Re: [MAINTAINERS SUMMIT] Annotating patches containing AI-assisted code

["Paul E. McKenney" <paulmck@kernel.org>]

On Tue, Aug 12, 2025 at 01:12:48PM -0400, Steven Rostedt wrote:
> On Tue, 12 Aug 2025 18:17:46 +0200
> Krzysztof Kozlowski <krzk@kernel.org> wrote:
> 
> > > Applying a patch containing the first tag might not be wise, either,
> > > depending on the outcome of a number of lawsuits currently in flight.
> > > Plus there are a lot of other countries that might choose to weigh in.  
> > 
> > Yes, that's what I wanted to imply. At least person applying the patch
> > and then later sending in pull request to next maintainer could not use
> > excuse "I did not know, that Assisted-by causes legal risk".
> 
> Once you add your SoB, it means "You know". As described in the Submitting
> Patches documentation:
> 
>   Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1 
>   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ 
> 
>   By making a contribution to this project, I certify that:
> 
>         (a) The contribution was created in whole or in part by me and I
>             have the right to submit it under the open source license
>             indicated in the file; or
> 
>         (b) The contribution is based upon previous work that, to the best
>             of my knowledge, is covered under an appropriate open source
>             license and I have the right under that license to submit that
>             work with modifications, whether created in whole or in part
>             by me, under the same open source license (unless I am
>             permitted to submit under a different license), as indicated
>             in the file; or 
> 
>         (c) The contribution was provided directly to me by some other
>             person who certified (a), (b) or (c) and I have not modified
>             it.
> 
>         (d) I understand and agree that this project and the contribution
>             are public and that a record of the contribution (including all
>             personal information I submit with it, including my sign-off) is
>             maintained indefinitely and may be redistributed consistent with
>             this project or the open source license(s) involved.
> 
>   then you just add a line saying::
>  
>         Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.example.org>
> 
> 
> If you add your SOB and then find out later that your AI tool added some
> code that was not allowed, then you broke (a) and (b), and I believe you
> are legally liable because your SoB means "You know". If you don't know,
> then you should *not* be submitting the code.

Couldn't have said it better myself, thank you!

							Thanx, Paul