Post B10VkBA2AxvjnynNNw by Kiloku@burnthis.town
(DIR) More posts by Kiloku@burnthis.town
(DIR) Post #B0xp7BLywOWWiaBcGW by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-05T19:05:26Z
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I'll definitely have more to say about this one, but it's an immense tragedy to see a library management tool, of all fucking things, betray the whole concept of artistic expression like this.https://buc.ci/abucci/p/1764956951.732666
(DIR) Post #B0xp7FwHtLwQwLCfPU by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-05T19:16:27Z
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I would seriously consider a hard fork over this, but that's a life-changing decision that I would need to give a lot more thought first.Regardless, of all the AI betrayals, this one might cut closest to the bone yet.
(DIR) Post #B0xp7KJpbl9QWWFWfA by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-05T19:42:31Z
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In retrospect, maybe the fact that Calibre's CI pulls in an AI translation engine's client should have been a clue back three years ago. Sigh.
(DIR) Post #B10VkBA2AxvjnynNNw by Kiloku@burnthis.town
2025-12-05T23:26:55Z
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@xgranade @abucci @davidgerard If anyone wants to voice their discontent on their forums, someone started a thread on it. The (sole?) maintainer of Calibre says it's off by default, but IMO that's not good enough
(DIR) Post #B10VkCeYcxwMQw5GbI by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-06T00:00:46Z
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@Kiloku @abucci @davidgerard Yeah, fair enough. I don't think there's anything useful to be gained at this point, given what he's already done in the repo. That's such a huge betrayal of trust, I don't see coming back from that, personally.
(DIR) Post #B10VkDtpzdl0IcEz3Y by AMS@infosec.exchange
2025-12-06T13:39:05Z
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@xgranade @Kiloku @abucci @davidgerard If all it's doing is providing a menu item to shell out to ${AI_COMMAND} ${BOOK_ID} and is disablable then I'm more ok than "we ship LLM slop in out security sw".
(DIR) Post #B10VkF5DaoSFyCZaQy by abucci@buc.ci
2025-12-06T14:44:05Z
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@AMS@infosec.exchange I've said this to two other people now:Introducing AI features into a software project with limited developer resources means that limited developer resources will be spent developing and maintaining those AI features when they could be spent on all the other, (imo) better things that could or should be done. It's a poor decision from the standpoint of managing resources, and that by itself reflects poorly on the decisionmaker regardless of what was at stake. This is a valid concern regardless of whether the features are opt-in or opt-out.and I stand by it. Sure, less is at stake than with KeePassXC, say. Still, I think it signals the beginning of the end of the project as I knew it, and I think it's important to pay attention to such signals. Whether you act on them or not is a function of your personal risk tolerance and threat model and whatnot. But writing them off or calling them "ok"? To me that feels like cope.@xgranade@wandering.shop @Kiloku@burnthis.town @davidgerard@circumstances.run
(DIR) Post #B10VkG1i5LF6tbwIbY by AMS@infosec.exchange
2025-12-06T17:24:23Z
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@abucci @xgranade @Kiloku @davidgerard I've been coping with terrible decisions from software I use for over 20 years and I'm tired. Honestly this is so far down the list from potteringware everywhere or wayland we-won't-do-it or chrome eee-ing the world while ff turns on some llm scanner for everything or llm coding in critical security tools that it's barely a bump. If it is less work to put in a menu item than fending off all the ai-bros trying to contribute vibe-code for it, then I'm not going to jump on them for it.
(DIR) Post #B10VkHGHUeUaj5lRxI by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-06T18:52:34Z
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@AMS @abucci @Kiloku @davidgerard I can't find it in my heart to get mad about systemd, I'll leave that one to others who get more down into the weeds in distro internals. Similarly, I have no personal experience with Wayland that would lead me to be mad about it (separately, it leaves a bad taste in my mouth that at least some of the complaints with Wayland pretty strongly resemble reactionary Rust hate, which, uh... no).This Calibre thing is much, much worse, though.(1/2)
(DIR) Post #B10VkII5fPX9uzcPPk by xgranade@wandering.shop
2025-12-06T18:53:57Z
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@AMS @abucci @Kiloku @davidgerard I said a bit more about why I think it's worse over at https://wandering.shop/@xgranade/115671289658145064, but the short version is that this action completely reverses and undermines the relationship Calibre has with artistic expression.That's a violation of trust, through and through, and demonstrates that there isn't a future for that project as-is.
(DIR) Post #B10VkIsFUySPj8XHm4 by abucci@buc.ci
2025-12-07T13:57:29Z
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@xgranade@wandering.shop @AMS@infosec.exchange @Kiloku@burnthis.town @davidgerard@circumstances.run I fully agree. I thought I'd add a couple things I came across in the meantime:https://buc.ci/abucci/p/1765115677.356051The calibre developer is AI-poisoned, and is antagonistic to people with concerns about the generative AI being added to calibre (which he claims ownership of, apparently, calling it "my software").In case you needed another reason to consider alternatives.