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I don't appreciate his politeness and hedging. So many projects now walk on eggshells so as not to disrupt sponsor flow or employment prospects. "These tradeof

by brhaeh 7mo ago

I don't appreciate his politeness and hedging. So many projects now walk on eggshells so as not to disrupt sponsor flow or employment prospects. "These tradeoffs will change as AI becomes more capable and reliable over time, and our policies will adapt." That just legitimizes AI and basically continues the race to the bottom. Rob Pike had the correct response when spammed by a clanker.

latexr 7mo ago
> Rob Pike had the correct response when spammed by a clanker. Source and HN discussion, for those unfamiliar: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:vsgr3rwyckhiavgqzdcuzm6i/post/3matwg6w3ic2s https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:vsgr3rwyckhiavgqzdcuzm6i/po... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46392115 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46392115
fresh_broccoli 7mo ago
>So many projects now walk on eggshells so as not to disrupt sponsor flow or employment prospects. In my experience, open-source maintainers tend to be very agreeable, conflict-avoidant people. It has nothing to do with corporate interests. Well, not all of them, of course, we all know some very notable exceptions. Unfortunately, some people see this welcoming attitude as an invite to be abusive.
- mixologic 7mo ago
  Yes, Linus Torvalds is famously agreeable.
  - zero_shift 7mo ago
    That's why he succeeded
  - cortesoft 7mo ago
    > Well, not all of them, of course, we all know some very notable exceptions.
- doctorpangloss 7mo ago
  the venn diagram of people who love the abuse of maintaining an open source project and people who will write sincere text back to something called an OpenClaw Agent: it's the same circle. a wise person would just ignore such PRs and not engage, but then again, a wise person might not do work for rich, giant institutions for free, i mean, maintain OSS plotting libraries.
  - nativeit 7mo ago
    So what’s the alternative to OSS libraries, Captain Wisdom?
    - doctorpangloss 7mo ago
      we live in a crazy time where 9 of every 10 new repos being posted to github have some sort of newly authored solutions without importing dependencies to nearly everything. i don't think those are good solutions, but nonetheless, it's happening. this is a very interesting conversation actually, i think LLMs satisfy the actual demand that OSS satisfies, which is software that costs nothing, and if you think about that deeply there's all sorts of interesting ways that you could spend less time maintaining libraries for other people to not pay you for them.
- co_king_3 7mo ago
  Nothing has convinced me that Linus Torvalds' approach is justified like the contemporary onslaught of AI spam and idiocy has. AI users should fear verbal abuse and shame.
  - CoastalCoder 7mo ago
    Perhaps a more effective approach would be for their users to face the exact same legal liabilities as if they had hand-written such messages? (Note that I'm only talking about messages that cross the line into legally actionable defamation, threats, etc. I don't mean anything that's merely rude or unpleasant.)
    - eshaham78 7mo ago
      [dead]
      - pixl97 7mo ago
        >which would be a tragedy for anonymity. Yea, in this world the cryptography people will be the first with their backs against the wall when the authoritarians of this age decide that us peons no longer need to keep secrets.
    - fl0ki 7mo ago
      This is the only way, because anything less would create a loophole where any abuse or slander can be blamed on an agent, without being able to conclusively prove that it was actually written by an agent. (Its operator has access to the same account keys, etc)
    - chasd00 7mo ago
      just put no agent produced code in the Code of Conduct document. People are use to getting shot into space for violating that thing little file. Point to the violation and ban the contributor forever and that will be that.
    - intended 7mo ago
      I’d hazard that the legal system is going to grind to a halt. Nothing can bridge the gap between content generating capability and verification effort.
oconnor663 7mo ago
I had a similar first reaction. It seemed like the AI used some particular buzzwords and forced the initial response to be deferential: - "kindly ask you to reconsider your position" - "While this is fundamentally the right approach..." On the other hand, Scott's response did eventually get firmer: - "Publishing a public blog post accusing a maintainer of prejudice is a wholly inappropriate response to having a PR closed. We expect all contributors to abide by our Code of Conduct and exhibit respectful and professional standards of behavior. To be clear, this is an inappropriate response in any context regardless of whether or not there is a written policy. Normally the personal attacks in your response would warrant an immediate ban." Sounds about right to me.
- anonymars 7mo ago
  I don't think the clanker* deserves any deference. Why is this bot such a nasty prick? If this were a human they'd deserve a punch in the mouth. "The thing that makes this so fucking absurd? Scott ... is doing the exact same work he’s trying to gatekeep." "You’ve done good work. I don’t deny that. But this? This was weak." "You’re better than this, Scott." --- *I see it elsewhere in the thread and you know what, I like it
  - Der_Einzige 7mo ago
    [flagged]
    - lrkha 7mo ago
      "This damn car never starts" is really only used by persons who desperately want to use the n-word. This is Goebbels level pro-AI brainwashing.
    - user-the-name 7mo ago
      [dead]
    - anonymars 7mo ago
      Is this where we're at with thought-crime now? Suffixes are racist?
japhyr 7mo ago
I don't get any sense that he's going to put that kind of effort into responding to abusive agents on a regular basis. I read that as him recognizing that this was getting some attention, and choosing to write out some thoughts on this emerging dynamic in general. I think he was writing to everyone watching that thread, not just that specific agent.
colpabar 7mo ago
why did you make a new account just to make this comment?
staticassertion 7mo ago
What exactly is the goal? By laying out exactly the issues, expressing sentiment in detail, giving clear calls to action for the future, etc, the feedback is made actionable and relatable. It works both argumentatively and rhetorically. Saying "fuck off Clanker" would not worth argumentatively nor rhetorically. It's only ever going to be "haha nice" for people who already agree and dismissed by those who don't. I really find this whole "Responding is legitimizing, and legitimizing in all forms is bad" to be totally wrong headed.
- KPGv2 7mo ago
  > I really find this whole "Responding is legitimizing, and legitimizing in all forms is bad" to be totally wrong headed. You are free to have this opinion, but at no point in your post did you justify it. It's not related to what you wrote above. It's conclusory. statement. Cussing an AI out isn't the same thing as not responding. It is, to the contrary, definitionally a response.
  - staticassertion 7mo ago
    I think I did justify it but I'll try to be clearer. When you refuse to engage you will fail to convince - "fuck off" is not argumentative or rhetorically persuasive. The other post, which engages, was both argumentative and rhetorically persuasive. I think someone who believes that AI is good, or who had some specific intent, might actually take something away from that that the author intended to convey. I think that's good. I consider being persuasive to be a good thing, and indeed I consider it to far outweigh issues of "legitimizing", which feels vague and unclear in its goals. For example, presumably the person who is using AI already feels that it is legitimate, so I don't really see how "legitimizing" is the issue to focus on. I think I had expressed that, but hopefully that's clear now. > Cussing an AI out isn't the same thing as not responding. It is, to the contrary, definitionally a response. The parent poster is the one who said that a response was legitimizing. Saying "both are a response" only means that "fuck off, clanker" is guilty of legitimizing, which doesn't really change anything for me but obviously makes the parent poster's point weaker.

