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AI Usage Policy

github.com

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Re: AI Usage Policy

#141

Post by mijoharas »

weinzierl wrote: post #59
Lucasoato wrote: post #38

> Bad AI drivers will be banned and ridiculed in public. You've been warned. We love to help junior developers learn and grow, but if you're interested in that then don't use AI, and we'll help you. I'm sorry that bad AI drivers have ruined this for you. Finally an AI policy I can agree with :) jokes aside, it might sound a bit too agressive but it's also true that some people have really no shame into overloading yo…

I don't think ridicule is an effective threat for people with no shame to begin with.

I think it makes sense, both for this, and for curl.

Presumably people want this for some kind of prestige, so they can put it on their CV (contributed to ghostty/submitted security issue to curl).

If we change that equation to have them think "wait, if I do this, then when employers Google me they'll see a blog post saying I'm incompetent" changes calculation that is neutral/positive for if their slop gets accepted to negative/positive.

Seems like it's addressing the incentives to me.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#142

Post by nicoburns »

imiric wrote: post #27
arjunbajaj wrote: post #9

I can see this becoming a pretty generally accepted AI usage policy. Very balanced. Covers most of the points I'm sure many of us have experienced here while developing with AI. Most importantly, AI generated code does not substitute human thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite. On that last point, whenever I've gotten Codex to generate a substantial feature, usually I've had to rewrite a lot of the code to make it…

I agree with you on the policy being balanced. However: > AI generated code does not substitute human thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite. Isn't that the end goal of these tools and companies producing them? According to the marketing[1], the tools are already "smarter than people in many ways". If that is the case, what are these "ways", and why should we trust a human to do a better job at them? If these "ways"…

> Isn't that the end goal of these tools and companies producing them?

It seems to be the goal. But they seem very far away from achieving that goal.

One thing you probably account for is that most of the proponents of these technologies are trying to sell you something. Doesn't mean that there is no value to these tools, but the wild claims about the capabilities of the tools are just that.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#143

Post by phanimahesh »

imiric wrote: post #101
Terretta wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intern generated code does not substitute for tech lead thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite.

No, the code is generated by a tool that's "smarter than people in many ways". So which parts of "thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite" can we trust it with?

Very little, until it stops being stupid in many ways. We don't need smart, we need tools to not be stupid. An unreliable tool is more dangerous and more useless than having no tool.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#144

Post by TeMPOraL »

stephantul wrote: post #73
senko wrote: post #64

On a tangent: the origin of the problems with low-quality drive-by requests is github's social nature. That might have been great when GitHub started, but nowadays many use it as portfolio padding and/or social proof. "This person contributed to a lot of projects" heuristic for "they're a good and passionate developer" means people will increasingly game this using low-quality submissions. This has been happening for…

Your point about rereading without ai makes so much sense. The economics of it have changed, human nature hasn’t. Before 2023 (?) people also submitted garbage PRs just to be able to add “contributed to X” to their CV. It’s just become a lot cheaper.

Let's not forget the Hacktober Fest, the scourge of open source for over a decade now, the driver of low-quality "contribution" spam by hordes of people doing it for a goddamn free t-shirt.

No, this problem isn't fundamentally about AI, it's about "social" structure of Github and incentives it creates (fame, employment).

Re: AI Usage Policy

#145

Post by phanimahesh »

milancurcic wrote: post #114

I think that a warning of public ridicule may be fine. However, actually doing it is quite low brow IMO. I'm sad to see more and more otherwise admirable projects step down to that (assuming they actually do it).

An unenforced threat is toothless. Publicly stating we do not appreciate XYZ pr that was ai generated, low effort and in bad faith is perfectly acceptable.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#146

Post by quanwinn »

Version467 wrote: post #24

The biggest surprise to me with all this low-quality contribution spam is how little shame people apparently have. I have a handful of open source contributions. All of them are for small-ish projects and the complexity of my contributions are in the same ball-park as what I work on day-to-day. And even though I am relatively confident in my competency as a developer, these contributions are probably the most thoroug…

I'm not surprised. Lower barrier of entry -- thanks to AI in this case -- often leads to a decrease in quality in most things.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#147

Post by TeMPOraL »

imiric wrote: post #101
Terretta wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intern generated code does not substitute for tech lead thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite.

No, the code is generated by a tool that's "smarter than people in many ways". So which parts of "thinking, testing, and clean up/rewrite" can we trust it with?

Trust is a function of responsibility, not of smarts.

You may hire a genius developer that's better than you at everything, and you still won't trust them blindly with work you are responsible for. In fact, the smarter they are than you, the less trusting you can afford to be.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#148

Post by micromacrofoot »

Version467 wrote: post #24

The biggest surprise to me with all this low-quality contribution spam is how little shame people apparently have. I have a handful of open source contributions. All of them are for small-ish projects and the complexity of my contributions are in the same ball-park as what I work on day-to-day. And even though I am relatively confident in my competency as a developer, these contributions are probably the most thoroug…

It's because the AI is generating code better than they would write, and if you don't like it then that's fine... they didn't write it

it's easy to not have shame when you have no skin in the game... this is similar to how narcissists think so highly of themselves, it's never their fault

Re: AI Usage Policy

#149

Post by javcasas »

meindnoch wrote: post #123
monegator wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The biggest surprise to me with all this low-quality contribution spam is how little shame people apparently have. ever had a client second guess you by replying you a screenshot from GPT? ever asked anything in a public group only to have a complete moron replying you with a screenshot from GPT or - at least a bit of effor there - a copy/paste of the wall of text? no, people have no shame. they have a need for a l…

Our CEO chiming in on a technical discussion between engineers: by the way, this is what Claude says: *some completely made-up bullshit*

Hi CEO, thanks for the input. Next time that we have a discussion, we will ask Claude instead of discussing with who wrote the offending code.

Re: AI Usage Policy

#150

Post by bwat49 »

alansaber wrote: post #11

"Pull requests created by AI must have been fully verified with human use." should always be a bare minimum requirement.

I would hope that actually testing the changes is done regardless of whether or not AI is used
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