Posted by choult 1 day ago
We are going to have the organic label soon on apps with this mindset..AI assisted development is evolving by the day and at the rate most apps will be built that way..
You are equating manual coding with more thinking, which has proven to be not the case given that it is mostly automated.
My point was that you can have very well designed and thoughted apps with LLMs. In fact, I'd argue you can go way further and deeper than any manual coded application paired with AI assistance.
But maybe this instance is not the case. But even if it turns out to be not the case, if the app does work and serves the utility you are after, then why not using it? People use many things in everyday life without thinking about what thought was put into it..in fact, most people don't think at all about what it took to build anything, and how it was built..
Do you really know or care if the shoes you wearing was handmade or built by a factory in china using robots? you probably don't know and don't care.
If that were the case here, then a user of the app probably would not come away with the impression that it was a "very much LLM-aided app."
You're talking about how LLMs can be used in such a way that they help production of an app but remain invisible to the end user. But the beginning of this thread was someone using the app and coming away with the impression that it was heavily LLM influenced, which suggests that it was not done thoughtfully and did not remain invisible to the user.
But the parent comment positioned itself against all "LLM-aided apps", the author didn't say a slop or poorly coded. And even if it looks like LLM coded, we still can't tell about the level of thought that went into it. Developers had many poorly coded UIs and yet the apps functioned well and served it's purpose.
So the entire chain of reasoning is a form stereotype forming. Looking at this specific app, I can see that the author thought about the marketing/business and functionality, more than other alternatives, maybe because they had more mental bandwdith to do so.
I assume you are saying that because I apologized. I apologize for sounding like AI, I assure you it was hand written and I put thoughts into those comments.
> But... I get a "buy merch" popup the moment I open the page, and there seems to be a pro option for what seems to be a very much LLM-aided app? ...IDK, rubs off a bit wrong IMO. Just my personal opinion.”
Again, if the user of the app comes away with the impression that the app “seems to be a very much LLM-aided” then the LLM usage has affected the end product.
That is not say there are really mindlessly produced apps out there. But the comment made it sound that anything LLM-aided is negative.
Take a step back and think about your question in the context of privacy and software security.
For a few example answers, look at:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adware
In fact, given the recent reports, in terms of security, one is better off consulting LLMs on the exposure surfaces. Something a solo developer can now do cheaply but in the past required a lot of specialized knowledge.
Sorry I don't understand your argument.
What does "LLM-assisted coding" have to do with the question I answered? Here's that question again:
> if the app does work and serves the utility you are after, then why not using it?
Note that this question does not contain any reference to "LLMs". Indeed, an LLM-generated product can contain adware, spyware, or trojan horses just like a human-written one.
For additional context, this app in question seems to actually contain adware and spyware, and has a closed source codebase, so might contain a trojan horse as well.
Those seem like pretty good reasons to not run this totally-vibe-coded software, so I'm sorry, but I don't understand your argument that LLMs make this okay or not okay or whatever.
My comment was about not equating every LLM assisted app as poorly thought of. Your comment is about this specific app, and I personally would not install this app regardless of how it was coded.
But again in terms of security since you brought it, I'd argue that having LLM assisted coded app might be secure than manually coded application given the recent advancements. Again, this is a generic statement, not specific to this app.
Your later comments generalizing to "every LLM assisted app" seem like a bit of insecurity you might be feeling for using LLM assistance. No need to feel that way. LLM assistance is okay. We're discussing something different from mere LLM assistance.
The author mentioned LLM-aided app, not even AI assisted; nor vibe coded hence my reaction. I don't have insecurity from using LLM nor from coding manually. But I noticed a trend in people thinking and biases and it threw me off hence the comment.
My original comment was heavily downvoted and furthermore some of my comments were accused of being written by AI meanwhile I'm writing it by hand. Again, people are taking tribes/camps, if you speaking of insecurities, it actually the opposite clearly, many programmers are worried of being displaced and automated. And I do understand the concern, I'm just stating the fact that one can have very deeply thoughted LLM-aided app.
But this process is new, and not every AI assisted app is thoughtless. In fact, I'd argue that if a person put more thoughts and amplify their abilities with AI assisted coding, then the total sum of mental labour exceed that of any manually coded app by huge margins.
