Yup, I’m posting another this week. Sorry.
This week I’m hoping we can wrangle a solution around AI and our selfhosted community. There are plenty of strong opinions (both pro and con), but one thing is for certain - there needs to be better disclosure in promo posts. Two options (that aren’t mutually exclusive):
- Any posts of an AI focused, AI Developed, etc software gets an [AI] tag. No, a [Not-AI] tag is not needed to accomplish this, thats kind of a “non-golfer” sort of tag.
- Comment requiring an AI disclosure response to every promo post, if its not detailed in the post itself. Specifics (generating docs for commands, translation, whole-boat vibe-coded this app, etc) would be requested.
I will say that having disclosure and/or tagging would mean that comments that just say “slop” or “fuck ai” or whatever would be off topic at that point, that information is already provided, so its just noise (and sometimes pretty uncivil - I’ve been light on that for now due to the need for a rule on this).
The tag [AI] would make it easy to filter out (or search for, if that’s your thing), but there is a wildly different degree of AI use out there, and from the posts with a positive score, its usually due to responsible AI use (translations, a snippet they had to do something obscure with, available to use with AI but doesn’t require it, whatever), which is why I think the disclosure has a place as a benefit to everyone.
Please provide any input or alternative options on this, and I can then put it to a vote like the last one. Comments seem to be the best approach without involving something off-site, but if you have a better idea/option, please share.
Not a fan of a tag, since it’s not transparent enough. Sounds like every minor use of AI would warrant a tag, which seems past the point.
The disclosure comment I feel works well. People that care about if/how AI was used can check it to get a proper impression of the scale of and workflow for AI usage, and those who don’t care can ignore it.
Self hosted AI is such an oxymoron.
How so
I don’t have a problem with AI. I have a problem with vibe-coded apps released as a one-shot and then never maintained or supported. That’s slop.
I also have a problem with the trace apps (lifttrace, nutritrace, etc.) because while they’re entirely vibe-coded, they are actively developed, but they’re posted here by a brand promotion account that doesn’t otherwise contribute to the community. If there’s any “x% self-ptomotion” threshold, they fail it, because it’s 100% self-promotion.
I know I also reported another post as slop recently but I don’t remember what it was.
Yeah. Abandonware isn’t cool generally
I would still prefer an additional [Non-AI] tag. Even if people are arguing against it - it is not same omitting an [AI] tag and consciously saying “I never used and never will use AI”. And the latter is the thing most users who want the AI-tag are looking for.
Same. It removes the ability to have plausible deniability of “oh I just forgot to tag it”—no, if you tagged it “non-AI” and it was actually vibe-coded, you clearly deliberately and consciously lied.
Yep. It is a time-suck to see an interesting new project only to check it out and find out it’s AI slop. For some apps, it doesn’t bother me… They may not require the access or stability of critical apps. Other times, I just can’t trust a slop app, and it would be very helpful to know which it is in advance.
+1
Home-AI oriented channels like Reddit’s localllama are filled with self promotion garbage, and more will trickle here over time… I’m not even against self promo or heavy coding assistance, but 9-times-out-of-10, the linked repo is nonsense, or straight-up fraudulent. And being obviously vibe-coded is a common tell.
Good to get ahead of this.
Also, +1 on supressing driveby insults. If the post is tagged up front, there’s no need. That being said, it should be okay for users to call out an obvious grift, or a “nonsense repo” that’s actually pure slop.
This sounds like a review / gating problem. Getting people to self filter / self gate is never going to work, and if it does it will work probably on the wrong people.
That being said, it should be okay for users to call out an obvious grift, or a “nonsense repo” that’s actually pure slop.
Especially if the disclosure is blatantly a lie, absolutely. I’d also say if you see any indicators that they are lying in the disclosure, its still worthy of reporting - but I would say report and separately message the “why”, to limit visibility of seeing those indicators.
I want a community where people can use AI to help build a tool and be able to post about it here. But unfortunately, I’m just not seeing that. The AI-generated apps seem to be coupled to a drive-by, AI generated post (and comment replies) all full of em dashes and the standard Claude slop language.
So, yes, mandate an AI tag. Hold posters to it and remove violators, because it seems to always be the same class of “contributors” that are cosplaying as software developers.
Not sure if your rule changes are touching this, but the worst offenders I don’t want to see here are:
- posting and commenting text written entirely by AI
- not open sourcing or giving any visibility into their code
- adopting a paid model
The people doing that remind me of the people who would approach me 20 years ago saying “hey I have an idea for an app I want you to build and I’ll give you 5% of my company. It’s like Facebook for dogs, but I need you to sign an NDA before I say any more”.
I want a community where people can use AI to help build a tool
Sure, that’s github
and be able to post about it here
Fine, but others including myself want that slop as far away from here as possible. Maybe start another community? I suggest calling it c/vibehosted.
Fine, but others including myself want that slop as far away from here as possible
And there are people like me who are fine with moderate AI use and would rather judge the project themselves rather than have them rejected outright.
Maybe there should be a community poll
Why a vote to switch up an existing community? The admins have proposed the [AI] tag to mitigate slop projects.
You said you wanted a community to post vibe coded projects, go ahead and set it up. I don’t see why it needs to be foisted onto c/self hosted, unless you have some vested interest in boosting sloppy mcslopface projects.
