Linus Torvalds tells AI haters to fork off

ai and ml

Linux supremo says contributors opposed to AI use can 'just walk away'

Chief penguinista Linus Torvalds has declared that Linux is not an "anti-AI" project, telling contributors who object they can either walk away or fork the kernel.

On lore.kernel.org, the archive for Linux kernel mailing lists, reformed potty mouth Linus was responding to a discussion about some negative sentiments toward AI. 

It is one area where Torvalds said he was willing to “absolutely put my foot down as the top-level maintainer … Linux is not one of those anti-AI projects, and if somebody has issues with that they can do the open-source thing and fork it."

“Or just walk away.” 

Ever the pragmatist, Torvalds described AI as a tool, “just like other tools we use. And it’s clearly a useful one. It may not have been that ‘clearly’ even just a year ago, but it’s no longer in question today. 

“Anybody who doubts that clearly hasn’t actually used it.” 

In October 2024, the Linux kingpin branded 90 percent of AI as marketing hype, saying he hated the hoopla generated by the tech industry. He said at the time: “I really don’t want to go there, so my approach to AI right now is I will basically ignore it.” 

He predicted things would change in five years, though he has softened his stance in 21 months.

AI can be a “somewhat painful tool, both for maintainer workloads and just from an ‘it keeps finding embarrassing bugs’ standpoint,” Torvalds conceded this week. “But the solution is not to put your head in the sand and sing ‘La La La, I can’t hear you’ at the top of your voice like some people seem to do.” 

The solution, he said, is to make sure LLM tools help maintainers rather than cause them pain. “We’re not forcing anybody to use it, but I will very loudly ignore people who try to argue against other people from using it.” 

The kernel project continues to be about technology, Torvalds added, and while the social angle of developing open source software is an important aspect, it is a “side benefit, not the point of the project.” 

“In the kernel community we do open source because it results in better technology, not because of religious reasons. And so we make decisions primarily based on technical merit. Not fear of new tools.” 

The seeming shift in stance was evident when The Register's SJVN spoke to senior Linux maintainer Greg Kroah-Hartman in March: he told us AI-assisted bug reports and code review had improved dramatically.

"Something happened a month ago, and the world switched. Now we have real reports… All open source projects have real reports that are made with AI, but they're good, and they're real."

Torvalds in May said AI tools were only useful if they help “rather than cause unnecessary pain and pointless make-believe work.” 

Some maintainers in open source have complained of burnout - not helped by AI slop bug reports - and others worry about the quality of vibe-coding. 

Work still lies ahead before AI consistently proves it's more help than hindrance.

“AI isn’t perfect,” said Torvalds in the mailing-list post on Tuesday. “But Christ, anybody who points to the problems at AI [sic] had better be looking in the mirror and pointing at themselves at the same time. Because it’s not like natural intelligence is always all that great either.” 

Quite right.  ®