proposed AI policy

[Aaron Merey]

Hi Frank,

On Wed, Apr 8, 2026 at 1:50 PM Frank Ch. Eigler via Systemtap
<systemtap@sourceware.org> wrote:
> Proposed policy:
>
> We welcome AI-assisted contributions in this project, with the same
> criteria as those produced by a less-assisted human, such as:
>
> - quality: correctness, intelligibility, stylistic consistency
> - general willingness to stand behind code for review and in future
> - no known copyright infringement or license incompatibility problems
>
> Rationale:
>
> Developers should feel free to use all the technological assistance
> they can safely handle, to produce quality contributions.  The final
> work speaks for itself, regardless of the tools used to build it, or
> indeed the identity of the creators.
>
> While some legalities of AI-generated content are murky, there is no
> known categorical incompatibility between free software licenses and
> AI-generated code.  Maintainers generally assume good faith when
> dealing with any contributor's work.

I support this policy. The existing patch review practices are capable
of handling AI-assisted contributions much the same as contributions
that are not AI-assisted. Low quality submissions can be refused,
commits found to have copyright or license problems can be reverted,
etc.

Should the policy include a mandate that contributors disclose when a
contribution is AI-assisted? In this case I'm leaning towards no
mandatory disclosure. The stated rationale for this policy is that
contributions speak for themselves regardless of tool use or creator
identity. So why should we demand special disclosure rules for just
one specific type of tool? There is no settled precedent for mandatory
disclosure so AFAIK we don't have a legal requirement to demand this
from contributors. Like any other contributor policy we can update
requirements if needed.

Aaron