Re: Guidelines for pre-trained ML model weight binaries (Was re: Where should we put machine learning model parameters?)

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hello,

Simon Tournier <zimon.toutoune@gmail.com> skribis:

> On sam., 13 mai 2023 at 12:13, 宋文武 <iyzsong@envs.net> wrote:
>
>> Hello, zamfofex submited a package 'lc0', Leela Chess Zero” (a chess
>> engine) with ML model, also it turn out that we already had 'stockfish'
>> a similiar one with pre-trained model packaged.  Does we reached a
>> conclusion (so lc0 can also be accepted)?  Or should we remove 'stockfish'?
>
> Well, I do not know if we have reached a conclusion.  From my point of
> view, both can be included *if* their licenses are compatible with Free
> Software – included the weights (pre-trained model) as licensed data.

We discussed it in 2019:

  https://issues.guix.gnu.org/36071

This LWN article on the debate that then took place in Debian is
insightful:

  https://lwn.net/Articles/760142/

To me, there is no doubt that neural networks are a threat to user
autonomy: hard to train by yourself without very expensive hardware,
next to impossible without proprietary software, plus you need that huge
amount of data available to begin with.

As a project, we don’t have guidelines about this though.  I don’t know
if we can come up with general guidelines or if we should, at least as a
start, look at things on a case-by-case basis.

Ludo’.