Most contributors tend to follow the rules of a project. Some will skirt them, some AI code will probably get in, but a ban will certainly limit it, and certainly look better in court compared to “We made it a rule that it’s okay to not disclose that you used the likely copyrighted code generator”.

Take for example the WINE project, which has a strict ban on anyone who has seen the Windows source code from contributing to the project (such as an ex-employee or someone who has seen the source code from a leak). This is obviously impossible to enforce; how could they reasonably prevent a microsoft employee from submitting code that might be infringing on Microsoft? They can’t. But their ban will certainly aid them in court if MS ever did sue them for infringement. and I think it likely anyone who had seen the source code and wanted to add a patch would respect the rule. It’s not perfect protection, but it’s certainly better than “If you submit windows source code, just don’t tell us, and hopefully we won’t get in trouble”.

I think had KDE’s policy proposal limited LLM use to just finding bugs, but prohibited using it for code, there would’ve been much less uproar. However even that would still likely encourage corporate AI use to find those bugs, which brings with it

Are you suggesting I made this initiative?

Seconding Cris, that was a fantastic read.

I’m not aware of any major project forks due to it, only smaller ones, such as this fork of Waybar that was specifically forked to remove the AI code added to the main project.

Forking the bigger projects would be a pretty huge effort. If enough left at once it could be viable, or perhaps a fork could be cut down to make it more manageable to maintain and develop for a smaller team.

If there is no forks, maybe the dissenters from the major projects will congregate toward independent projects who have already taken a stand against AI.

…No it isn’t? I can choose what software I use, there are projects making efforts to avoid AI as much as is possible, and most contributors tend to follow guidelines, so having no-AI rules, while not 100% effective at avoiding AI code, will still drastically reduce what gets in, which is all I’m aiming for, and which is absolutely achievable.

I’ve noticed that virtually all Pro-AI people are constantly pushing this idea that resistance is futile, and that we all just have to accept AI into all aspects of our lives, almost like a cult. I even saw some if that rhetoric in the KDE proposal this thread is about.

You can drink the AI koolaid as much as you want, but you’re not going to stop me from trying to limit it in my life wherever possible, and I’ll continue to advocate for others to abstain for a multitude of reasoned arguments as well.

That’s like telling a vegan to update their views and eat meat.

There are many legitimate reasons to want to avoid AI code and avoid encouraging corporate AI use. Not all of us have to adopt your views on AI.

There are more concerns beyond the quality of the code itself, such as the ones I listed here

Can relate, everything I used to think of as a safe haven, a return to 90’s style computing, is seemingly being corrupted, and the few remaining options we have require a rather big sacrifice in usability.

As it is impossible to completely avoid AI use with Linux, I must content myself with only minimization instead of complete elimination, as I won’t let the pursuit of perfection mean I just give up entirely. Any reduction is still meaningful, just as it’s still worthwhile to minimize fossil fuel usage and meat consumption as much as is reasonably possible.

AFAIK NetBSD is explicitly rejecting AI contributions.

Xfce have embraced AI with their new Wayland compositor.

Cosmic accepts AI code, but according to them, they take a preemptively hostile view toward AI code submissions and will rewrite some parts by hand.

There’s some lists linked in the comments here of DE’s that reject all AI.

That section only relates to descriptions of pull requests, not the AI code itself. They don’t want long rambly AI generated explanations of how the code works, but they are fine if the code itself is AI generated.

Check out the options listed here: https://slrpnk.net/comment/24475952

You make it sound like FLOSS hasn’t been able to function for the last 30 years without code plagiarizing LLMs.

Do you think the whole endeavor will just up and collapse without using fascist owned AI?

Perhaps for now. Personally I’d be hesitant to invest in learning Sway’s keyboard shortcuts and workflow if they’re going to be pro-AI long term.

It definitely seems like one of the better options for the full fledged DE’s.

On a related note, while looking through that new list, it lists Sway as a non-AI alternative, but as of a couple weeks ago, this doesn’t looks promising: https://github.com/swaywm/sway/issues/9272

Most contributors generally respect the rules of a project, and there are other rules put in place that are also not technically enforceable, such as asking a contributor to not submit copyrighted code (this would be virtually impossible for a reviewer to distinguish if it came from a closed source project), which also gives the project a stronger defense if brought to court, as they can then at least point to the rules and show where a contributor willfully broke them. In comparison, I suspect a court would not look kindly on a policy that says “Don’t disclose that you used a tool that has a 3 to 10% chance of introducing plagiarized copyrighted code with every prompt to avoid being shamed.”

As an example, the WINE project has a rule to not allow anyone who has even seen Windows source code from contributing to the project. This is to avoid the chances of someone subconsciously or consciously submitting a reproduction of what they saw in the Windows source code, and thus hopefully prevent the project being sued into oblivion from Microsoft (who would likely love to see that happen).

Adding a stipulation in the guidelines that contributors can only use more-ethical LLMs likely wouldn’t entirely prevent someone breaking that rule, but by in large, it is likely that most would adhere to it, making it an effective rule despite being difficult to enforce.

I think it could be pretty easily argued he is a centrist because he “Doesn’t think Charlie Kirk supported Hitler’s policies”, when Kirk clearly did.

you realize ai is just the tool and isnt a data center. data centers exist with out ai and ai exists with out data centers

I do not think LLMs can be “just a tool”.

Most LLM use is with corporate AI, and this KDE policy explicitly allows corporate AI usage. If they had restricted it to only open-source local models, I wouldn’t have nearly as many environmental concerns (though that would not solve the plagiarism issue).

For a more complete look at all of the downsides of AI usage, I’d encourage you to take a look at this comment.