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Title: LLM responses in emacs-devel mailing list
Date: September 28, 2026

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  So, I watch the GNU emacs-devel mailing list in my news
reader via Gmane[0]. Rcently, there's been an absolutely
massive thread of nonsense surrounding LLMs and an emacs
package, hermes.el, that's been going around in circles for
way too long. It's...a shitshow, to say the least.

  However, one emacs package developer, Thanos Apollo, had
decided to check out of the discussion and just set his LLM
agent to reply in his stead. One of the replies[1] managed
to get some people showing disgust at the act, and I don't
Eli Zaretski for having to deal with the mess being caused
by all of this. As someone who's been staff, moderation,
and administration for multiple communities in the past, I
know how much of a frustrating slog it can be to herd cats
among the people participating in the dicussions.

  I have to say that "Talk to the LLM" just might become a
new version of "talk to the hand", and I'd be considering a
rule or policy against such moves in future discussions. It
comes off as highly insulting and rude.  Almost like an
aristocrat saying "my butler will speak for me" and walking
off to do something else.

  The discussions and flame wars around LLMs have gotten
out of control at this point. Between the KDE debacle, this
whole situation, the AI witch hunts in the reader/author
spaces, and all of the fighting that amounts to nothing but
more hate and division, it's almost not worth being part of
online spaces anymore. I mean, I don't like LLMs, but there
is this new level of pure malice over multiple sides that
just makes it difficult to justify the constant damage to
my mental and physical health[^0].

  Even my love of retrocomputing tends to be spoiled by the
constant fighting in this uncivil war. I left three retro
tech communities because of it, and if it keeps up, I may
end up leaving more.

  My doctor wondered why I can't seem to relax. Here's one
of those reasons, I guess.

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[^0]: Yes, there is a physical aspect. When angry, your
      blood pressure rises, and sustained high BP can lead
      to major physical illness and other problems. I have
      BP issues as it is. I don't need more.

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[0]: http://gmane.io/
[1]: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2026-09/msg00581.html