Is it OK to run software written with the help of AI/LLMs on the Fediverse?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@reiver Yes, it's really interesting to see the difference. Maybe your phrasing, suggesting being neighbourly and helpful, brought out a different feeling in people?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@reiver Or maybe they read "help them" as "help them see the error of their ways"?

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@mmm_kay LOL

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@arthfach Why?

[fluentmoheshwar@mastodon.social]

@evan Yes, but with legitimate purposes such as automating posts from other platforms

[dan_turner@cosocial.ca]

@evan Canadians have contributed a lot of open source software where their only ask is to be properly credited, and that's being completely disregarded. Add in the fact that many (most?) LLM companies are run by companies that openly support Donald Trump, so using them is funding groups who want to strip Canadians of our sovereignty to steal from our neighbours.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@arthfach

What I'm hearing, I think, is roughly this: there are several reasons AI-assisted software is bad (provenance, skill atrophy, politics of AI companies, environmental impact listed, but there are more).

These are severe enough that AI-assisted software is materially different than other kinds of undesirable software, like proprietary software. One doesn't want such software to exist at all, on or off the Fediverse.

Is that about right?

@xgranade @mcc

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@arthfach Thanks, that's kind.

[evan@cosocial.ca]

@arthfach @xgranade @mcc

One thing we do on open networks is have kind of a live-and-let-live attitude towards software we don't like. Like, one might not like proprietary software, but one doesn't keep people using it from being on the Internet or on the Web.

In this case, I think you're saying, there's a combination of two factors. First, the Fediverse is not that kind of network -- we have shared values that we want to enforce. And second, AI-assisted software is too problematic to allow.

[davidgerard@circumstances.run]

@arthfach @evan @xgranade @mcc i am confident he knows all this and absolutely does not give a shit

[mcc@mastodon.social]

@evan @Arthfach @xgranade Most software is not based on stealing the commons and polluting the earth. Most software can be coexisted with because it does not destroy things around it by existing (scraper DDOS, people withholding things from publication because licenses can no longer be used to limit commerical exploitation, elimination of non-model-based software, mandatory infusion of "AI" into major platforms). "AI" does in fact knock things that are not "AI" off the web.

[reiver@mastodon.social]

@evan

Well, your poll reminded me about my poll.

Which reminded me to make something to help people who want to use LLM AI tools to create Fediverse software.

GitHub - reiver/vibefed: A Fediverse & ActivityPub plugin for those wishing to use LLM coding tools for the Fediverse and the Social Web.

A Fediverse & ActivityPub plugin for those wishing to use LLM coding tools for the Fediverse and the Social Web. - reiver/vibefed

GitHub (github.com)

(I've never created a Claude plugin before. So, this is new for me. But, it seems straightforward — it is just a git repo with a certain structure.)

There is A LOT more knowledge that needs to be added to it. And maybe some other stuff, too.

[reiver@mastodon.social]

@evan

BTW, I remember us talking about ActivityPub previews before.

And that Mastodon wasn't handling it well.

In your view, how should previews be handled from an ActivityPub point of view?

(I can add that as a skill to vibefed.)