22.10.2026 IfI Colloquium: Are We Automating Our Own Future Away? The Socio-Technical Cost of AI Agents in Open Source Ecosystems
Speaker:
Prof. Dr. Igor Wiese
University Federal Technological of Paranà, Brasilia
Date: Thursday, 22 October 2026, 17:15
Location: room BIM 4-033 at the Department of Informatics (IfI), Binzmühlestrasse 11, 8050 Zürich
Details about the format of the talk shall be checked always just ahead of a certain presentation date: (information here)
Abstract
For decades, the sustainability of Open Source Software (OSS) has relied on an onboarding process in which newcomers overcome complex socio-technical barriers. This developmental process is not merely transactional; it is deeply rooted in human motivation, communication, and the strategic guidance of experienced maintainers who act as community gatekeepers. Empirical research demonstrates that while technical excellence is required, social dimensions such as mentorship, empathy, and technical fun are what ultimately build a sustainable sense of belonging and long-term contributor retention. Great maintainers explicitly dedicate their attention to fostering this contribution environment, recognizing that communication and mutual human recognition form the very bedrock of open-source sustainability. Today, however, the unprecedented introduction of AI agents and generative tools threatens to overhaul the human-centric ecosystem. As AI automates lower-complexity tasks (and maybe more complex ones), it optimizes short-term individual productivity while paradoxically compromising the practical training grounds where newcomers build self-efficacy and initial project familiarity. In this talk, we will reflect on whether AI agents signify the peak of software engineering efficiency, or whether we are quietly automating a sense of belonging that keeps our communities alive, exploring the interplay between human motivations and the rise of agentic automation.
Bio
Dr. Igor Scaliante Wiese is a Full Professor of Computer Science at the Federal Technological University of Paraná (UTFPR) - Brazil and a CNPq Research Productivity Fellow. Dr. Wiese’s research focuses on mining software repositories and qualitative analysis to understand multiple phenomena in open source communities. Currently, Dr. Wiese’s active research addresses initiatives to foster gender diversity and a sense of belonging among underrepresented contributors. Concurrently, his latest projects examine the intersection of human and cognitive styles with agentic tools, focusing on how Generative AI can reshape onboarding barriers. His research brings an essential socio-technical lens to the ongoing AI transition, challenging our fundamental paradigms of developer productivity and community sustainability. During his career, he has been widely recognized, receiving the ACM SIGSOFT Distinguished Paper Award (2021), the IEEE TCSE Distinguished Paper Award (2020), and an Honorable Mention Award at the ACM CSCW conference (2020).