I really don't get those takes. AI is the best thing that ever happened to the Free Software world, it is basically turning any software into Free Software. You can just throw file formats, protocols or even plain binaries at the AI and it'll reverse engineer everything in a pinch. Users can finally modify software themselves, which was always the goal of the Free Software world, but very rarely happened in actuality, since it was just so damn complicated. AI lowered the barrier of entry tremendously, not just in terms of required knowledge, but especially time. Same with Creative Commons, sharing art and stuff, was a nice gesture, but rarely useful, since the level of work to modify a work to fit your project was pretty close to just doing it from scratch anyway. With AI everybody can toy around with image generators and get what they want.
Is a social contract being broken? Yeah, kind of, but the problems that that contract existed to solve are no longer a thing. Creation is now easy and commodified. We finally have computer we can interact with in natural language, something people tried to do for at least 70 years and never made any significant progress on until LLM arrived.
If you want to gatekeep or only create stuff to boost your own ego or portfolio, then AI might be an issue, if you actually want to build stuff, AI is godsend. We are essentially living in the StarTrek future with Holodecks and replicators and people still find reason to complain.
It’s become pretty difficult in some areas due to cryptographic signatures that are either bound to the hardware or to online services.
Apple has feasibly stopped any modifications of iOS and their apps, for all practical purposes. These kinds of ecosystems will only continue to expand and to displace more open ones. We’re already at the point where arguably the most performant non-server hardware (Macs with the latest SoCs) is bound to a proprietary OS. Efforts like Asahi can easily be shut down by Apple with newer hardware.
LLMs are no help against proper cryptographic lockdown.
I don't think Office only runs on attested hardware. I'm not sure about Office 365, but the last office you could actually run on your own computer had no protection from modification and in fact, we modified it very extensively.
Sure, I was talking about the general trajectory, and that there are effective ways to prevent modification that vendors will put to use. Meaning that LLMs are not a panacea.
grumbel · · focus · HN ↗
Is a social contract being broken? Yeah, kind of, but the problems that that contract existed to solve are no longer a thing. Creation is now easy and commodified. We finally have computer we can interact with in natural language, something people tried to do for at least 70 years and never made any significant progress on until LLM arrived.
If you want to gatekeep or only create stuff to boost your own ego or portfolio, then AI might be an issue, if you actually want to build stuff, AI is godsend. We are essentially living in the StarTrek future with Holodecks and replicators and people still find reason to complain.
ciupicri · · focus · HN ↗
Right... I bet Microsoft wouldn't mind at all if I modify Windows or Office.
Pannoniae · · focus · HN ↗
layer8 · · focus · HN ↗
Apple has feasibly stopped any modifications of iOS and their apps, for all practical purposes. These kinds of ecosystems will only continue to expand and to displace more open ones. We’re already at the point where arguably the most performant non-server hardware (Macs with the latest SoCs) is bound to a proprietary OS. Efforts like Asahi can easily be shut down by Apple with newer hardware.
LLMs are no help against proper cryptographic lockdown.
mitxela · · focus · HN ↗
layer8 · · focus · HN ↗