No, you can't. See, that's where you are just wrong: when you don't respect the boundaries an open source project sets that you want to contribute to then you are a net negative.
Restricting this is their right, and it is not for you to attempt to overrule that right. Besides the fact that you do not oversee the consequences it also makes you an asshole.
They're not asking for you to write standing on your head, they are asking for you to author your contributions yourself.
They are asking me to author my contributions in a way that they approve of. The essence of the request is the same as asking someone to author them whilst standing on their head.
Except they don’t, won’t and can’t control that: the very request is insulting.
I’ll make a change any way I choose, upright, sideways, using AI. My choice. Not theirs.
Their choice is to accept it or reject it based purely on the change itself, because that’s all there is.
If you’re going to lie and say there was no LLM involved, what else are you going to lie about? Copying code from another codebase with incompatible license terms, perhaps?
I would say people should be wary of any contributions whatsoever from a filthy fucking liar.
Nothing? Everything? Does it fucking matter? Assigning trust across a boundary like this is stupid, and that’s my point.
Oh, would you just accept my blatantly, verbatim copied-from-another-codebase-and-relicensed PR just because I said “I solemnly swear this is not blatantly, verbatim copied from another codebase and relicensed”?
That’s on you for stupidly assigning any trust to the author of the change. It’s the internet: nobody knows you’re a dog.
> Oh, would you just accept my blatantly, verbatim copied-from-another-codebase-and-relicensed PR just because I said “I solemnly swear this is not blatantly, verbatim copied from another codebase and relicensed”?
At that point you've proven intention, meaning you'll get the chance to argue your viewpoint in front of a judge.
Many major projects now require a signed DCO with a real name. That can be a nickname if you have a reasonable online presence under that name, but generally it has to identify you as an individual.
So you wouldn't sign it as "xXImADogOnTheInternet86Xx", but as "Tom Forbes (orf)".
And even if there won't be direct legal consequences, it'd certainly affect your ability to contribute to this or other projects in the future.
I'm really struggling to understand why you would burn down a decade+ old reputation over this particular issue. Is this really the hill you wanted to die on?
It’s an abstract argument with one pretty clear point that you can’t seem to grasp: people lie, on the internet, all the time. Any system, policy or discussion that pretends this isn’t the case is worthless.
This is not an abstract argument, you are showing a willingness to do the wrong thing in spite of being told not to, repeatedly, by many other participants here. I see only two things here:
(1) you would lie
(2) you fundamentally don't understand the concept of consent
> "I’ll make a change any way I choose, upright, sideways, using AI. My choice. Not theirs."
The fact that other people would lie is besides the point: those other people would get the exact same treatment if found out. Whether or not they would be found out is moot, it is the act of lying and ignoring consent that makes this what it is: asshole behavior. By extension anybody that practices this behavior is an asshole as well and by extension of that tying your own rep to people that would behave like that makes you an asshole and I highly doubt that that was your intention.
So now you've - over endless comments - shown that you fundamentally don't get this very important concept. Yes, people lie. But there are mechanisms for dealing with liars. Misrepresentation and fraud are serious things. Lawsuits, fines and in an extreme case jail, but on a more immediate level ostracizing. It makes you as a person into an undesirable. It also makes the world as a whole a worse place to live in, which is why such behavior is strongly discouraged, even if it is possible.
That's why we don't structurally go around clubbing old ladies over the head as a revenue model, not because we can't do it or because it would be acted upon by the law (that's for the few who don't get it) but because it is simply a bad thing to do. It is a matter of ethics. That's why if an open source project has a 'No AI' policy you either abide by the policy or you can expect massive backlash.
To think that you could do this and even should do this to make the point is as stupid as walking out and grabbing some old lady's hand bag to prove that it can be done: you are hurting an innocent to prove your point and it will cause a reaction that is at a minimum proportional to what you did and worst case you will be made an example of. This can be the proverbial career ending move. If you are Elon level rich and your inner asshole seeks a way out then yes, you could probably do it. But for normal folks such behavior is highly discouraged. Actions usually have consequences.
Finally: open source is a massive gift to society. The whole reason you can use AI in the first place is because that gift got abused in a way that open source contributors did not anticipate. If you're going around to pollute open source with AI contributions to effectively karma farm you have to wonder why you are so intent on doing that. Is it your purpose to destroy open source? Or is it just because you enjoy destroying stuff in general? I don't see any other options, this is a pathology and it would do you good to introspect on this for a bit instead of to respond with yet another ill conceived reply digging yourself in further. You've gone from 'mildly annoying' to 'wouldn't work with this person for any amount of money because they are a massive liability' in the space of 15 comments. I hope it was worth it to you.
This is a lot of words and I’m honestly not sure it’s worth reading. At a skim it seems naive at best, at worst a pretty stupid, pearl-clutching interpretation of the discussion.
> If you're going around to pollute open source with AI contributions to effectively karma farm you have to wonder why you are so intent on doing that? Is it your purpose to destroy open source? Or is it just because you enjoy destroying stuff in general? I don't see any other options, this is a pathology and it would do you good to introspect on this for a bit instead of to respond with yet another ill conceived reply digging yourself in further
Just in case you misunderstood things (it’s easy when you get so upset about trivial arguments on the internet!), I don’t use AI when contributing to open source projects.
Thanks for the imaginary psychoanalysis though I guess.
You not only broke the site guidelines badly with this comment, you actually escalated how bad the thread was by quite a margin. Please don't do that.
If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and stick to the rules when posting here, we'd appreciate it. Note this one: "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead."
Lying that you didn’t use an LLM when told that contributions made using LLMs are banned does indeed make you a sociopath. Whether you have also commit sexual assault is an independent axis, but when someone shows such blatant disregard for boundaries and consent, it does raise questions.
Instead of arguing for violating the boundaries of a "slow, bespoke" no-LLM project, you can simply start one that enjoys all the benefits of LLMs by NOT having that boundary. Very simple solution.
Their boundaries. If they don’t want to accept the code, cool. Nobody is forcing them to, and I respect that.
But if they can’t enforce their boundaries, because they can’t tell the difference between AI code and non-AI code without being told, then their boundaries they made up are unenforceable nonsense.
About as nonsense and enforceable as asking me to code upside down.
I'll make this blunt: if you're a guy then half the population is not capable of 'enforcing their boundaries' against you, more so if you count children. The problem you seem to have is to think that if someone is not capable of enforcing their boundaries that they are not allowed to have those boundaries and that it is your god given right to do whatever the F* you want just because you can. That's not how the world works, nor is it how it should work.
Boundaries - of all kinds - are not unenforceable nonsense, they are rights that you willingly and knowingly violate.
This is such an easily refuted assertion. Tell me, if something is wrong with the submitted code, who or what is responsible? If it's not "the LLM", then your opinion makes zero sense. The responsible party is always a human; therefore the responsible party rightfully deserves the credit whether it succeeds or fails.
I am authoring my contributions, using Clause Code as a tool. It doesn't make me an asshole.
If the maintainers don't want to accept it, fine. Someone will eventually fork and advance and we move on. The Uncles can continue to play in their no AI playground, and show each other how nice their code is.
The world is moving on from the "AI is bad" crowd.
Forking the code can be perfectly reasonable, with this or any other disagreement about policy. The main point of contention in this thread is whether you ought to lie about having used an LLM. I agree with Jacques: doing something like that would make you an asshole.
Restricting this is their right, and it is not for you to attempt to overrule that right. Besides the fact that you do not oversee the consequences it also makes you an asshole.
They're not asking for you to write standing on your head, they are asking for you to author your contributions yourself.