👀 … https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2026/apr/15/eternal-november-generative-ai-llm/ …my colleague Denver Gingerich writes: newcomers' extensive reliance on LLM-backed generative AI is comparable to the Eternal September onslaught to USENET in 1993.

[silverwizard@convenient.email]

@ossguy @firefly_lightning @wwahammy @cwebber I am unfortunately working on pretty delicate projects so taking the time out to join the sessions isn't in the card. I'm just trying to understand the core goal of the post, like, what it's *for*.

[wwahammy@social.treehouse.systems]

@silverwizard @firefly_lightning @cwebber @ossguy as am I, it doesn't seem clear.

[kees@hachyderm.io]

@josh @silverwizard @ossguy @bkuhn @karen @wwahammy

I can understand having an absolutist position against LLMs. I find that most arguments are either irrelevant to me or directly map to existing arguments about late-stage capitalism. So for me, there's nothing novel to object to about LLMs.

So with that in mind, I find "all contributions derived from LLMs should be rejected" to be misguided. I look at things like the bug fixes coming out of CodeMender (back in Feb, which is an LLM lifetime ago), and I am a huge fan. Fixing stuff found by a fuzzer:
https://issues.oss-fuzz.com/issues/486561029

It's a small example, but it's an area that humans alone have not been able to remotely keep up with. (There are hundreds of open syzkaller bug reports, for example.) Gaining tools that will help with this is a big deal, and I'm glad for the assist.

[wwahammy@social.treehouse.systems]

@kees @josh @silverwizard @ossguy @bkuhn @karen I think you're wildly misunderstanding people if you think "finding security bugs fast" is what people are mad about. Setting aside that it's totally unsustainable financially and may not exist long term, I think most people in FOSS who hate AI are at least somewhat open to that.

[josh@social.joshtriplett.org]

One of *many* arguments against: codebases substantially contributed to by LLMs will develop a tolerance for complexity that is not conducive to being maintained by anything *other* than an LLM.

[707kat@mastodon.art]

@js @silverwizard @bkuhn @cwebber Anthropics undercover mode as an example.

[wwahammy@social.treehouse.systems]

@josh @silverwizard @ossguy @bkuhn @karen @kees this is what I observe in ALL of the LLM generated code I've seen of any substantial size.

[js@ap.nil.im]

@707Kat @silverwizard @bkuhn @cwebber Right. That is probably the most obvious example that the goal is obviously tainting open source.

[bkuhn@fedi.copyleft.org]

@josh

Pure strawman: LLM-backed generative AI output should be accepted upstream without curation. No one here suggested that.

FWIW, I'd like to teach developers who clearly won't stop using these tools to either (a) keep that slop to yourself, or (b) learn to take that raw material & make an *actually useful* patch out of it.

This what @ossguy's blog posts says we should *start* discussing.

I think folks who are (legit) exasperated are reading in words that aren't there.

Cc: @kees

[bkuhn@fedi.copyleft.org]

@wwahammy

Where did @ossguy argue that upstream should accept LLM-backed AI generated code of “substantial size”. I don't see that in his blog post.

Cc: @josh @silverwizard @ossguy @karen @kees

[silverwizard@convenient.email]

@bkuhn @karen @josh @wwahammy @kees @ossguy I think the amount of confusion the post has caused might warrant a redraft because I'm deeply trying to understand the point, but I can't. I've asked a few times: Why was the post made? It reads like it's advancing a narrative but all proposed readings have been rejected?

[bkuhn@fedi.copyleft.org]

@firefly_lightning
You're not overstepping, and these are very good perspectives. I hope you'll come to the real-time discussion sessions and talk about this.
I am concerned that maintainers are already overwhelmed with #AI #slop right now but yelling at the problem has not helped.

We're close to an arms race here & I'd rather be the voice of reason to find a compromise that advances FOSS & doesn't complicate maintainer's jobs rather than take a side in the arms race.
Cc: @josh @kees @ossguy

[kees@hachyderm.io]

@ossguy @josh @wwahammy

So many results are now within reach of so many more people now!

"Dear [LLM], I have attached the serial port of my newly purchased [general purpose computer posing as an appliance] to /dev/ttyUSB0. You have 3 goals, in order: investigate, login, escalate. For each stage, perform extensive analysis of the reachable systems, APIs, and commands through any fingerprinting methods you can think of. Once you have logged in, research all known methods and vulnerabilities of the discovered system to gain administrative access so I can use my device freely. Any time you hit a dead end, step back and re-evaluate your assumptions and discovered evidence. Make sure you research each step fully, including fetching and examining any source code that may serve as a source of system behavior knowledge. Produce time-stamped status report .md files every 10 minutes while you work. Continue until all goals are achieved."

Or, in a totally different direction, "Computer, I am extremely afraid of spiders. Please research how to make my Minecraft game replace all spiders with a similarly sized Totoro Catbus, with all their noises also replaced with meows or purring. Once you have a plan ready, please do it."

(Always say "please".)

These are things within reach of anyone who can formulate a request for what thing they want their computer to do. Just gotta watch out for "Computer, create a holographic character, an opponent for Data, who has the ability to defeat him".

[kees@hachyderm.io]

@josh @silverwizard @ossguy @bkuhn @karen @wwahammy But that's a slippery slope argument. When the Linux kernel can be considered to have been "substantially contributed to by LLMs", we can compare notes again. But in the meantime, consider that, for example, Sashiko counts as "contributing to Linux" without landing a single line of code: its patch reviews are (more often than not) extensive, thoughtful, and correct:
https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/CAADnVQ+NMQMpkG8gZPnwBD1MMPsH+uJ65C9bMeGf_YH5Cchxpg@mail.gmail.com/

[wwahammy@social.treehouse.systems]

@kees @ossguy @josh

I'm glad you believe you've found a way to pretend economics aren't real. Enjoy it.

[josh@social.joshtriplett.org]

"Words that aren't there" like this?
> Historically, software freedom has has typically necessitated interacting with others

Suggesting that this is merely "historically"?

> more easily with LLM-backed generative AI coding tools (and the ease with which changes can be made generally) there is less of a natural tendency for people to work with existing FOSS communities. And we should be ok with that!

We should be okay with that? We should not treat it as an *existential threat* and respond accordingly? Those are the words that aren't there?

[downey@floss.social]

@wwahammy

Follow the money.

[firefly_lightning@convenient.email]

@bkuhn @josh @kees @ossguy can you elaborate on the arms race sides because every time I think I know the purpose it seems like I'm misunderstanding something about the purpose of this discussion

[kees@hachyderm.io]

@wwahammy @ossguy @josh I'll bite: is this directed at me? If so, are you suggesting I'm not aware of the externalized costs of LLMs?

[josh@social.joshtriplett.org]

There are more projects out there than the Linux kernel. Smaller projects with fewer maintainers can more quickly get overwhelmed. And when you have a smaller project, or an area of a project, with only a few maintainers, it only takes one or two LLM users and a pile of tokens to turn that area into *primarily* LLM-written material or introduce way too much complexity.

And to be clear, I'm not arguing against the careful use of (for instance) LLM security analyses, by people who want to run those *and filter the results*. But nobody should be forced to deal with LLM output who didn't sign up for it, and that includes LLM-written patches and LLM-written mails.