Live data from Hacker News

PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

frvr.com

51–60 of 239 posts

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#51

Hobby groups projects like this are less fun for a lot of people who used to enjoy interacting with smart people. It's definitely become a game of just spam claude for answers with zero understanding or care for how anything actually works. That's fine to get things done and fine for a lot of side projects, but it definitely ruins the joy that people have in understanding systems and working with intellectuals.

> Hobby groups projects like this are less fun for a lot of people who used to enjoy interacting with smart people.

This is definitely the case for me. Before AI tools became mainstream, it was already a difficult proposition to find other smart people who you could get along with and talk to, do something interesting together. The Internet made all the difference in my life because I was able to get outside my geographic region to do big things through open source and hacker communities. Now, that very important filter mechanism no longer works. It's Eternal September all over again. In a way, it's very much a domination of "ends" over "means" in the wider community that is being forced upon those who long focused on "means". For a lot of intelligent people, understanding something is /valuable on its own/, but for the wider world there is no value in simply knowing things, but what you do with that knowledge (or now that lack of knowledge). I even experienced this recently at DEFCON 34 where I saw other participants in some of the CTFs with me using AI tools and not really understanding what the tools were doing or what was happening, but just kind of bruteforcing/tokenmaxxing their way through. This isn't to say that those AI tools are fundamentally a bad thing to use in building open source software, security research, or even as a tool in a CTF, but that the "understanding" step needs to still be present or it destroys the fun in everything.

I'm certainly not having as much fun with computers these days, even as I've invested a lot of effort myself in local LLMs and trying to understand the tools and understand how to apply them reasonably, I've found I prefer much more analog entertainments. Thankfully there's always photography and lockpicking to entertain me at the moment and provide a pathway to meet other interesting fellows.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#52
post #33

Misleading title, there's another major reason: it's an embargo agreement violation that jeopardizes Linux support on PS5. https://x.com/theflow0/status/2099987019954831744

> The scene used to be a group of highly talented researchers, but now it is just a bunch of noobs using LLMs and writing hacks they don't even understand. Slop kiddies found the only hypervisor bug left, which I had also found a while ago, and decided to report to Sony. Sounds like he is salty that somebody found an exploit using LLM that he found manually (which probably took a significant amount of time.) I can pa…

> Sounds like he is salty that somebody found an exploit using LLM that he found manually

Nope. He is salty because someone made public the secret exploit that Linux-on-PS5 apparently relies upon to bypass Sony's hypervisor protection. Now Sony will fix the exploit, and there will be no more Linux on the PS5 until another exploit is found.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#53

Misleading title, there's another major reason: it's an embargo agreement violation that jeopardizes Linux support on PS5. https://x.com/theflow0/status/2099987019954831744

All Sony had to do was give us a path forward to run our own code on the PS5.

But I guess Sony being a gatekeeper wasn't a gatekeeper enough for certain regulatory agencies.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#54
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The scene used to be a group of highly talented researchers, but now it is just a bunch of noobs using LLMs and writing hacks they don't even understand. Slop kiddies found the only hypervisor bug left, which I had also found a while ago, and decided to report to Sony. Sounds like he is salty that somebody found an exploit using LLM that he found manually (which probably took a significant amount of time.) I can pa…

Rather, he's annoyed because the LLM User submitted the exploit to Sony (to get paid) and killed the only known viable path forward for development.

yeah, and tbh he should be, one douche ruined it for the rest of us

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#55

> “Slop kiddies found the only hypervisor bug left, which I had also found a while ago, and decided to report to Sony,” the modder said on social media. “I asked them to at least wait for GTA 6 to come out so that people would have the opportunity to legally purchase the game and also enjoy linux. They agreed to wait, but not a day passed and they decided to waste it instead.” If one user could have found this using…

Then I would imagine anyone else could have found it.

Right, including Sony. AI finding security flaws is very good in general, but one downside is that it will become easier to make "secure" devices that are hostile toward their owners.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#56
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Omitting half of the story is misleading, this isn't a pro/anti LLM story. Vibecoding has been the norm for months, it's the embargo violation today that triggered his resignation.

> …been the norm for months… You know, it’s petty, but I think one of the things I hate the most about AI is that it surpassed front end JavaScript frameworks in terms of changing what the standard is every few years. What’s the point of learning anything if it becomes obsolete faster than the seasons change?

To be fair the JS frontend communities brought this to themselves way before LLM slop.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#57

Hobby groups projects like this are less fun for a lot of people who used to enjoy interacting with smart people. It's definitely become a game of just spam claude for answers with zero understanding or care for how anything actually works. That's fine to get things done and fine for a lot of side projects, but it definitely ruins the joy that people have in understanding systems and working with intellectuals.

> Hobby groups projects like this are less fun for a lot of people who used to enjoy interacting with smart people.

Same thing did happen to many work places. People at all levels proxy questions through LLMs and don't even bother to read/trim/edit the response.

Funny, how suddenly a tight, 1-2 sentence response on point is a sign of skill.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#58
It's strange working on Opensource these days. I've mostly worked on my own stuff alone which usually doesn't get much attention/additional contribution. Then I see on Reddit, HN or LinkedIn someone creating a major App or Plugin in a weekend. Sometimes I take a closer look the artisanal quality is effectively unmaintainable, at least for humans. But in the end it's hard to get a good overview, and the sheer quantity seems to dwarf any other efforts.

Not to mention how the code can then be sourced by an AI model in an instant without any credit.

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#59
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The scene used to be a group of highly talented researchers, but now it is just a bunch of noobs using LLMs and writing hacks they don't even understand. Slop kiddies found the only hypervisor bug left, which I had also found a while ago, and decided to report to Sony. Sounds like he is salty that somebody found an exploit using LLM that he found manually (which probably took a significant amount of time.) I can pa…

> Sounds like he is salty that somebody found an exploit using LLM that he found manually Nope. He is salty because someone made public the secret exploit that Linux-on-PS5 apparently relies upon to bypass Sony's hypervisor protection. Now Sony will fix the exploit, and there will be no more Linux on the PS5 until another exploit is found.

Okay, I misunderstood. But it wasn't particularly secret if 'noobs' had access then?

Re: PS5 Linux lead quits: "a bunch of noobs using LLMs" that "they don't understand"

#60
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Omitting half of the story is misleading, this isn't a pro/anti LLM story. Vibecoding has been the norm for months, it's the embargo violation today that triggered his resignation.

> …been the norm for months… You know, it’s petty, but I think one of the things I hate the most about AI is that it surpassed front end JavaScript frameworks in terms of changing what the standard is every few years. What’s the point of learning anything if it becomes obsolete faster than the seasons change?

Just so you know, the frontend framework wars started and ended pretty quickly in the latter half of the 2010s.

It was the downstream effect of the browser wars settling down and W3C making big moves on getting vendors to finally implement standards that were sorely needed. It had nothing to do with web dev culture.

Post reply on HN