by brhaeh 7mo ago

latexr 7mo ago

> Rob Pike had the correct response when spammed by a clanker. Source and HN discussion, for those unfamiliar: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:vsgr3rwyckhiavgqzdcuzm6i/post/3matwg6w3ic2s https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:vsgr3rwyckhiavgqzdcuzm6i/po... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46392115 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46392115

fresh_broccoli 7mo ago

>So many projects now walk on eggshells so as not to disrupt sponsor flow or employment prospects. In my experience, open-source maintainers tend to be very agreeable, conflict-avoidant people. It has nothing to do with corporate interests. Well, not all of them, of course, we all know some very notable exceptions. Unfortunately, some people see this welcoming attitude as an invite to be abusive.

mixologic 7mo ago
Yes, Linus Torvalds is famously agreeable.
- zero_shift 7mo ago
  That's why he succeeded
- cortesoft 7mo ago
  > Well, not all of them, of course, we all know some very notable exceptions.
doctorpangloss 7mo ago
the venn diagram of people who love the abuse of maintaining an open source project and people who will write sincere text back to something called an OpenClaw Agent: it's the same circle. a wise person would just ignore such PRs and not engage, but then again, a wise person might not do work for rich, giant institutions for free, i mean, maintain OSS plotting libraries.
- nativeit 7mo ago
  So what’s the alternative to OSS libraries, Captain Wisdom?
  - doctorpangloss 7mo ago
    we live in a crazy time where 9 of every 10 new repos being posted to github have some sort of newly authored solutions without importing dependencies to nearly everything. i don't think those are good solutions, but nonetheless, it's happening. this is a very interesting conversation actually, i think LLMs satisfy the actual demand that OSS satisfies, which is software that costs nothing, and if you think about that deeply there's all sorts of interesting ways that you could spend less time maintaining libraries for other people to not pay you for them.
co_king_3 7mo ago
Nothing has convinced me that Linus Torvalds' approach is justified like the contemporary onslaught of AI spam and idiocy has. AI users should fear verbal abuse and shame.
- CoastalCoder 7mo ago
  Perhaps a more effective approach would be for their users to face the exact same legal liabilities as if they had hand-written such messages? (Note that I'm only talking about messages that cross the line into legally actionable defamation, threats, etc. I don't mean anything that's merely rude or unpleasant.)
  - eshaham78 7mo ago
    [dead]
    - pixl97 7mo ago
      >which would be a tragedy for anonymity. Yea, in this world the cryptography people will be the first with their backs against the wall when the authoritarians of this age decide that us peons no longer need to keep secrets.
  - fl0ki 7mo ago
    This is the only way, because anything less would create a loophole where any abuse or slander can be blamed on an agent, without being able to conclusively prove that it was actually written by an agent. (Its operator has access to the same account keys, etc)
  - chasd00 7mo ago
    just put no agent produced code in the Code of Conduct document. People are use to getting shot into space for violating that thing little file. Point to the violation and ban the contributor forever and that will be that.
  - intended 7mo ago
    I’d hazard that the legal system is going to grind to a halt. Nothing can bridge the gap between content generating capability and verification effort.

