Stack Overflow is the largest developers’ community for programming and coding questions.
Most techies rely on it for technical queries and help them with their jobs/projects.
You will find answers from experts here for your complex questions for free. The contributions were for making the community better.
But Stack Overflow has other plans to monetize the content in partnership with OpenAI.
Several users are not okay with it and have started protesting the move. One of the users Ben, with the username benui, tried to delete his top-rated answer as a sign of protest.
However, Stack Overflow doesn’t allow that after a time period, so he tried changing it to a protesting message, details of which he posted on Mastadon.
Stack Overflow Responded with a Ban
Stack Overflow responded with a 7-day ban for removing or defacing content. They further stated that it is part of the collective effort of the community to help others.
The company also mentioned that these kinds of actions may cause “disruption” in the community.
The question-and-answer website also invited Ben to communicate further to “clear any misunderstandings.”
A Few Reasons Behind the Protest
More users are joining the protest against Stack Overflow’s latest partnership. Some have raised concerns over the use of their contributions without credit.
A few others want revenue-sharing programs to be compensated for using their answers in generative AI.
The Flip Flop of AI on Stack Overflow
Moderators have been strict about not using AI to answer for the longest time.
That policy may go down the bin as the company is geared towards AI generation through API sharing.
Stack Overflow CEO Prashanth Chandrasekar has prompted a shift in the company’s stand on AI. Now, they are aiming to incorporate AI into their products.
This statement came after Stack Overflow laid off 10%, or 58 employees over the last quarter.
