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My open source repos are in a weird place. If someone opens an issue to ask a question, I know for 100% certain that they'd get a better answer if they just copy-pasted it into Claude. I don't know their setup, and sometimes I don't even remember the repo that well, so I have to go re-read my own code to jog my memory.
What exactly is my job as a "maintainer" now? Especially for projects that are "done"? To just respond and say "gee, you should really ask your agent to help you with this?"
@nolan
> sometimes I don't even remember the repo that well
Part of responsible maintenance is planning for succession.
If you have already got to the point where you don't have good working knowledge of the code base, it's past time that you found a successor who will more actively maintain it than you.
Part of good maintenance is admitting when you're no longer truly maintaining the code base. Maybe no one is; if so, make that clear and freeze the repository.
I used to get a lot of pleasure (bizarrely) out of being a kind of ad-hoc StackOverflow for my own projects. I actually kind of enjoyed asking people about their setups, helping them debug, and then occasionally incorporating those learnings into the project. Now it just feels… useless. Even a potential PR is often better as a fork (since everyone has their own little custom needs – you don't want to bloat the project with that).
This may also just be me using the state of AI coding as a justification for my own loss of interest in open source. Although I've gone through periods of burnout and losing interest before, this time feels different because I just can't even imagine what kind of new project I'd start today. Which is odd because a lot of other people seem to be concluding "I'm 10x more effective, time to build a bunch of zany stuff I never would have!"
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