“After more than 15 years, Microsoft has modified my diagram,” engineer Vincent Driessen wrote on his blog on Wednesday. If you see the word “morged” and start sweating that you’re behind on Internet slang again, don’t worry. It’s not actually a word, but an AI slop from the official instructions on how to use Github, published by Microsoft on its Learn portal. More specifically, this is an excerpt from an AI-generated graphic plagiarized from a chart Driessen published on his blog more than a decade ago.
“In 2010, I wrote a successful Git branching model and created an accompanying diagram. I designed the diagram in Apple Keynote. At the time, I was obsessed with colors, curves, and layout until it clearly communicated how branches related to each other over time,” Driessen explained in today’s post. It’s a useful chart, and he’s made the source files available for others to use and modify freely, and he’s done that through years of technical talks, Wikis, and videos.
The graph on Microsoft’s official page (now removed, but still visible on the Internet Archive) is unmistakably based on Driessen’s original, and, well, it’s terrible. Rather than using his source files, it was apparently run through some kind of AI image generator to recreate the form common in Slop’s slides. The arrows no longer point correctly, parts of the image that were intentionally light gray to avoid complicating the geometry are now completely black, and the words “continuously join” have changed to “continuously join.” The word “feature” also changed to “feature” in one bubble, and the vertical axis of the graph now says “Tim” instead of time.
“The AI rip-off wasn’t just ugly,” Driessen wrote. “It was careless, blatantly amateurish, and lacked ambition, to say the least. It’s unbecoming of Microsoft.”
He points out that that’s simply because this chart has been used many times over the years. and This likely allowed people to identify Microsoft’s image as a plagiarized version, call it out, and identify him as the original creator. But as the use of AI becomes increasingly common, how many other cases like this will go unnoticed?
The tutorials on the Microsoft Learn portal have been updated with the replaced images, but the page doesn’t mention any recent changes or why.
“I find this whole thing very sad,” Driessen wrote. “It’s not because some company used my drawing. Like I said, it’s been everywhere for 15 years and I’ve always been okay with it. What’s disappointing is the lack of process and care. Someone took a carefully created piece, ran it through a machine, washed away the fingerprints, and… This is not the time to be inspired by something and build on it. It’s the opposite: take something that worked and make it worse. Is there a goal here beyond ‘generating content’?”
As of this article’s publication, Microsoft had not yet responded to a request for comment.
