Comment by vdfs

13 days ago

> But so far, I mostly saw only "approximations" of expensive software

Genuine question: isn't this what photopea did to photoshop?

5 comments

vdfs

> isn't this what photopea did to photoshop?

There's no evidence the PhotoPea author ever decompiled PhotoShop binaries. He emulated a desktop program's functions, menu structure and look in a web app by writing original code. Even if you had the PS source code, delivering a PhotoShop-like experience in a web page requires a lot of original work (especially in 2013). Before PhotoPea, Adobe had said that making PhotoShop browser-based would be extremely difficult, if not impossible and never be performant.

PhotoPea proved that with enough work and skill it was possible. Having an LLM coding agent look at PhotoPea itself and turn it into a copy of PhotoPea and then representing it as your own work is not at all the same.

IvanK_net 13 days ago

Yes, and I totally support it! They start "from zero" and build everything piece by piece by testing the input / output of each feature. I just hope they use Photoshop / Photopea / Other software only from the users perspective and not by analyzing the code (source code or "binaries" - it probably does not matter to AI nowadays).

In this case, it was a clear copy-paste of my code, whith the variable names changed by the AI.

uurrnn 13 days ago

I use photopea every day. I can only imagine the complex emotions you're going through. I am not nearly as attached to my software, I imagine, just because of how "unimportant" it is.
I am still very attached to it though. For no good reason other than "it's mine", I think.
Isn't it a good thing software can't be closed? We have to use someone's tool though, and ego is inevitable, so idk? 100s of separate "open source" versions and people use what they think is the best?
Is it just about accountability? and having an author/human attached to the product to direct it? Choosing the person you have the most faith in?
/rambling