The Rust Evangelism Task Force has declared "ethics" to be out of scope. And that's going as well as you might guess:
This document establishes a policy for how LLMs can be used when contributing to rust-lang/rust. [...] No comment on this PR may mention the following topics:
• Long-term social or economic impact of LLMs
• The environmental impact of LLMs
• Anything to do with the copyright status of LLM output
• Moral judgements about people who use LLMs
jwz: The Rust Evangelism Task Force has declared "ethics" to be out of scope
And that's going as well as you might guess: This document establishes a policy for how LLMs can be used when contributing to rust-lang/rust. [...] No comment on this PR may mention the following topics: Long-term social or economic impact of LLMs.jwz.org
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C.Suthorn
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to C.Suthorn • • •flpvsk
in reply to jwz • • •the excerpt left me with an impression that things are worse than they are
to add a few more quotes to balance that take:
> We still consider these topics to be important, we simply do not believe this is the right place to discuss them.
> This intentionally does not address the moral, social, and environmental impacts of LLMs. These topics have been extensively discussed on Zulip without reaching consensus, but this policy is relevant regardless of the outcome of these discussions.
jwz
in reply to flpvsk • • •@flpvsk Anyone who says "we want to craft this policy only around technical reasons without any discussion of ethics" is:
A) Putting their thumb on the scale
B) A massive piece of shit
flpvsk
in reply to jwz • • •i largely agree. my *charitable* read on this would be:
1. they are not ready to put together AI guidelines in it's full and final form, bc the discussion is ongoing (not set aside, just not finalized, ongoing on Zulip).
2. At the same time AI-authored PRs keep coming in, so they need something in the policy to point to to reject those.
that's the impression I got at least
jwz
in reply to flpvsk • • •Dźwiedziu
in reply to jwz • • •I'd go further: we need to make them hand it back.
@flpvsk
The Penguin of Evil
in reply to jwz • • •Sam Coulter
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to Sam Coulter • • •Sam Coulter
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to Sam Coulter • • •flpvsk
in reply to flpvsk • • •and most importantly, the policy itself
> The policy's guidelines are roughly as follows:
> It's fine to use LLMs to answer questions, analyze, distill, refine, check, suggest, review. But not to **create**.
groxx
in reply to flpvsk • • •@flpvsk agreed - it's largely just saying "we need a policy either way. constructive comments welcome, broader discussion belongs elsewhere" and that seems... fine? Github is hardly an ideal (or even good) place for heavily threading discussions. And they're correct that they need a policy, as many treat "no comment" as permission.
That said, the Zulip they link to is not publicly visible, which is rather concerning. Private discussions are fine, but they're not evidence, and they don't provide a place to go to contribute.
jwz
in reply to groxx • • •@groxx @flpvsk No, it's saying, "This is where we're going to decide what our policy should be, and oh by the way, the primary and most fundamental objections that many people have to using LLMs are out of bounds for this discussion."
That's not just putting your thumb on the scale, that's kicking the legs out from under the table.
groxx
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to groxx • • •groxx
in reply to jwz • • •@flpvsk with a large group of people, how you do get a policy written down and agreed on when both sides feel very strongly?
I would much prefer they ban LLMs entirely, but many clearly disagree and you still need enough of them to sign off on it for it to be adopted. How do you reach that point when both are brigading heavily?
jwz
in reply to groxx • • •@groxx @flpvsk Why are you making this my problem to solve? It manifestly is not. I don't even use Rust.
My primary point is that claiming you are having a conversation about something while at the same time forbidding the primary objections to it -- is not a conversation.
groxx
in reply to jwz • • •@flpvsk the conversations have been happening and will continue to happen, yes? Or is there a sign that it has been stopped everywhere?
And on the ethical side, it really does seem to me that it's largely a brick wall between the two, and few cross over. The kind of unproductive fights that leads to are obvious, and happening all over. So you're kinda left with: A) fight and go nowhere, B) fork and the associated costs (either you leave or you kick them out), or C) moderate to try to make progress. I'm not really seeing any other options.
(I'm not deeply active in the community, maybe there are signs it's just being shut down everywhere? If there are, then I entirely agree with you)
jwz
in reply to groxx • • •ShadSterling
in reply to flpvsk • • •jwz
in reply to ShadSterling • • •Simon Brooke
in reply to jwz • • •the elder sea
in reply to jwz • • •How about this part?
eigenmagic.net/@benno/11657592…
Benno
2026-05-15 01:10:40
Solemarc
in reply to the elder sea • • •jwz
in reply to Solemarc • • •Solemarc
in reply to jwz • • •Cody Casterline 🏳️🌈
in reply to jwz • • •Also seems very weird that *whether LLM code can even be legally copyrighted and licensed for OSS* gets sandwiched between questions of "just ethics".
You'd think you'd want to have that one nailed down before accepting ANY contributions. 🤔
Barry Rowlingson
in reply to jwz • • •mhoye
in reply to jwz • • •Toni Aittoniemi
in reply to jwz • • •Netzpolitik Baden-Württemberg
in reply to jwz • • •Iris Young (he/they/she) (PhD)
in reply to jwz • • •Drew haz a new instance
in reply to jwz • • •Bynkii
in reply to jwz • • •Scott Smith
in reply to jwz • • •nothacking
in reply to jwz • • •To be fair, the policy itself doesn't seem too bad:
... Show more...To be fair, the policy itself doesn't seem too bad:
While it doesn't state it explicitly, it's heavy implied that any (non typo correction) code changes made by an LLM are banned.
Reads like a "we need to have a policy" policy. Allows things that the devs can't prevent, puts heavy limitations on slop coding where they can, and requires disclosure of any use.
Fantômas
in reply to jwz • • •10tothe22
in reply to jwz • • •El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸 • • •El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸 • • •El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸
in reply to jwz • • •jwz
in reply to El Pamplina 🇺🇦 🇵🇸 • • •Proto Himbo European
in reply to jwz • • •