I’ve gotten through (I believe) all the comments in the meta thread. So I want to establish a few things, first being a better definition on spam.

Spam is not “I don’t like this and its a paid product” or “I don’t like this and they used AI/LLMs”.

Spam would generally be considered:

  • Mass-posting - Posting the exact same post across a bunch of of different communities, rapidly.
  • Repetitive Content (aka karma farming) - repeatedly submitting old popular content. I’ll note that this is completely irrelevant on lemmy, this was more of a reddit issue due to karma.
  • Bot Activity / AI Abuse - Using scripts/bots/gen AI to automate posts and comments.
  • Unsolicited DMs - Mass private messages or chats to users, completely unsolicited

I’d say anything other than that deserves a followup rule, and this definition should go in the sidebar.

Regarding the promotional posts themselves, I think something like the 10% rule makes sense - no more than 10% of the account should be self-promotional material or comments within the community.

I do think it makes sense to include an exception for 100% free/libre open source projects. Partially open projects with a closed (paid) component should be subject to the 10% rule. So what I propose as the rule would be:

Promotional posts require community participation or they will be removed. No more than 10% of your posts or comments may be self-promotional, or your post will be removed. F/LOSS Exception: If your post is about a project that is completely open source & without any paywalls, it will be exempt from this rule.

Questions, comments, clarifications, and harsh criticisms are welcomed in the comments. As a reminder from my intro post, and because of some comments in the other thread, I will mention:

There are people on both sides of the keyboards, so please be respectful of others.

  • Tolstoy@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    4 months ago

    Nice to see the changes, but may I ask if tagging could be beneficial?

    Surely it would help to sort out self promotion, help requests and informational posts.

    Also, since we’re all in the lemmy-bubble, a lot of people may despise vibe-coded projects, at least it looks/feels like it, so it may be worth tagging project with AI code?

    I’m maybe narrow-minded, but please enlighten me^^

      • Tolstoy@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        4 months ago

        So doing nothing is the way? There are useful project created with AI but also a lot of harmful ones.

        Even I know, that the bigger part of selfhosters are copy and pasting guides and aren’t developer themselve, so why should we not try and at least warn these people?

          • curbstickle@anarchist.nexusOPMEnglish
            0·
            4 months ago

            I would hate to see this happen

            • [AI TAG] - slop, derision, FOAD
            • [NOT AI] - all good!

            Which is what is happening now without the tag as soon as someone sees “AI”, regardless of what its doing, how it was used, or if its even related to the development.

              • curbstickle@anarchist.nexusOPMEnglish
                0·
                4 months ago

                I think you’re missing the part where this happens now.

                Having an AI tag also means that posting comments to complain about using AI is off-topic and would be removed.

                  • curbstickle@anarchist.nexusOPMEnglish
                    0·
                    4 months ago

                    It seems like you’re making a case for some kind of loop - AI tag means you can’t complain about AI tagged posts, and if you do, your post gets removed.

                    Comment, but yes.

                    My counter point is - if the hostility already exists without a tag, that confirms the tag isn’t a cultural fix.

                    Not my job or in my control to change the culture, only to keep it on topic and appropriate commentary.

                    Is that really the right direction, given the reality of AI assistance in coding?

                    I can’t force people to recognize a tool as a tool, and I’m not trying to.

                    Moderating away dissent isn’t community health, it’s just quieter dissent.

                    And doesn’t detract from the posts with people who do understand the different ways to leverage an llm, and wish to interact with that content.

                    Let’s at least not do something that propagates the knee jerk “fuckAI and fuck you” Lemmy is famous for.

                    Which is what is happening now. So it can either be that, or something else. If you have a better idea, absolutely post about it as I said. Doing nothing, however, does nothing and continues exactly what you’re concerned about.

          • Tolstoy@lemmy.worldEnglish
            0·
            4 months ago

            I’m totally on your side about awareness and “you have to check it yourself”.

            Nobody is telling AI aided projects are bad. Nobody is saying vibe-coded projects are bad.

            The problem with vibe-coded projects is, that on average, the code isn’t checked by the owner itself. Surely there a some people using AI as aid and check it afterwards but this is sadly only a small proportion.

            In my honest opinion, we should not create rules around exceptions.

            We’re currently in a timeline, where it’s hard to tell what is right and what is wrong about AI usage but we have to start somewhere…

      • curbstickle@anarchist.nexusOPMEnglish
        0·
        4 months ago

        Really doesn’t address the issue at all.

        Because its not just user due diligence, but what the comment threads become.

        This is a discussion for another round though, not for this rule.

    • curbstickle_lw@lemmy.worldMEnglish
      0·
      4 months ago

      I actually do want tagging of some sort, I think its a sensible approach overall. I think its a quick way to identify that your project used AI and people can quickly filter, per your example.

      That said, I think that should be a separate item, and I don’t want to inundate with stickies either. That was going to be my next “oh look a mod is annoying us with his opinion again” post, but then we ended up seeing a ton of promo content this week. I’m trying to stick to a mod post every week or two so everyone has a chance to see and respond to things.

      That said, if you want to get that discussion ball rolling, feel free to make a meta post about it of course!

      • Tolstoy@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        4 months ago

        Thanks for your work, time and effort. I also think, it would be better to separate it and first end the discussion about promotions and co, so it could settle before kicking of another round^^