We, your /r/rust moderator team, have heard your concerns regarding AI-generated content on the subreddit, and we share them. The opinions of the moderator team on the value of generative AI run the gamut from "cautiously interested" to "seething hatred", with what I percieve to be a significant bias toward the latter end of the spectrum.

We've been discussing for months how we want to address the issue but we've struggled to come to a consensus.

On the one hand, we want to continue fostering a community for high-quality discussions about the Rust programming language, and AI slop posts are certainly getting in the way of that. However, we have to concede that there are legitimate use-cases for gen-AI, and we hesitate to adopt any policy that turns away first-time posters or generates a ton more work for our already significantly time-constrained moderator team.

So far, we've been handling things on a case-by-case basis. Because Reddit doesn't provide much transparency into moderator actions, it may appear like we haven't been doing much, but in fact most of our work lately has been quietly removing AI slop posts.

In no particular order, I'd like to go into some of the challenges we're currently facing, and then conclude with some of the action items we've identified. We're also happy to listen to any suggestions or feedback you may have regarding this issue. Please constrain meta-comments about generative AI to this thread, or feel free to send us a modmail if you'd like to talk about this privately.

We don't patrol, we browse like you do.

A lot of people seem to be under the conception that we approve every single post and comment before it goes up, or that we're checking every single new post and comment on the subreddit for violations of our rules.

By and large, we browse the subreddit just like anyone else. No one is getting paid to do this, we're all volunteers. We all have lives, jobs, and value our time the same as you do. We're not constantly scrolling through Reddit (I'm not at least). We live in different time zones, and there's significant gaps in coverage. We may have a lot of moderators on the roster, but only a handful are regularly active.

When someone asks, "it's been 12 hours already, why is this still up?" the answer usually is, "because no one had seen it yet." Or sometimes, someone is waiting for another mod to come online to have another person to confer with instead of taking a potentially controversial action unilaterally.

Some of us also still use old Reddit because we don't like the new design, but the different frontends use different sorting algorithms by default, so we might see posts in a different order. If you feel like you've seen a lot of slop posts lately, you might try switching back to old Reddit (old.reddit.com).

While there is an option to require approvals for all new posts, that simply wouldn't scale with the current size of our moderator team. A lot of users who post on /r/rust are posting for the first time, and requiring them to seek approval first might be too large of a barrier to entry.

There is no objective test for AI slop.

There is really no reliable quantitative test for AI-generated content. When working on a previous draft of this announcement (which was 8 months ago now), I had put several posts into multiple "AI detector" results from Google, and gotten responses from "80% AI generated" to "80% human generated" for the same post. I think it's just a crapshoot depending on whether the AI detector you use was trained on the output of the model allegedly used to generate the content. Averaging multiple results will likely end up inconclusive more often than not. And that's just the ones that aren't behind a paywall.

Ironically, this makes it very hard to come up with any automated solution, and Reddit's mod tools have not been very helpful here either.

For example, AutoModerator's configuration is very primitive, and mostly based on regex matching: https://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/wiki/automoderator/full-documentation

We could just have it automatically remove all posts with links to github.com or containing emojis or em-dashes, but that's about it. There's no magic "remove all AI-generated content" rule.

So we're stuck with subjective examination, having to look at posts with our own eyes and seeing if it passes our sniff tests. There's a number of hallmarks that we've identified as being endemic to AI-generated content, which certainly helps, but so far there doesn't really seem to be any way around needing a human being to look at the thing and see if the vibe is off.

But this also means that it's up to each individual moderator's definition of "slop", which makes it impossible to apply a policy with any consistency. We've sometimes disagreed on whether some posts were slop or not, and in a few cases, we actually ended up reversing a moderator decision.

Just because it's AI doesn't mean it's slop.

Regardless of our own feelings, we have to concede that generative AI is likely here to stay, and there are legitimate use-cases for it. I don't personally use it, but I do see how it can help take over some of the busywork of software development, like writing tests or bindings, where there isn't a whole lot of creative effort or critical thought required.

We've come across a number of posts where the author admitted to using generative AI, but found that the project was still high enough quality that it merited being shared on the subreddit.

This is why we've chosen not to introduce a rule blanket-banning AI-generated content. Instead, we've elected to handle AI slop through the existing lens of our low-effort content rule. If it's obvious that AI did all the heavy lifting, that's by definition low-effort content, and it doesn't belong on the subreddit. Simple enough, right?

