• You might not have noticed, but we here at Hackaday are pretty big fans of Open Source - software, hardware, you name it. • We’ve also spilled our fair share of electronic ink on things people are doing with AI. • So naturally when [Jeff Greerling] declareson his blog(and in a video embedded below) that AI is destroying open source, well, we had to take a look. • [Jeff]’s article highlights a problem he and many others who manage open source projects have noticed: they’re getting flooded with agenetic slop pull requests (PRs). • It’s now to the point that GitHub will let you turn off PRs completely, at which point you’ve given up a key piece of the ‘hub’s functionality. • That ability to share openly with everyone seemed like a big source of strength for open source projects, but [Jeff] here is joining his voice with others like [Daniel Stenberg] of curl fame,who has dropped bug bountiesover a flood of spurious AI-generated PRs.
Article Summaries:
- Hackaday reports that AI‑generated pull requests are flooding open‑source repositories, prompting maintainers to reconsider openness. Jeff Greerling’s blog notes that the volume of “agenetic slop” PRs has reached a point where GitHub now allows disabling PRs entirely, a move that would sacrifice a core collaborative feature. Other developers, such as curl’s Daniel Stenberg, have removed bug‑bounty programs to curb spam. The article suggests that projects may need to shift to invitation‑only PRs and enforce strict “no AI” policies, though this risks limiting community contributions and could invite harassment from bots. The trend highlights growing tension between automation and open‑source governance.
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