I am sponsoring the following proposal. > - -8<- BEGIN PROPOSAL > > Summary: Reject LLMs (generative "AI") as far as practical > > BACKGROUND > > LLMs have many serious problems, including: undermining the mechanisms > of free software community building; environmental damage; > exploitation of authors; disruption to open web hosting by > aggressive scraping; generation and promulgation of bullshit; > polluting the information commons; hazards to users' mental health; > economic bubbles; distortion of the computer hardware market; > fraud; ownership by horrible people and companies; and so on. > Ethical and safe use of this technology is almost impossible. > > Ideally, LLM output should not form any part of software that we rely > on, nor should LLM output ever take the place of human-written prose. > > Unfortunately some of the wider software world, including many of our > upstreams, take a different view. Therefore a complete ban on LLM > output as part of Debian is currently impractical. > > REQUESTS > > 1. We request that all contributors to Debian avoid the use of LLMs in > their Debian work. > > 2. We request that all decisionmakers within Debian discourage LLM use > as much as practical. Practicality is a judgement call and we > recognise that it will involve uncomfortable compromises. > > 3. We request that everyone, even outside Debian, should refrain from > using this technology. In particular, the Free Software and Open > Source communities should reject LLMs. We recognise that not > everyone will heed this call. > > REQUIREMENTS (SUPPLEMENT TO THE CODE OF CONDUCT) > > 4. Within Debian, messages to humans (including for example bug > reports, mailing list messages, discussions on Salsa, and blog > posts on Planet Debian) must be drafted solely by humans without > LLM assistance. > > 5. Any use of LLMs for Debian work must be disclosed. > > 6. Individual projects and maintainers may ban LLM contributions > completely. Such bans (including by upstream projects) must be > respected. > > 7. Violations of these requirements should be treated as violations of > the Code of Conduct and should result in swift but proportionate > disciplinary action. > > 8. Any contributor who feels they cannot write in English without > assistance, may write in their native language, and expect readers > to use translation tools of their choice. In that case a > human-written English summary would be very welcome but is not > required. In any case we promise not to shame anyone for any > linguistic mistakes. > > - ->8- END PROPOSAL
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