--- title: Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI... description: Zig creator Andrew Kelley discusses in a JetBrains interview why the project formally bans AI-generated contributions, arguing that such submissions are low... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI Contributions, and Moved Zig off GitHub | daily.dev og:description: Zig creator Andrew Kelley discusses in a JetBrains interview why the project formally bans AI-generated contributions, arguing that such submissions are low... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/u7qXwrLEB.png og:image:alt: Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI Contributions, and Moved Zig off GitHub og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI Contributions, and Moved Zig off GitHub **[InfoQ](https://daily.dev/sources/infoq)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Zig creator Andrew Kelley discusses in a JetBrains interview why the project formally bans AI-generated contributions, arguing that such submissions are low quality, waste maintainer review time, and undermine the mentorship-based social contract of open source. He also explains the project's move from GitHub to Codeberg, citing persistent CI failures on GitHub Actions and a preference for nonprofit stability over corporate growth incentives. Kelley contrasts Zig's stance with Bun's recent AI-assisted rewrite from Zig to Rust, framing the divergence as a difference in project values rather than language merits. The piece also recaps Zig's origin story, born from frustrations with JavaScript, Go's GC pauses, pre-1.0 Rust's borrow checker, and C++ memory bugs while building a digital audio workstation. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### Why did the Zig project ban AI-generated contributions? Zig maintainer Andrew Kelley says AI-generated pull requests are consistently low quality and have negative value because reviewers spend time on contributors who don't understand their own submissions, sometimes copy-pasting reviewer feedback back into a chatbot to fake competence. He also frames code review as mentorship investment reserved for contributors who can grow into core team members, which AI users rarely do. _Anyone weighing AI-assisted contributions against maintainer trust can follow this debate on daily.dev._ ### Why did the Zig project move its repository from GitHub to Codeberg? Zig migrated because GitHub Actions continuous integration runs kept silently failing to produce results, breaking the project's CI pipeline. Andrew Kelley also cited a preference for nonprofit-run infrastructure like the German nonprofit Codeberg, arguing nonprofits favor long-term stability over the growth and monetization pressures facing corporations and startups. _Teams evaluating self-hosted or nonprofit code forges over GitHub can track this kind of migration story on daily.dev._ ### Why did Andrew Kelley create the Zig programming language instead of using Go, Rust, or C++? Kelley was building a native digital audio workstation and found each existing option unsuitable: JavaScript lacked low-level hardware control, Go's stop-the-world garbage collector pauses broke real-time audio playback, pre-1.0 Rust's borrow checker friction derailed UI font rendering for weeks, and C++ produced persistent memory corruption bugs. He quit his job in 2018 to build Zig instead. _Developers comparing systems languages for real-time or low-level work can dig into cases like this on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Zig quits GitHub, gripes about Microsoft's AI obsession](https://daily.dev/posts/zig-quits-github-gripes-about-microsoft-s-ai-obsession-yv5hvprru) · The Register · 119 upvotes · 29 comments - [Zig creator seeks 'uncompromising perfection' before blessing 1.0](https://daily.dev/posts/zig-creator-seeks-uncompromising-perfection-before-blessing-1-0-xjndfdjvj) · DEVCLASS · 28 upvotes · 13 comments - [The Zig project's rationale for their firm anti-AI contribution policy](https://daily.dev/posts/the-zig-project-s-rationale-for-their-firm-anti-ai-contribution-policy-88a1ctlfz) · Hacker News · 1 upvotes · 1 comments --- Tags: [#open-source](https://daily.dev/tags/open-source), [#github](https://daily.dev/tags/github), [#ai-coding](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-coding), [#zig](https://daily.dev/tags/zig) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI Contributions, and Moved Zig off GitHub","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb"},"datePublished":"2026-09-23T10:45:07.583Z","dateModified":"2026-09-23T10:45:29.167Z","description":"Zig creator Andrew Kelley discusses in a JetBrains interview why the project formally bans AI-generated contributions, arguing that such submissions are low...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/075bda62d1abc4c87699455df2a3c070?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/075bda62d1abc4c87699455df2a3c070?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"InfoQ","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"InfoQ","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/afc3bced3e1e4b188dd9127017a60e0c","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/infoq"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"open-source,github,ai-coding,zig","timeRequired":"PT4M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"InfoQ","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/infoq"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Andrew Kelley Interview: Why He Built Zig, Banned AI Contributions, and Moved Zig off GitHub"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/andrew-kelley-interview-why-he-built-zig-banned-ai-contributions-and-moved-zig-off-github-u7qxwrleb#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"Why did the Zig project ban AI-generated contributions?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Zig maintainer Andrew Kelley says AI-generated pull requests are consistently low quality and have negative value because reviewers spend time on contributors who don't understand their own submissions, sometimes copy-pasting reviewer feedback back into a chatbot to fake competence. 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