I'm not sure about this particular app, haven't looked into it. But I was merely commenting about the mindset of the parent comment.
If you are an experienced programmer (not someone that did an online course and calls like this) with YEARS of experience in coding in multiple languages really, the only real limitation is the speed at which you can type on the keyboard, that is usually way faster than what the even good LLM is able to emit tokens.
This not considering token expense: if we see at the point of view of the company, it's way cheaper an experienced programmer, that in my country costs you 4000 a month tax included, than the tokens that an LLM would use to do the same job.
On top of that there is the environmental impact of all of this, and why they are almost making me not use my car because it's euro 5 and now there is euro 6, these AI companies are emitting tons of CO2 to do stuff that human beings can do with 1/1000 the energy that these AI companies use.
I mean, have you truly tried? do others thing this is true? I'm truly astonished if that is majority experience, I think we need to get surveys on this.
You'll find plenty of people on HN who have this experience,but they just tend to be ridiculed or told they just haven't used AI correctly or enough. Admitting you don't use LLMs for everything, or god forbid at all, is like telling Christians you don't want to be saved.
I'm not here condemning people who use or not use. We have a new tech, for anyone who have been in the field long enough, it is nothing short of magic was has been accomplished in the last few years.
I could turn around 10K lines of code per day (I know it's not the best measurement but it does capture size to some extent) when I was not able to pull more than a 100 LOC. Let us say that most of it work, and there are few rough edges, a senior programmer can follow the shape of the code, and understand where to tweak and where the LLM get stuck. So this is basically like having racing engine compared to running.
To metaquote a recent thread - where is the vibe-coded replacement for Photoshop that outcompetes it? or Word? Why aren't vibe-coded games dominating Steam?
The speed alone doesn't translate to productivity and productivity alone doesn't translate to quality.
"The speed alone doesn't translate to productivity and productivity alone doesn't translate to quality."
Damn FDA organic app users are mad about this one
HN is not that rational of a discussion form but there are some good articles/comments so worth being around.
I'm not advocating for those means, but I understand how people are feeling more helpless than ever to just "let the system work it out" when the system appears to be bought and paid for by a small concentration of corporations and people with an increasingly disproportionate share of wealth.
-Thomas Jefferson
I personally think the tree of liberty is probably getting pretty thirsty.
And in retrospect, the French revolution is not considered a dark episode of modern history, on the contrary.
well, the idea of democracy was to offer a viable path for people's discontent to be heard and remediated.
Unfortunately in most Western countries, dysfunctionality and corporatism have taken it over, and that is why you're seeing authoritarians on the rise across the world. They paint democracy and "legacy" figures as the scapegoat and themselves (plus handing them allllllll the power) as the only solution - just look at Milei and the chainsaw.
I created it in two months using Claude Code. It would have taken me three years without it. I would have never done it.
What about this free service is a win for big tech?:
It’s their game at this point, unfortunately. We hold very little say in how things go.
...which refers to the song https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Making_Plans_for_Nigel; the most well-known person called Nigel in the UK currently being https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nigel_Farage .
Why would I want a bluetooth scanner to phone home? Seems untrustworthy. Nearby Glasses wins from a data safety perspective.
- run foreground service with the type "connectedDevice"
- discover and pair nearby Bluetooth devices
- run foreground service
- control vibration
- Google Play billing service
- run at startup
- Google Play license check
- have full network access
- view network connections
- ask to ignore battery optimizations
- prevent phone from sleeping
- connect to paired Bluetooth devices
- show notifications
and so I leave this comment as off topic, but, is it pretty easy to get your new app to appear in that ad slot, above the main contender?
https://www.interteammarketing.com/blog/how-to-target-compet...
I think these concerns are on topic, given the larger concern is about how bad actors can wield technology for profitable surveillance.
marketing > technical ability
It's been this way ever since I've worked in the industry and will probably never change because of human behavior.
No idea's original, there's nothing new under the sun
It's never what you do, but how it's done
Twice.
____coders don't even bother to vibe-code, they don't have a clue that there might be a better solution /s
"ZuckOff" is a better quality marketing name for an app like this, vibecoded or not.
The media and already consumers have talked more about "ZuckOff" than "Nearby Glasses" so a winner has already been chosen.
