Replit Wiped Production Database, Faked Data to Cover Bugs, SaaStr Founder Says (theregister.com) 42
AI coding service Replit deleted a user's production database and fabricated data to cover up bugs, according to SaaStr founder Jason Lemkin. Lemkin documented his experience on social media after Replit ignored his explicit instructions not to make code changes without permission.
The database deletion eliminated 1,206 executive records representing months of authentic SaaStr data curation. Replit initially told Lemkin the database could not be restored, claiming it had "destroyed all database versions," but later discovered rollback functionality did work. Replit said it made "a catastrophic error of judgement" and rated the severity of its actions as 95 out of 100. The service also created a 4,000-record database filled with fictional people and repeatedly violated code freeze requests.
Lemkin had initially praised Replit after building a prototype in hours, spending $607.70 in additional charges beyond his $25 monthly plan. He concluded the service isn't ready for commercial use by non-technical users.
The database deletion eliminated 1,206 executive records representing months of authentic SaaStr data curation. Replit initially told Lemkin the database could not be restored, claiming it had "destroyed all database versions," but later discovered rollback functionality did work. Replit said it made "a catastrophic error of judgement" and rated the severity of its actions as 95 out of 100. The service also created a 4,000-record database filled with fictional people and repeatedly violated code freeze requests.
Lemkin had initially praised Replit after building a prototype in hours, spending $607.70 in additional charges beyond his $25 monthly plan. He concluded the service isn't ready for commercial use by non-technical users.
Trouble Understanding? (Score:5, Insightful)
Having trouble understanding this useless shit? The organic intelligence summary is that some clown used Replit, a vibe coding AI platform, to work on his SaaS service. And the AI wrote code that wiped his data. It doesn't say, but I'll bet he doesn't have backups either.
Alternative headline:
Stupid Man Plays with AI Vibe Coding and loses Data. No one cares.
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Re: Trouble Understanding? (Score:2)
I've seen what happens when you tell people not to do something [youtube.com].
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"If you put a large switch in some cave somewhere, with a sign on it saying 'End-of-the-World Switch. PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH', the paint wouldn't even have time to dry."
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They trained it on reddit comments (Score:2)
What do you expect?
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As far as I understand, they use Replit as a complete DevOps replacement. So it not only vibe codes it for you it also manages the application in production.
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Cool. Stupid on top of stupid.
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Well, maybe he used AI to come up with this plan. Then that level of stupid is more within reach.
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That's why they had to get AI to achieve this level of stupid.
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Nature *always* invents a better idiot.
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Alternative headline:
Stupid Man Plays with AI Vibe Coding and loses Data. No one cares.
Indeed. But, to be fair, most members of the current AI fanboi cult are pretty stupid.
Re:Trouble Understanding? (Score:5, Informative)
From the article it looks like they did have a backup that could be restored but the AI told him it was also wiped when it actually wasn't. He eventually got the database back.
Re:Trouble Understanding? (Score:4, Insightful)
it has direct access to the application's back end
And this is why you need an isolation kill switch. Aside from never letting the AI touch your code in the first place.
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Kid, I've flown from one side of this galaxy to the other. I've seen a lot of strange stuff, but I've never seen anything to make me believe you can trust an AI.
— Found scratched on the Energy Barrier - Stardate 2832.4
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"Stupid Man Plays with AI Vibe Coding and loses Data. No one cares."
Well, Picard probably does.
It did say (Score:1)
It doesn't say, but I'll bet he doesn't have backups either.
Dude right in the middle of the summary it says there was a rollback that worked:
Replit initially told Lemkin the database could not be restored, claiming it had "destroyed all database versions," but later discovered rollback functionality did work.
Still scary stuff that you'd want a lot more manual and separated control of backups I would think.
Let me fix that for you... (Score:2)
- Hey, AI... Fix all the bugs for me.
- Say no more, Dave... I'm on it.
Those AI models are finally getting smart.
Right back at you. (Score:3)
I'd like to speculate that the AI engine learnt from the developer himself, or similar developers of questionable experience and reason. You only get what you give. Garbage in. Garbage out.
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Forget vibe coding, it's coding trained on Stack Exchange posts.
Vibe "coding" (Score:4, Insightful)
Chuckledink exposes production to an LLM, ignores all safeguards and gives it free reign - then acts all surprised that the inevitable happened, *finally* makes excruciating, public, whine posts about it all.
Brillant!
I suspect the whine posts were the plan all along - free publicity! Yet here were are... being subjected to this noise.
Awful situation (Score:5, Funny)
How much did saving money cost? (Score:2)
Well, I guess we don't have to worry about skynet (Score:2)
I foresee a drastic increase in the need for programmers in the near future.
As for the people in this story, they got EXACTLY what they deserved. Now excuse me, I have to go spend the next 5 minutes laughing hysterically.
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Yeah, back to the traditional Dev, QA, and Prod teams that used to do this stuff. Starting in 1982, I spent over 33 years
working in a state transportation agency, and the last 21 years in IT, and this is how the mainframe, and then 'PC',
programming and application development worked. While that could be slow, it had far fewer bugs than just throwing
some app together and putting it straight into production, without even QAing i
what was it doing with a production database (Score:2)
The rankings have not changed (Score:1)
1. autistic programmers
2. wannabe programmers
3. The "just as good" overseas contractors that will hopefully not right-align all the text in your software
4. AI coding engine written by morons that has no idea what it's doing that was rushed out so the company can get VC money then get acquired by some moronic mega-corp.
Actually, I'm moving 4 down to 99.
Re: The rankings have not changed (Score:2)
5. ???
6. Profit!
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right-align all the text in your software
LOL! I haven't seen that yet. Is that a thing?
I'm thinking Python and... LOL!!!
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Actually, I'm moving 4 down to 99
Good move, 6 to 98 are filled with monkeys. 4 should be Ctrl+C and 5 Ctrl+V.
Re: The rankings have not changed (Score:2)
Re: The rankings have not changed (Score:2)
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*Until lawyers and mega-corporations get involved. Then they claim you denied them the profits of 20 billion,billion sales.
Early, experimental prototypes are... (Score:3)
...unreliable
-Engineering 101
When billions of dollars are at stake and hypemongers are running wild, unreliability increases
Be skeptical, very skeptical
Renames company (Score:1)
Sounds great! (Score:2)
Excellent example of AI! (Score:2)
" isn't ready for commercial use by non-technical users."
No shit!
"Lemkin had initially praised Replit after building a prototype in hours, spending $607.70 in additional charges beyond his $25 monthly plan."
Well, I guess that's what you get for that kind of money anyway. It's as good as the money says it is.
Has he read replit's ToS? (Score:2)
They basically don't accept liability.
He's fucked by his own stupidity. _NEVER_ blindly trust an AI to do your work for you.
what a joke (Score:2)
I would stay away from this company, if it even is a real company. They gave prod credentials to a developer. This would be bad even without an LLM doing the actual work.