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Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

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Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#11

Post by mmastrac »

In one of my previous comments (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47770124) I asked if Gas Town has shipped anything of value. I did not expect it to be an Ouroborous.

(Edit, thanks MisterTea: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47770805)

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#13

Post by GolfPopper »

dminik wrote: post #9
simonw wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I am giving every cent of that crypto money to charity" - https://twitter.com/Steve_Yegge/status/2044114434348724351

I don't see how that is relevant? If he really did steal that money, it's not his to give. You can't take someone's money and then not only not give it back, but also give it away.

Sure you can. It just requires more steps, expensive suits, and using terms like "leveraged buyout". He just went about it wrong.

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#14

Post by JumpCrisscross »

dmurray wrote: post #5

It seems completely in the spirit of Gas Town. A respectable software provider should warn you about this kind of behaviour at install time, and give you the opportunity to opt out. Gas Town fulfilled all its obligations in this regard with these (and other) warnings in the original announcement: > WARNING DANGER CAUTION > GET THE F** OUT > YOU WILL DIE

> A respectable software provider should warn you about this kind of behaviour at install time, and give you the opportunity to opt out

They honestly only need to disclose. Requiring contribution as part of the social contract is perfectly okay—if someone disagrees, they don’t get to use Gas Town.

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#15

Post by overgard »

simonw wrote: post #4
selectodude wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, he stole a bunch of money with a crypto rugpull, can’t really give him the benefit of the doubt anymore.

"I am giving every cent of that crypto money to charity" - https://twitter.com/Steve_Yegge/status/2044114434348724351

I don't really see how that makes it ok. I stole your wallet, but I gave the cash to a homeless person!

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#16

Post by juped »

moab wrote: post #7

Is anyone surprised? I'm reminded of how I felt during the NFT craze. LLMs are extremely powerful when used with deliberate care. Gas Town is the exact opposite of what is needed to actually do useful things in prod. I guess good on Steve for doing what he does so well, and getting so much hype around a vibe coded mess.

Just like with NFTs, this is all going to discredit the actually sensible use cases for years.

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#17

Post by PunchyHamster »

juped wrote: post #16
moab wrote: post #7

Is anyone surprised? I'm reminded of how I felt during the NFT craze. LLMs are extremely powerful when used with deliberate care. Gas Town is the exact opposite of what is needed to actually do useful things in prod. I guess good on Steve for doing what he does so well, and getting so much hype around a vibe coded mess.

Just like with NFTs, this is all going to discredit the actually sensible use cases for years.

...still haven't seen single sensible use case for one that couldn't be solved easier/better/cheaper normal way

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#18

Post by Leynos »

selectodude wrote: post #3
keeganpoppen wrote: post #2

iono if “steal” has the right valence here

Eh, he stole a bunch of money with a crypto rugpull, can’t really give him the benefit of the doubt anymore.

How does this work? Someone names a coin after his project, pays him commission for every transaction so he will be incentivised to give it positive coverage on his blog, then sells their stake once the value inflates leaving bagholders with worthless coinage and Yegge with his commission?

Edit: Apparently so: https://pivot-to-ai.com/2026/01/22/steve-yegges-gas-town-vib...

Re: Does Gas Town 'steal' usage from users' LLM credits to improve itself?

#19

Post by sdfwg »

This gets legally interesting. Yegge does not know what is going on in the codebase, so he can blame the AI. But the AI maliciously increases token consumption.

That is clearly the fault of the clankers that produced this crap, so their providers are responsible.

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