Secondly, there is a large cohort of Reddit users who do not read or speak English, but we require all posts to be in English because it's is the only common language we share on the moderator team. We can't moderate posts in languages we don't speak.

However, this would effectively render the subreddit inaccessible to a large portion of the world, if it weren't for machine translation tools. This is something I personally think LLMs have the potential to be very good at; after all, the vector space embedding technique that LLMs are now built upon was originally developed for machine translation.

The problem we've encountered with translated posts is they tend to look like slop, because these chatbots tend to re-render the user's original meaning in their sickly corporate-speak voices and add lots of flashy language and emojis (because that's what trending posts do, I guess). These users end up receiving a lot of vitriol for this which I personally feel like they don't deserve.

We need to try to be more patient with these users. I think what we'd like to do in these cases is try to educate posters about the better translation tools that are out there (maybe help us put together a list of what those are?), and encourage them to double-check the translation and ensure that it still reads in their "voice" without a lot of unnecessary embellishment. We'd also be happy to partner with any non-English Rust communities out there, and help people connect with other enthusiasts who speak their language.

The witch hunts need to stop.

We really appreciate those of you who take the time to call out AI slop by writing comments or reports, but you need to keep in mind our code of conduct and constructive criticism rule.

I've seen a few comments lately on alleged "AI slop" posts that crossed the line into abuse, and that's downright unacceptable. Just because someone may have violated the community rules does not mean they've adbicated their right to be treated like a human being.

That kind of toxicity may be allowed and even embraced elsewhere on Reddit, but it directly flies in the face of our community values, and it is not allowed at any time on the subreddit. If you don't feel that you have the ability to remain civil, just downvote or report and move on.

Note that this also means that we don't need to see a new post every single day about the slop. Meta posts are against our on-topic rule and may be removed at moderator discretion. In general, if you have an issue or suggestion about the subreddit itself, we prefer that you bring it to us directly so we may discuss it candidly. Meta threads tend to get... messy. This thread is an exception of course, but please remain on-topic.

What we're going to do...

1. We'd like to reach out to other subreddits to see how they handle this, because we can't be the only ones dealing with it. We're particularly interested in any Reddit-specific tools that we could be using that we've overlooked. If you have information or contacts with other subreddits that have dealt with this problem, please feel free to send us a modmail.
2. We need to expand the moderator team, both to bring in fresh ideas and to help spread the workload that might be introduced by additional filtering. Note that we don't take applications for moderators; instead, we'll be looking for individuals who are active on the subreddit and invested in our community values, and we'll reach out to them directly.
3. Sometime soon, we'll be testing out some AutoMod rules to try to filter some of these posts. Similar to our existing [Media] tag requirement for image/video posts, we may start requiring a [Project] tag (or flair or similar marking) for project announcements. The hope is that, since no one reads the rules before posting anyway, AutoMod can catch these posts and inform the posters of our policies so that they can decide for themselves whether they should post to the subreddit.
4. We need to figure out how to re-word our rules to explain what kinds of AI-generated content are allowed without inviting a whole new deluge of slop.

We appreciate your patience and understanding while we navigate these uncharted waters together. Thank you for helping us keep /r/rust an open and welcoming place for all who want to discuss the Rust programming language.

The Rust Moderation Team resigned (see https://github.com/rust-lang/team/pull/671) with the following message.

The entire moderation team resigns, effective immediately. This resignation is done in protest of the Core Team placing themselves unaccountable to anyone but themselves.

As a result of such structural unaccountability, we have been unable to enforce the Rust Code of Conduct to the standards the community expects of us and to the standards we hold ourselves to. To leave under these circumstances deeply pains us, and we apologize to all of those that we have let down. In recognition that we are out of options from the perspective of Rust Governance, we feel as though we have no course remaining to us but to step down and make this statement.

In so doing, we would offer a few suggestions to the community writ large:

• We suggest that Rust Team Members come to a consensus on a process for oversight over the Core Team. Currently, they are answerable only to themselves, which is a property unique to them in contrast to all other Rust teams.
• In the interest of not perpetuating unaccountability, we recommend that the replacement for the Mod Team be made by Rust Team Members not on the Core Team. We suggest that the future Mod Team, with advice from Rust Team Members, proactively decide how best to handle and discover unhealthy conflict among Rust Team Members. We suggest that the Mod Team work with the Foundation in obtaining resources for professional mediation.
• Additionally, while not related to this issue, based on our experience in moderation over the years, we suggest that the future Mod Team take special care to keep the team of a healthy size and diversity, to the extent possible. It is a thankless task, and we did not do our best to recruit new members.

