Something I found interesting that deserved a write-up this morning is the blog post from LibreOffice / The Document Foundation on no AI being a feature.
What is LibreOffice? It's a completely free and open source office suite. Think like Microsoft Office / Microsoft 365 - but entirely free and open. It includes apps for document writing, spreadsheets, presentations and more.
Recently, LibreOffice 26.8 was released with plenty of new features but what stuck out is their developers listing "No artificial intelligence" as a feature worth highlighting in their announcement:
"LibreOffice 26.8 contains no generative AI features. Documents are not transmitted to remote services for processing, and no component of the suite requires network access to function. This is a deliberate position. Any organisation handling confidential, legally privileged or personal data needs to know where that data goes, and the only assurance that survives an audit is that it does not leave the machine."
It seems this actually ruffled a few feathers. With a fair few comments being left across the net about their stance, which leads to the "Yes, no AI is now a feature" blog post. In it, they note some firm stances they will not be pushed on including:
"User-controlled execution. The user must be able to choose where inference takes place: on the local computer, on an infrastructure directly controlled by the user, or on a service chosen independently by the user. A default setting that silently redirects to a single provider is not a choice.
No content may leave the computer without authorisation. The content of documents is a user’s asset and, in many implementations, is also legally protected material: medical records, case files, tender documents and student data. Transmission must be the result of a user’s decision and not behaviour carried out in the background by the application.
No telemetry of any kind. LibreOffice does not collect usage data, and this must also apply to AI features.
No dependence on a single provider. An integration that only works with a single company’s API is a lock-in mechanism, regardless of how it is described in the release notes. Interfaces should be open and implementable by multiple backends.
No compromises on format. Generated content must be in ODF format, just like any other content, and must retain its structure, styles and semantics. An assistant that generates documents in a proprietary format perpetuates content lock-in.
Entirely optional. It must be installable, removable, and absent from the user interface for those who do not wish to use it, including administrators deploying the software across thousands of workstations who, due to company policy, do not authorise its use."
We've seen this in the gaming industry too. Plenty of developers are now making it very clear no AI is being used in their games, while more and more store pages get wordy AI notices.
I think we're going to see plenty more of this as time goes on, at least until that AI bubble finally pops.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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You can also find comments for this article on social media: 
It's a very pro consumer stance.
Last edited by Hooly on 4 Sep 2026 at 8:39 am UTC
Liam Squires-Hand 4 Sep 2026
Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.To check for updates? Most likely.
fenglengshun 4 Sep 2026
Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.Update checking and remote contents, probably (both cloud and network shares). Sounds easier to just ask for internet access in the Flatpak manifest than not doing so, potentially confusing user that expect connecting to those sources to just work like it does in the normal install.
Of course, there's nothing wrong with doing it the way you did - I do the same with WPS Office.
Last edited by fenglengshun on 4 Sep 2026 at 9:39 am UTC
fenglengshun 4 Sep 2026
Personally don't care about it either way - there are already alternatives if you want tight integration with an LLM.
Quoting: Liam Squires-HandSince when do apps have to check for updates*? Package manager does that.Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.To check for updates? Most likely.
* Dig at windows being garbage
Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.To update the extensions?
Last edited by emphy on 5 Sep 2026 at 3:22 am UTC
Quoting: ShabbyXLibre office is slightly special in that way.Quoting: Liam Squires-HandSince when do apps have to check for updates*? Package manager does that.Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.To check for updates? Most likely.
* Dig at windows being garbage
They can just be updated with a package manager, but they also have their own build in update process(It's horrifying to use, but it does exist.).
Also libre office uses network access for optional cloud integration functions and extension updating.
Both are optional and off by default.
Although we lowly consumers don't consume the networked functions quite often, there's a whole professional ecosystem build around libre office. (External Link: You need to be logged in to view this.) and enterprises love networked functions.
With all the other stuff up until now, even if you didn't like it, there wasn't a reason or a way to sell its absence as a feature.
And now AI enters the picture ...
I would just wish that the mass market would catch wind of how bad this stuff actually is and start avoiding it.
Quoting: ShabbyXNot necessarily; it is possible to download the whole office suite in e.g. DEBs and install them manually, no "software store" involved...Quoting: Liam Squires-HandSince when do apps have to check for updates*? Package manager does that.Quoting: HoolyI installed LibreOffice via Flatpak and revoked network access, because I do not see why a document editing suite would require an internet connection to begin with.To check for updates? Most likely.
