clankerfree (Software for Humans)

clankerfree.org, titled "software for humans", indexes projects whose authors self-certify that they do not contain or use generative AI or LLM technology. When it was clipped in September 2026 the list was short: two hosts and five projects, each with one quoted line of policy and a link to where the line comes from.

What is listed

The hosts are Codeberg and SourceHut. Codeberg's line is "You must not share projects that mostly consist of code written by 'generative AI'-tools", and its link points at a commit inside a pull request against Codeberg's organization repository rather than at a published terms page, so the listing alone does not show whether the rule is in force. SourceHut's is "No AI features whatsoever", from its homepage.

The projects are Alacritty, whose contributing guide says contributions "must not include content generated by large language models or other probabilistic tools"; GIMP, whose merge-request template says "No AI-generated contents allowed"; LibreOffice, whose 26.8 release post (26 August 2026) says it "contains no generative AI features"; NetBSD, whose commit guidelines say LLM-generated code "is presumed to be tainted code"; and Zig, whose code of conduct says "No LLM-generated content, whether it be code or prose."

The policy

Clankerfree software is defined as authored solely by humans. Assistive software such as IDEs, language servers and accessibility tools is fine unless it is implemented with AI. A project is listed at the site author's discretion under three conditions: it is under a licence the site considers open source, its authors claim it was made without AI assistance, and it cannot be proven to include AI contrary to that claim. Listing is not an endorsement in either direction. To be added or removed, post with the #clankerfree tag on ActivityPub and the author will eventually see it.

Reading it

Two different claims share the list. The definition is about authorship, but the SourceHut and LibreOffice lines are about product features, and a program with no AI features can still contain AI-written code, or the reverse. The Alacritty, GIMP, NetBSD and Zig lines are rules for contributors, and Codeberg's is a rule for what users may host. The directory is looser than its own definition, which is worth knowing before treating a listing as a statement about how a codebase was written.

The only verification is the third condition, and it is a negative one, so a listing has the same structure as the human-made-disclosure marker: unverifiable, and meaningful mainly as a stance. What makes a project rule stronger than a blog footer is enforcement. A maintainer can refuse a patch at review time and point at the rule. The rules also rest on different reasons. NetBSD's "tainted" treats LLM output as a provenance and licensing problem, like code of unknown copyright, while Zig's rationale is contributor-poker, review as an investment in people that an LLM-authored patch cannot repay.

anti-llm-discourse once described Zig's ban as the rare institutional exception; this list shows a handful more, and simonw-zig-anti-ai covers the Zig case in detail. llm-critics-are-right-use-anyway is the sceptical reply: Theocharis doubts bans like Zig's and Gentoo's can work because nobody can reliably tell. slop-marker-convention and readme-not are the mirror convention, declaring machine authorship instead. The directory also fits Eischmann's prediction in how-ai-is-changing-open-source that human-curated software sources regain value when publishing gets chaotic, though this one curates by claimed method rather than by vetting quality.