I’m not sure I understand. First off I’m not the same person as GP. Second, the admins are proposing an AI tag, which I’m supportive of. I’m just saying that I am OK with AI-assisted projects being posted to this community (with the AI tag of course)
The first bullet is, the other two are covered in the current rule 7 that just went live this week.
While part of promo, this is just about its own item here. In part because it could be something like “I wrote some of this script, got some ai help to talk to this closed device, here’s what I’m using” which doesn’t really fit promo, but still garners a lot of negative attention and comments.
I’m a bit hopeful this one would be of slightly broader benefit than just the straight up promo posts (which has a good amount of requirements now to filter out the garbage, though it does put some delays on f/loss projects that are well intentioned).
Just found the other rule post. Looks great!
I think this should be a thing. At the same time, I would also want something similar for funding or platforming fascists, but that is unlikely to end up being done. I think a simple tag, the [AI] one would work, is the best current solution. I think extra detail in the post is a good thing to do, for example AI assisted documentation, AI assisted bug finding, AI assisted vibe coding. They are all different and have different effects on the product and community. If someone uses AI to find bugs in their own code I am all for it, that is a great use if it. If they use AI to write their login system I am not keen at all given the likelihood of intense security issues and the low likelihood that they will ever fix it.
I would also want something similar for funding or platforming fascists
Ooh that would be good
I wonder if there is a database somewhere…
I really is like having the disclosure comment pinned for a more nuanced explanation of what, if any, AI went into a project or post. I think just a tag can’t capture the levels of AI use.
I’m personally a never-genAI, but, unless we go No AI as a community, I don’t think it makes sense to group all projects that touch AI for documentation with all that use it for testing with all that completely let the AI generate all their code, etc. And I don’t think setting a threshold for which get tagged makes sense either. Basically, a tag is misleading no matter how it’s implemented.
If you don’t delineate, it will simply be easier to tag everything ai as there was ai involved somewhere and you’re less likely to need to defend yourself.
Actually might be easier to do [AIless]
I will say that having disclosure and/or tagging would mean that comments that just say “slop” or “fuck ai” or whatever would be off topic at that point, that information is already provided, so its just noise (and sometimes pretty uncivil - I’ve been light on that for now due to the need for a rule on this).
good idea
it won’t solve the “noise” problem though. I was relatively active on !imageai@sh.itjust.works and we were constantly nagged by sloppies even though the community is clearly dedicated to generativeArt
No, but with a rule in place like these, its clearly out of place and can be removed. I don’t harbor any delusions about not seeing those sort of comments.
Would be nice though. And I like being nice.
My 2 cents are that the issue is promotion not AI, if people started promoting stuff made without AI that would still be spam.
From the rules:
F/LOSS Exception: If your post is about a project that is completely open source & can be self-hosted in full without payment, your post is exempt from the 10% requirement. The exception does not exempt you from the account age requirement.
I would propose making this the requirement and not an exception, forbid all promotion of closed source, and allow the 10% requirement for open source projects.
Unfortunately the comments I’ve seen and the reports I get would disagree. Even on older accounts that post and comment plenty.
I like the AI tag idea. I’m someone who has what I’d call a noderate approach to AI, not an AI bro but any means but I’m also okay with some things built with AI if they’re done with care. If others don’t want to see it, fine, then that’s what a tag could be useful with. However the fuck AI/slop comments on something that admits to being AI is annoying to me. (We know it’s AI, they literally said it is).
If it becomes too much content, then yes would be okay with bi-forcating the community, buy only after it becomes a problem.
I’m not consistent about it yet, but because of exactly this, I’m trying to differentiate the two when I talk.
Responsible automation? I use ML or machine learning.
The grift consuming the world? A Tech Bro? “AI”
I think one of the saddest things is the conflation between the two, like you can’t even talk about one without invoking the other. Or it opening up that whole ethical debate, when you’re just talking about, like, a 100M transcription model trained by one research in some university on a potato.
Thanks for grappling with this @curbstickle@anarchist.nexus
Yes this is needed. Thank you for the proposal here.
I would suggest that this probably needs to be really explicit about any AI involvement, i.e. a minimum if AI is used in any capacity in the coding process, it should require the tag. And ideally an explanation if it was used in other parts of the process.
That last post that came up said they used AI ‘for code review only’. In my mind even that deserves the tag, because these terms are so easy to work around. Someone can ‘code up’ the following:
#include <studio.h> int main(void) { printf(“Program that does X thing”;) }
(yes, I know the main arguments are not written correctly. You get the point)
and then have the AI reviewer ‘fix’ their code by doing all the actual work. A strict requirement for this tag, for any AI involvement in the creation of the code seems like the key. The code part is going to be where the security issues crop up, and where it’s really important to know who or what is producing the code you’re about to run on your home server.
I think we’re fairly used to a world where people use templates for their websites, documentation, etc. AI use there bothers me less, but an honest disclaimer saying what the AI did would sure go a long way to reducing the hate comments. I think people will still drive-by downvote, but that can’t (and IMO really shouldn’t be) prevented. But without a rule, people aren’t going to be honest.
The scary part is just how emboldened people feel nowadays to just entirely use an AI for all the coding, documentation, website, and then not even put their name on the project. These to me feel like borderline state actor trojan horses disguised as open-source projects.
Legitimate open source developers can spend years writing code to do something very sinplle but useful, and for them to be drowned out by a bunch of completely AI driven, slop posts really bothers me.
