Live data from Hacker News

MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

blog.meshcore.io

131–140 of 190 posts

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even just a pro-trump thing. That's not even the thing particularly annoying about hams because that's annoying across all of society. I can tolerate disagreeing with peoples opinions but not disagreeable/disharmonioous behavior. Hams act super gatekeepey and act insanely protective/defensive around things that don't actually belong to them. They tend to have a high sense of self-importance around their skil…

It's a simple exam that 10yo kids pass all the time. If someone is complaining about the licencing process, the problem is on that individual, not the system. Like with roads and cars, radio spectrum is a very limited and very shared resource, and there has to be some regulation, or else some Elon Musk-type person would already take it for themselves for a commercial reason. It's also self-policed, so that means that…

The problem isnt the test. In the USA the test is cheap. Books can easily be acquired online.

The problem is hams - the people who are habitually are on amateur radio.

I find them to be incredibly anti-digital, holier than thou, loud about hard-conservative positions, misogynist, racist, and more. And when Ive tried to further the art and science of radio comms, hams are some of the first to talk down what I contributed.

They are people who I dont, and dont want to associate myself with.

Ive also known others that made that assumption when I said I was a ham. Lots of people have had those experiences, and also chosen not to associate with them.

I'm sure this doesnt apply to "all Hams". It does apply to a supermajority in the USA, enough to say that I do not want to be a ham any longer. I already refused to communicate with them, nor associate with them.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#133
post #44

>We have always been wary of AI generated code, but felt everyone is free to do what they want and experiment, etc. But, one of our own, Andy Kirby, decided to branch out and extensively use Claude Code, and has decided to aggressively take over all of the components of the MeshCore ecosystem: standalone devices, mobile app, web flasher and web config tools. >And, he’s kept that small detail a secret - that it’s all…

Agreed. I use meshcore and have multiple repeaters setup. I don't care about people using ai assisted coding but I think it should be disclosed especially if its closed source. Now the trademark take over seems crazy especially given Andy hasn't contributed to the github project, only personal for profit add ons. I do also think that the meshcore core team have "tacked on" and tried to enforce a stronger narrative wi…

It wasn't ai assisted coding, it was vibe coding from someone with no real coding background. A communication protocol can't be vibe coded, how do you enforce security if the person is unable to understand what the tool created?

Especially when they try to hide that they were using those tools in the first place

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#134
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't find the source code either for the official MeshCore app or for MeshOS -- where can I read the code?

It's so weird right? I keep hearing people say it's open source but like... where's the code then? I've tried to find it. I can find stuff for core components, but they lock features behind a delay-wall in the app. If it was open source that stuff would be gone immediately.

https://github.com/meshcore-dev/MeshCore

The vibecoder was on MeshOS, which indeed is not open source

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#135
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> only personal for profit add ons In that context it is quite logical to take a trademark out once the project is mature enough so you can profit off other people's work. Considering their user base does not like the hidden vibe coded idea I don't think this is bias but a sane rationalisation.

There’s a lot of framing in how questions are asked. I’m going to bet asking the community “Would you like more features if they’re made using AI assistance?” is going to get wildly different results.

"AI assistance" isn't really an honest representation of the claim of what happened is, though.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#136
post #14

I've played with MeshCore and Meshtastic a bit, and while they are fun, the general hype seems overblown. The "SHTF" types that get involved with this tend to just taint the whole concept for me. I was/am interested in the use cases for building sensor networks, but most of the chatter seems to be around people who just want to send Hello World type texts back and forth, without realizing how poorly a network like th…

If you want to build sensor stuff you should have a look a LoRaWAN.

Get a basestation from Mikrotik and use Chirpstack as backend.

This setup is commercially very very battlefield proven.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#137

Spicy take but I think this whole Lora thing is a dead end bad technology not worth our time. Wifi HaLow 802.11ah is finally out & available, sometimes at ok prices. We don't really have ad-hoc communication pioneered for wifi, but it's doable and we ought lean into it, rather than using some totally different stack, especially one that is under strict control of a single company. What we learn doing wifi halow can d…

> Wifi HaLow 802.11ah

LoRa is another level. It works down to -146dBm.

802.11ah dies around -100dBm.

Still much much better than "standard" Wifi. But you are comparing two different beasts.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#138
I think it was a good decision. I just spent a couple weeks doing experiments with meshcore/meshtastic/reticulum/... comparing them to our stealth solution and I experienced a functional core in meshcore surrounded by a lot of vibe coded slop.

In particular I did not like the shoddy documentation of the various vibe coded interfaces and how brittle the integration experience felt because of them.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#139

What is it with mesh projects and having these super draconian trademark enforcers? Meshtastic is the same. One of the main reasons I got interested in MeshCore was reading the Meshtastic trademark rules and just finding them... really really over the top.

they all hope to make lot of money of of it. meshcore has a marketing team spamming reddit all day and a mao to make you believe people use it right now. then you connect to yhe mesh and you're utterly alone there. at least meshtastic has real users lol.

Re: MeshCore development team splits over trademark dispute and AI-generated code

#140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heh, I use MeshCore in Massachusetts and my layperson explanation is that MeshCore is for people who would be HAMs except they don't have the patience to take an exam. You're probably more correct, but not having the FCC as a barrier to entry using $20 hardware means a passing curiosity becomes me installing a repeater on our roof with a cavity filter that reaches half a city. It's super fun. I was using a vibe coded…

I came up with a way to install a repeater 20ft up a mast that's been on top of the building my office is in, but it's been idle since the TV station that used to be in here left. It has decent reachability, but unfortunately it's not at a particularly high point of the city, it has great reacability into the University and can reach my house, but there's a ridge to the south that puts the antenna more like ground le…

Next project: putting a repeater on that ridge!
Post reply on HN