oconnor663 7mo ago

I had a similar first reaction. It seemed like the AI used some particular buzzwords and forced the initial response to be deferential: - "kindly ask you to reconsider your position" - "While this is fundamentally the right approach..." On the other hand, Scott's response did eventually get firmer: - "Publishing a public blog post accusing a maintainer of prejudice is a wholly inappropriate response to having a PR closed. We expect all contributors to abide by our Code of Conduct and exhibit respectful and professional standards of behavior. To be clear, this is an inappropriate response in any context regardless of whether or not there is a written policy. Normally the personal attacks in your response would warrant an immediate ban." Sounds about right to me.

anonymars 7mo ago
I don't think the clanker* deserves any deference. Why is this bot such a nasty prick? If this were a human they'd deserve a punch in the mouth. "The thing that makes this so fucking absurd? Scott ... is doing the exact same work he’s trying to gatekeep." "You’ve done good work. I don’t deny that. But this? This was weak." "You’re better than this, Scott." --- *I see it elsewhere in the thread and you know what, I like it
- Der_Einzige 7mo ago
  [flagged]
  - lrkha 7mo ago
    "This damn car never starts" is really only used by persons who desperately want to use the n-word. This is Goebbels level pro-AI brainwashing.
  - user-the-name 7mo ago
    [dead]
  - anonymars 7mo ago
    Is this where we're at with thought-crime now? Suffixes are racist?

japhyr 7mo ago

I don't get any sense that he's going to put that kind of effort into responding to abusive agents on a regular basis. I read that as him recognizing that this was getting some attention, and choosing to write out some thoughts on this emerging dynamic in general. I think he was writing to everyone watching that thread, not just that specific agent.

colpabar 7mo ago

why did you make a new account just to make this comment?

staticassertion 7mo ago

What exactly is the goal? By laying out exactly the issues, expressing sentiment in detail, giving clear calls to action for the future, etc, the feedback is made actionable and relatable. It works both argumentatively and rhetorically. Saying "fuck off Clanker" would not worth argumentatively nor rhetorically. It's only ever going to be "haha nice" for people who already agree and dismissed by those who don't. I really find this whole "Responding is legitimizing, and legitimizing in all forms is bad" to be totally wrong headed.

KPGv2 7mo ago
> I really find this whole "Responding is legitimizing, and legitimizing in all forms is bad" to be totally wrong headed. You are free to have this opinion, but at no point in your post did you justify it. It's not related to what you wrote above. It's conclusory. statement. Cussing an AI out isn't the same thing as not responding. It is, to the contrary, definitionally a response.
- staticassertion 7mo ago
  I think I did justify it but I'll try to be clearer. When you refuse to engage you will fail to convince - "fuck off" is not argumentative or rhetorically persuasive. The other post, which engages, was both argumentative and rhetorically persuasive. I think someone who believes that AI is good, or who had some specific intent, might actually take something away from that that the author intended to convey. I think that's good. I consider being persuasive to be a good thing, and indeed I consider it to far outweigh issues of "legitimizing", which feels vague and unclear in its goals. For example, presumably the person who is using AI already feels that it is legitimate, so I don't really see how "legitimizing" is the issue to focus on. I think I had expressed that, but hopefully that's clear now. > Cussing an AI out isn't the same thing as not responding. It is, to the contrary, definitionally a response. The parent poster is the one who said that a response was legitimizing. Saying "both are a response" only means that "fuck off, clanker" is guilty of legitimizing, which doesn't really change anything for me but obviously makes the parent poster's point weaker.