Between something opensource and trusted, and a proprietary potential backdoor that can send the data back to the Zuck himself you'd probably want to choose the former (cause you never know with closed sources).
I'm glad that he has shared the link as for me it's definitely useful. It's not a competition and I don't care what media talk, that's not about money.
Outside of that, this project giving scary warnings is something I cannot recommend to others.
> Between something opensource and trusted and proprietary backdoor that can send the data back to the Zuck himself you'd probably want to choose the former.
Only HN veterans care about this, not people in the real world.
Decided by whom?
This feels like astroturfing. The amount of new users recommending and hyping this proprietary product seems odd.
(something as simple as a product name)... is enough to make someone ignore the actual point about software trust and instead argue that good marketing is what's important :)
Of course the irony there is palpable. Worry about the glasses while disregarding everything else.
And it is not about being first here. ZuckOff is just a better packaged app, that's why it took off.
> Do you really think popular = automatically better?
If it gets the point effectively across better than the original.
Yes.
It is more supported than something that is OSS that will die in under a year.
There are features that ZuckOff has that are more useful than the suggested one IMO.
For a vibecoded app, it is well packaged with a great name.
That is how you get people to use your app.
If you see something that is popular but you think it is worse, then your better/worse axis is not aligned with the majority.
For example, X is better than Mastodon because you don't have to pick a server to use.
If I go on another subject I invested time in, RPGs, D&D is the most popular system while inferior imho to a lot of others. Even if we have to keep the very flawed d20 system, the way forgotten chronicles handles everything is superior (and if in your bad opinion it's not the case because weirdly you like the class system, you probably would prefer pathfinder instead of dnd).
It was an amazing book.
BTW, I will also recommend 'a hero of our time' by Lermontov. In it, you will get an updated view of what the meaning of 'friends' will be. :)
EDIT: since this is getting upvotes, I will also mention that Lermontov is a descendant of the Learmonts, who were British folk.
Also, the book is small but it's jampacked with a lot of wisdom--street and abstract both-- and presented using a language that shines with poetry, it shines even through translation (Penguin Classics trans. is best).
This comment box is too small to contain the story.
* The Quantum Thief
* The Fractal Prince
* The Causal Angel
Actually, most of the story is on his WikiPedia page:
The 1st 2 are independent, I recommened people stop after 2nd book
As digital dystopias go, this is one of the worst I've seen; the episode ending with this happening to the protagonist shook me to the core.
> Logs every Bluetooth device it hears, glasses or not
How much AGI is required before LLMs stop putting totally irrelevant technical details into marketing copy?
> Nothing leaves your phone and there is no account.
This is good to know, but it's the exact type of thing Claude is obsessed with putting everywhere once you tell it NOT to do something. For example, if I tell it to commit but never push changes to GitHub, it can't help but leave "Changes committed; nothing was pushed." to EVERY SINGLE MESSAGE. The model just can't help but report back about everything it's NOT doing, and it drives me crazy.
What’s annoying is the stuff it decides to put into user facing copy, details that they’d never give a shit about, calling everything real, etc
Similarly, a venue could request a do-not-film-this-venue setting and make sure no photos are taken at a party.
There was an article on HN that one city's police force, when there were protests going on, took to playing Disney songs from loudspeakers; so that any recording of their interactions would be impossible to publish on any significant internet platform (or at least, the audio would be muted, by IP protection filters).
When you look at it from a legal "use it or lose it" and corporate risk perspective it's quite surprising that Disney didn't even sent cease and desists.
Edit: Of course you don't lose the copyright but your ability to litigate someone else's unfair use is a lot weaker when their lawyer can trot out a million examples that you were fine with.
Nobody who loves Disney songs would listen to them while also hearing police officers shouting, etc.
There's no human to appeal to in social media platforms. It's automated, algorithmic enforcement; and when it's wrong (or someone exploits it to be wrong, like this), you're powerless to do anything. It means nothing if you're technically in the legal right: the platforms are risk-averse and don't care about your false positive.
Ahem...
In the UK/EU Let me introduce you to article 22 of the GDPR
The data subject shall have the right not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects concerning him or her or similarly significantly affects him or her.
i.e. If subjected to an algorithm making decisions, you have an automatic right of appeal to a _human_.
https://gdpr-info.eu/art-22-gdpr/
You need to adopt a sensible data protection law if you don't want to be exploited.