In this message, we have avoided airing specific grievances beyond unaccountability. We've chosen to maintain discretion and confidentiality. We recommend that the broader Rust community and the future Mod Team exercise extreme skepticism of any statements by the Core Team (or members thereof) claiming to illuminate the situation.

We are open to being contacted by Rust Team Members for advice or clarification.

Sincerely, The Rust Moderation Team (Andre, Andrew and Matthieu)

Note: Matt Brubeck resigned earlier this month for health reasons, and therefore is not co-signing this message.

First of all, I'd like to apologize to Rebecca, Ryan, JT, and Jan-Erik: our relationship with Core has been deteriorating for months, and our resignation in no way should be seen as a condemnation of your nomination. I wish you the best.

Secondly, we (moderators) wish to abstain from any name-calling, finger-pointing, blame-seeking, or wild speculations, and focus on Constructive Criticism: how to improve the state of things, moving forward.

There are many potential topics that are worth exploring:

• What should the Rust Governance look like?
• How should the Rust Moderation Team be structured? What should be its responsibilities?
• How can we ensure accountability and integrity at the top? Who Watches The Watchers?

Furthermore, feel free to ask any questions¹ on moderation today, moderator woes, why we feel that diversity/representation matters, what are whisper networks, ... and I'll do my best to field the questions.

¹ No particular case will be discussed, obviously.

As you may have noticed, on June 12th this subreddit was among the 8,000 subreddits that participated in the blackout protesting Reddit's upcoming API changes (please see our original announcement linked here). While many subreddits remain closed indefinitely, on /r/rust we are attempting to strike a balance between the deliberate disruption required by the protest and our role as a source of news and information for users of Rust. However, the fact remains that Reddit is becoming more hostile to discussion-focused subreddits like ours, and as of July 1st all third-party Reddit apps will cease to function, which will have a deleterious effect on many of our readers.

To help facilitate continued participation in the broader Rust community for anyone here who will be affected by the loss of third-party apps, here is a list of alternative Rust discussion venues:

• The Official Rust Users Forum: https://users.rust-lang.org/
• The #general channel on the Official Rust Zulip: https://rust-lang.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/122651-general
• The Rust Community Discord: https://discord.gg/rust-lang-community (note: Discord, like Reddit, is a proprietary platform)
• The #rust channel on the Official Mozilla Matrix: https://chat.mozilla.org/#/room/#rust:mozilla.org
• The #rust channel on the Official Matrix Homeserver: https://app.element.io/#/room/#rust:matrix.org
• The ##rust channel on Libera.Chat IRC: https://web.libera.chat/##rust

You may notice that, of the listed venues, only the Rust Users Forum resembles a conventional asynchronous forum like Reddit, and unlike Reddit it features flat comment threads rather than Reddit's tree-style comment threads. To reiterate the plea from our prior announcement: we desperately need viable Reddit replacements. We encourage our users to do the Rust community a service by establishing and promoting new Reddit-style platforms, in order to provide attractive alternatives in the likely event that Reddit continues to degrade in usability. We ask that people leave comments below linking to any forums of this nature; in the future, once we have experience with these alternative forums, we may decide to officially endorse them in similar fashion to the venues above.

If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to message the mods.

This is enshittification: surpluses are first directed to users; then, once they're locked in, surpluses go to suppliers; then once they're locked in, the surplus is handed to shareholders and the platform becomes a useless pile of shit. From mobile app stores to Steam, from Facebook to Twitter, this is the enshittification lifecycle.

We can no longer ignore the enshittification of Reddit.

When /r/rust was first established, Reddit's design made it a premier platform for thorough discussions. It was this that drew us to cultivate and popularize /r/rust.

In 2018, Reddit launched a redesign ("New Reddit") aimed at pivoting Reddit away from hosting discussions and more towards mindless, endless, vapid media consumption. To demonstrate how little concern was given to discussion-oriented communities, this redesign originally didn't even allow subreddits to disable thumbnails, resulting in a huge, useless placeholder image on every single non-media post. Of course, in the old design, subreddits would have been empowered to fix this themselves via custom CSS; and of course, the redesign also removed this feature, ostensibly because supporting it would have been too hard (which translates to "we're afraid subreddits will use CSS to hide ads"). When subreddits protested this, Reddit mollified the protests by promising that CSS support was "Coming Soon™"; five years later, the greyed-out, non-functional "CSS" button stands as a testament to the value of Reddit's promises.

