever willingly release one of their LLM-gen-AIs under a copyleft license. However, even if they did, the GPL Agreements already account for such situations.

First, nothing in SB 1000's amended § 2757.{1,2,3(a)}) conflicts or
contradicts anything in any version of the GPL Agreements. Any entity that might someday
release a GPL'd LLM-gen-AI can both simultaneously *comply with GPL's
requirements* **and** meet all the requirements in
§2757.{1,2,3(a)}). Nothing in GPL prohibits a redistributor from doing
extra nice things for their customers and users *beyond copyleft* — as long as they don't
directly contradict a requirement already in the GPL.

SB 1000 2757.3(b) requires some complex analysis, but causes
no problem. All versions of the GPL Agreements had to
consider that software patent licensing might impose additional
restrictions outside of the GPL. Specifically, the GPL has no real
mechanism to force a third
party[ 2](https://sfconservancy.org/feeds/omnibus/#return-patent-license-gpl)
who has never copied, modified, distributed, installed, and/or deployed the GPL'd
software to issue a GPL-compatible patent license. All versions of the GPL
Agreements therefore have a catch-all clause to deal with situations where
external conditions make it impossible to comply with the license. Here's
that clause from GPLv3:

12. … If conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot convey a covered work so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not convey it at all. For example, if you agree to terms that obligate you to collect a royalty for further conveying from those to whom you convey the Program, the only way you could satisfy both those terms and this License would be to refrain entirely from conveying the Program.

This clause was specifically designed to catch situations like we have with Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 2757.3(c) (and SB 1000 §2757.3(b)'s amendments). Imagine that this series of exceedingly unlikely events come to pass. Some Big Tech company:

condition imposed onthis company that

contradict[s] the conditions of [the GPLv3]. This company now

cannot convey [the] covered work so as to satisfy simultaneously [their] objections under [GPLv3] and … other pertinent obligationsimposed by §2757.3. The GPL Agreements planned for this possibility: in the end, GPLv3 requires everyone in the distribution chain from the original company down to all its licensees to stop conveying the work. (NB: GPLv2§7 is nearly identical to GPLv3§12.)

Furthermore, note that the GPL Agreements *terminate on their own*
when any entity in the distribution chain violates any term —
including GPLv3§12 / GPLv2§7. So, yes, GPL Agreements *are* irrevocable,
but *only as long as everyone remains in compliance with the
license*. Termination for reasons of non-compliance is fully accounted for, and thus the SB 1000 changes to Cal Bus. & Prof. Code § 22757.3, despite GitHub's misdirection, *actually make the law more copyleft-compatible* by changing the term ”revoke” to ”terminate“ — which tracks GPL's language exactly!

Even if the analysis above fails, and a Court rules that there is an irreconcilable incompatibility in California between the GPL Agreements and Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 22757 (as it currently stands, or as amended by SB 1000), a simple addition to GPLv3§7 can account for this. That section, entitled Additional Terms is designed to explicitly incorporate pro-user policy terms that might not be explicitly available in GPL Agreements. Regardless, there is no need to rush to update the GPL Agreements on this front, as the above analysis likely holds.

Below we include our own template letter that we urge you to download, modify into your own words, and send it to Senator FIXME. It's particularly important to do this if you live or work in California, and be sure to Cc your own senator as well.

[Letter coming in about 30 minutes, check back soon. ]

[ 1](https://sfconservancy.org/feeds/omnibus/#return-microsoft-wholly-owns-github) In June 2018,

[ 2](https://sfconservancy.org/feeds/omnibus/#footnote-patent-license-gpl) Various terms of the GPL
Agreements can bind patent holders in various ways to keep the code safe
from patent infringement claims for downstream users