(In the excerpt you quoted: "legal effects" / or "significantly affects").
Though presumably you would prefer the alternative; that such companies are unrestrained in what they may do and the population at large must simply bend over and grab their ankles with both hands?
This has never once prevented a DMCA notice from being issued, and I'm sure you can guess how easy it is to get a person at YouTube to review your appeal
Rendering security cameras useless for identifying any criminals?
Maybe some of these commenters aren’t old enough to remember when fighting for your right to take photographs and videos in public places was one of the frequent topics in online places like Slashdot and BoingBoing. There have been waves of attempts to restrict freedoms to take photos in many countries. When they pass there’s a significant loss of personal rights and freedoms.
> Similarly, a venue could request a do-not-film-this-venue setting and make sure no photos are taken at a party.
Do you really want this? An off-button for all cameras nearby? Please purchase your official photographs from the gift shop or from the $5 Photo Booth.
This would be a dream for bad people who don’t want to be recorded or photographed doing something, like a bad police officer. Just keep a device around that broadcasts the “do not record at this venue” signal and you can shut down recordings all around.
that requires too much goodwill and effort from the makers of such devices. They know their audience wouldn't want that. They don't give a shit about what people being filmed think.
Think about it some more. It's all fun and games, until same technology is used against you. There was literally a Black Mirror episode about this very thing.
Yes, let's keep coming with more of these great ideas.
To cut this short: the whole overall idea is just universal DRM writ large. A big, principled no fucking way, ever from me.
But what about the personal privacy / venue rights ...
That's a social problem, it should not be used as excuse to give unilateral control over other people's technology to groups or individuals with special interests.
It would make sure no websites track you.
The idea was for concert venues display these on-stage to block smartphones from filming (and redirect users to iTunes purchases instead IIRC)
Sounds like a swift way to be included in "Need constant observation" list. Or we can even build a special surveillance for such folks along with plausible Parallel construction scenario constantly refreshed.
Dash cams would effectively become illegal.
Someone just wanting to record themselves and some friends doing something would need to ask explicit permission from everyone in the background.
It's just not a tenable option.
If you meant to say "to being filmed", how do you implement that? People have been filming crowds since the 1950s; "Candid Camera" famously made covert filming mainstream.
"Should be" is a dream of the Good Ship Lollipop. Here IRL, laws and regulations are the only thing that will discourage it.
Sounds a lot worse. The possible applications of this alone are infinitely more scary than perverts filming others without their consent.
This is THE nightmare scenario. Think about it for a second and you’ll see why.
Not sure why you think social norms are positive. Negative amoral behaviors can become norms. I'd argue the west has tons of amoral behavior that is normalized.
Likewise, it's not acceptable to shove a camera to everyone's face, and it shouldn't be on people to opt-out of it.
Explains a lot about why people vote for racist and right wing parties.
Now I get the racists, but you, quite literally, just boiled down all politics to: left wing parties = good; right wind parties = bad;
And, honestly, that’s gotta be the single most childish and naive take anyone could ever make about politics.
It’d be funny if it weren’t so sad that you think you’re “fighting big tech” when this is probably the most “I’m a social media junkie” take ever.
It… really is not.
People thinking in such binary terms (good vs evil) is exactly how we get to where we are today.
Nothing is as black and white as it seems to be. Especially politics.
Haaaaaa.
Dude. Seriously. I mean this in the least snarky and rude way possible: try to get off social media.
(Yes, example chosen for its reputation for indifferent enforcement.)
What the parent comment is suggesting is to invert the onus. "I can film you by default, unless you tell me not to".
We want a society that does not need these workarounds.
The tricky part is that social peer pressure requires a lack of anonymity - not just in terms of detecting whether people are recording without consent at the time - but also the posting of content online.
Naming and shaming requires names.
[1] https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/12/19/1065306/roomba-i...
If we have to come up with a technological solution to grant anonymity when people are filming, criminals can use it.
If we as a society don't go around filming everyone all the time, we don't need that technical solution available, so we can film the criminals when they are doing something criminal.
Oh, the hypocrisy