Hi,
On Mon, Jul 27, 2026 at 03:49:59PM +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:
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> Thanks for the feedback. I hereby amend my proposal.
>
> (Technically, I am proposing and accepting an amendment. AIUI people
> who already seconded my version can choose to withdraw their second,
> but remain seconders by default. I have CC'd the seconders.)
>
> After listening to what people have said so far, I think my paragraph
> 8 (about translations etc.) is too much of a can of worms. I think
> this is probably best dealt with on a forum-by-forum basis by the
> moderators. If anyone would prefer the version with paragraph 8,
> please do say. If there whoa sufficient support, we could have both
> on the ballot.
>
> I've included scope for moderators to make exceptions. I take Sean's
> point that this risks undermining a critical point - hence the "narrow
> and tailored" wording. In practice with a resolution like this we
> need to trust the moderators, CT, DAM, etc., to honour its spirit.
> To my mind the intent is quine clear about the ethics, even if the
> operative sections are more woolly.
>
> Changes:
>
> - Delete paragraph 8 ("may write in their native language").
Thanks for that.
> - New paragraph 4a with a narrow exception-making power for
> admins/mods.
I liked this, but I'm still a little confused. For example, consider CT, which
I'm part of. We try to have members from different timezones to be able to
respond promptly to urgent requests when they arise. Of course, we can't easily
find native English speakers in every timezone. Yet we frequently need to
communicate quite precisely, quickly, and most of the time in English. In many
situations, I find myself carefully choosing my words and text structure, as
circumstances often require great care to avoid causing more harm to those
involved. So sometimes I use assistance from tools (ex. deepl) to find the
words that best represents my intended communication.
Thing is, I don't even know what some of these tools use internally. They might
use LLMs... and they are very likely doing so already. And I believe that a
similar workflow is part of the daily work of many Debian contributors
nowadays. As I understand your point 4, this may fall against the rule that the
message "must be drafted solely by humans without LLM assistance.". If so, I
would be violating our CoC, even unintentionally, and therefore would promptly
leave CT to avoid being in that position. This would affect my motivation to
work for Debian quite a lot. And I fear this could happen more widely than we
realise.
I'm sorry if the above makes no sense and I'm misunderstanding your point. But
if makes *some* sense please make it clearer then.
Other than that, for the sake of avoiding more division, I would try to use
less harsh language when presenting this ballot ('bullshit','horrible
people'...).
With all that said, I second this ballot, because (1) it seems to represent the
feeling of a signficant part of our community and (2) because I personally
appreciate the spirit of it, even if I'm not completely certain how I would
weigh my vote at this point :-)
Bests,
> - Write "Codes of Conduct" and "the relevant Code of Conduct".
>
> - Fixed some typos found by ispell.
>
> I have retained the paragraph numbering to help keep the discussion
> clear. I hope the Secretary will be able to renumber them when the
> time comes and the ballot options are final. Kurt, please LMK if
> you'd prefer me to renumber them myself right away.
>
> - -8<- BEGIN PROPOSAL
>
> [ EDITORIAL NOTE FOR THE SECRETARY: When transposing this into an
> actual ballot, please renumber paragraphs and delete this note. ]
>
> 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 and 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 CODES 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.
>
> 4a. Moderators and disciplinary teams may make narrow and tailored
> exceptions to rule 4, and decide on interpretation.
>
> 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 relevant Code of Conduct and should result in swift and
> proportionate disciplinary action.
>
> - ->8- END PROPOSAL
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> --
> Ian Jackson <[email protected]> These opinions are my own.
>
> Pronouns: they/he. If I emailed you from @fyvzl.net or @evade.org.uk,
> that is a private address which bypasses my fierce spamfilter.
>
--
Tiago Bortoletto Vaz
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