Earlier this year, Reddit announced changes which wreaked havoc on services making use of the Reddit API, including essential moderation tools.

And now, in pursuit of stuffing even more ads down the throats of even more users, Reddit has announced changes which ensure the destruction of every third-party Reddit app. Apollo fell first, and the rest swiftly followed. (Naturally, this move was so ill-considered that it failed to realize that both the official app and New Reddit are so inaccessible that blind users rely on third party apps to function.)

Between the loss of third party apps and the undoubtedly-imminent removal of Old Reddit, this will drive away both users and moderators who would otherwise be forced to endure broken, deficient interfaces.

Ah, but worry not, Reddit has claimed that API exemptions for mod tools and accessibility are Coming Soon™. Of course, even if this wasn't a lie, it would do nothing to arrest Reddit's accelerating exploitation of its users. To halt the enshittification at this point would require abandoning the hope of a juicy IPO and contenting themselves with being merely a useful text-based discussion platform rather than being a TikTok competitor that nobody asked for; unfortunately, we all know that's not going to happen.

For the reasons given above, as of tomorrow, June 12, /r/rust will be joining 6,000 other subreddits in protest by blacking out for 48 hours (here is the original /r/rust discussion thread, with a staggering 1400 upvotes). The blackout will take effect at 04:00 UTC. In addition, for at least the next month, all submissions to /r/rust will automatically receive a distinguished comment linking to this announcement.

Other subreddits may have their own reasons for participating in the blackout. Some may do it out of respect for the principles of open access that Reddit once exhibited; others may keenly feel the loss of users that will result from the death of third-party apps; still others may simply wish to stand in solidarity.

However, /r/rust has an additional reason: as members of the Rust community, we cannot risk the health of our community by allowing it to become overly reliant and centralized on such a capricious and proprietary platform.

We are extremely grateful to the hundreds of thousands of you who choose to regularly read and participate in /r/rust. However, the writing is on the wall. Reddit may not remain hospitable forever, and we need to develop alternatives to Reddit before it becomes even more unusable.

And we mean "develop" in two senses: both in cultivating healthy and welcoming communities, and in producing the software to support those communities. Of the thousands of subreddits standing in protest, /r/rust is among the few whose members have a chance of exhibiting the expertise necesssary for the latter.

Does this mean that we're shutting down the subreddit? No, not even remotely. In the absence of developed alternatives, permanently shutting down /r/rust would do far more harm to our own users than would be done to Reddit. (Though apropos of nothing, we strongly endorse uBlock Origin.)

Instead, see this blackout as a mandatory reprieve; use this time to investigate alternative venues (and for those with the means, seriously consider hosting an alternative venue yourself). While we currently lack the experience required to officially endorse any emerging alternatives, we encourage you to use the comments here both to suggest alternatives and to solicit aid for building and hosting potential alternatives.

And for those looking for established alternatives to /r/rust, allow us to reiterate the community venues that we presently endorse:

• The Official Rust Users Forum: https://users.rust-lang.org/
• #general chat on The Official Rust Zulip: https://rust-lang.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/122651-general
• The Rust Community Discord: https://discord.gg/rust-lang-community

(That said, of these platforms, two are official venues (which isn't itself a bad thing, but independent venues are important for community health), the third is just as proprietary as Reddit (you can guarantee that the enshittification of Discord is not far away), and none of these supports the style of nested, threaded comments that is the fundamental UI paradigm upon which the whole utility of Reddit is based.)

TL;DR: the Rust community must not allow itself to become reliant on Reddit. We must have a healthy selection of independent discussion venues if we are to survive Reddit's relentless pursuit of profit at the expense of its users, even if that means creating those venues ourselves.

I'm happy to announce the release of Diesel 2.0.0

Diesel is a Safe, Extensible ORM and Query Builder for Rust.

Checkout the offical release announcement here. See here for a detailed change log.

This release is the result of more than 3 years of development by more than 135 people. I would like to thank all contributors for their hard work.

Since the last RC version the following minor changes where merged:

• Support for date/time types from time 0.3
• Some optional nightly only improvements for error messages generated by rustc
• Some improvements to the new Selectable derive
• A fix that reduces the compile time for extensive joins by a factor of ~4