[michaelmior]

This really depends on how you define automation. CI on GitHub depends on webhooks which is an officially supported part of the API. So there isn't anything unsolicited happening.

I just don't think there's any meaningful claim that CI explicitly configured by maintainers using officially supported channels should be lumped in the same category as automated scraping of repositories for creating PRs.

Sure, there are many definitions of automation that would include both of these things, but I think it's obvious what GitHub intends in practice.

[d0lph]

The automation wouldn't be doing anything unsolicited either, since it's only doing things that have been defined in the UI.

Perhaps they didn't mean automation per se, but CI is certainly automation, automatic merging, as in not manually merged by a human.

Perhaps a better rule would have been, no automation on repos not controlled by yourself.

[movermeyer]

The actual rule is no "excessive automated bulk activity".

https://help.github.com/articles/github-terms-of-service/

[d0lph]

That being the case, seems like OP's bot probably should have been allowed, especially since it seemed like they were only automating their repos.

[movermeyer]

This bot was exclusively applied to repos that were not mine.

[michaelmior]

If it's defined in the UI, it doesn't make it unsolicited. I can go to any repository for someone I've never heard of and make a PR as a human. That is still unsolicited. I think the concern is the combination of unsolicited and automated.