* Dig at windows being garbage
Moreover, there are some internet features (which most users do not use anyways, I guess), like:
1. UI Theming/skins - I believe these can be searched for and installed from LO online store
2. LO Extensions - These I believe can also be searched for and installed from LO online store
3. Importing of data tables directly from web pages/URLs...
4. Is't the whole LO Help in a form of online pages only?
So yeah, there are some legitimate usecases....
But such an aggressive, polarized, love/hate (mostly hate...) relationship toward what amounts to a tool is a first for me.
I've seen (and adopted) many frontier techs - like I suspect many here - but witnessing such a deep stigma, especially among some categories of the enthusiasts, is impressive.
Any organisation handling confidential, legally privileged or personal data needs to know where that data goes, and the only assurance that survives an audit is that it does not leave the machine.As someone who works with claude regularly for my job (basically a requirement at my company), this quote reads very much like something you would get from claude. They may be advertising no ai features which I greatly appreciate, but I wonder how much they use it during their work, or if its language patterns have at least rubbed off on the people making these announcements.
Quoting: syylkBut such an aggressive, polarized, love/hate (mostly hate...) relationship toward what amounts to a tool is a first for me.It's a "tool" (more honestly a set of technologies) with much bigger societal implications and secondary effects than most. And more relevantly to the statement in the article, huge privacy and information security implications as well. Dismissing all objections as "hate" is disingenuous.
And to be fair, most people don't care about the tech, but how the real-world implementation affects them and the world around them.
Quoting: tuubiIt's a "tool" (more honestly a set of technologies) with much bigger societal implications and secondary effects than most.Yes, I hear you. It has vast societal implications and secondary effects.
But what about the telephone?
Gunpowder?
Steam powered machinery?
Human flight?
Personally owned cars?
Written languages?
Integrated circuits?
Antibiotics?
Computer networks?
Molecular synthesis?
Fusion and fission?
(I can go on for hours, but I'm sure you get the score)
Think of each and every one of these (sets of) technologies and tell me they didn't change the very face of the world, when they became mainstream. I'm personally glad that LO took this route. But that slop is here to stay, I fear.
Quoting: syylkNone of those were a company stealing everybodies work to resell it by slightly altering it artificially and they were not made to get rid off workers or monopolizing basically everything that can be created.Quoting: tuubiIt's a "tool" (more honestly a set of technologies) with much bigger societal implications and secondary effects than most.Yes, I hear you. It has vast societal implications and secondary effects.
But what about the telephone?
Gunpowder?
Steam powered machinery?
Human flight?
Personally owned cars?
Written languages?
Integrated circuits?
Antibiotics?
Computer networks?
Molecular synthesis?
Fusion and fission?
(I can go on for hours, but I'm sure you get the score)
Think of each and every one of these (sets of) technologies and tell me they didn't change the very face of the world, when they became mainstream. I'm personally glad that LO took this route. But that slop is here to stay, I fear.
Its a plagiarizing machine. And plagiarizing is frowned upon for a reason. Due to this it doesn't even allow to do anything which was impossible before. Quite the contrary. It's backwards and so widespread, it actually makes it harder to find good and well made stuff.
Last edited by Savor592 on 5 Sep 2026 at 2:44 am UTC
Quoting: syylkMaybe it's just me and my meager 35 years in this industry, but I don't remember any other technology being this divisive in adoption. Every major technological advance was invariably met with resistance, mistrust and suspicion - yes, even the almighty Internet.It's almost as if there was something about this technology that was different from all the others.
But such an aggressive, polarized, love/hate (mostly hate...) relationship toward what amounts to a tool is a first for me.
Quoting: syylkI'd say that quite a few other technologies could also have done with far more reflection from the viewpoint of societal and personal costs/benefits on whether and how they were to be used before they were implemented en masse.Quoting: tuubiIt's a "tool" (more honestly a set of technologies) with much bigger societal implications and secondary effects than most.Yes, I hear you. It has vast societal implications and secondary effects.
But what about the telephone?
Gunpowder?
Steam powered machinery?
Human flight?
Personally owned cars?
Written languages?
Integrated circuits?
Antibiotics?
Computer networks?
Molecular synthesis?
Fusion and fission?
(I can go on for hours, but I'm sure you get the score)
Think of each and every one of these (sets of) technologies and tell me they didn't change the very face of the world, when they became mainstream. I'm personally glad that LO took this route. But that slop is here to stay, I fear.
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