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Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
201–210 of 500 posts
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#202We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
I think classifying it as an allergy or a status thing is a little too glib. I’ve read and reviewed, conservatively, hundreds of AI generated documents for work, and “written”/commissioned a bunch too. My biggest issue is that it’s impossible to engage with and give feedback on an AI written document, because it’s impossible to know whether misconceptions or gaps are because the author doesn’t understand the material deeply enough or the author does but the AI doesn’t and the author’s not proofreading carefully enough. Or if a surprising idea is raised — is it the authors insight, can they elaborate on it, where did it come from, etc?
Hackernews isn’t work, obviously, but “it’s impossible to engage deeper with the material because the author doesn’t really exist” is sort of a problem for a discussion site. If the human coauthor puts in enough work, they can make sure the doc really reflects their views and their understanding, but in my experience that’s much less common.
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#203We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
I don't rely on LLMs and I don't find them useful, hence I don't use LLMs and everything about them deserves to be questioned.
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#204We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
> This is why we see so many "just show me the prompt" responses, along with others like this Many are quite a bit more subtle, like this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48844062 The more subversive undercurrent is interesting to me. People intentionally fucking with someone's bot, burning tokens for the lulz.
If someone were so dumb they didn’t understand the method used in the link… mind explaining?
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#205We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
I don't rely on LLMs and I don't find them useful, hence I don't use LLMs and everything about them deserves to be questioned.
LLMs are unquestionably useful. The number of things I've used them to accomplish on HN—things that I've wanted to do for over a decade—is mind-blowing. Performance optimizations, log file anlaysis, tracking down race conditions—it's quite incredible.
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#206Earlier quoted context omitted.
Out of curiosity I looked through your post history to find an example of a time you got downvoted for calling out AI comments. The first one I could find was 3 months ago ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47493096 ), where you got downvoted for calling out an AI comment...to a comment that had zero common signs of AI writing. The OP then replied: > Not AI. Not sure how I feel getting my writing style called out…
Just the idea that something is AI is bothersome to some, and some AI content is genuinely useful and gets thrown out with the bathwater. Not saying all of it is useful, but there are shades of grey, not just black and white.
I can't speak for everyone, but I've done a lot of reflecting on this so I have something of an explanation for why I feel this way about AI
I think it's because I'm not optimizing my life to get the correct answer as fast as possible, or to build things as fast as possible.
To me, the most important thing about the internet is connecting with other people. If I ask a question on a forum it's because I want to talk to someone about it, maybe make an acquaintance or even a friend. Otherwise I would of course just ask the AI now. Google has been around for a long time, and could already usually find answers for me. I still would rather discuss with a colleague sometimes than Google every single thing.
Human connection. We need more of it, not less. I think heavy AI use and reliance on AI for thinking, research, communication and building... It's going to isolate people even more
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#207Nobody wants to label their stuff as AI generated because they removed credibility. Communities can flag posts as AI generated based on speculation and telltales but it won’t be 100% and will take extra work. I think the era of the blog is simply dead now and that’s mostly ok. Blogspam and corporate blogs had killed quality bogs ages ago even before AI was a thing. The real question is what replaces it. Oh and of cou…
If counterfeit or stolen cash is indistinguishable from real or honest cash, should you accept it? Should you spend it? No. Why? Because doing so erodes and potentially destroys society. Whether you agree that a con artist is only a criminal if he gets caught, or you think he’s a criminal the whole time, surely you can see why many people might want to know if they are dealing with a friend and not something simulati…
bullshitting has never been a crime
if it were, 90% of startups would be illegal and they founders jailable
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#208We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
I think classifying it as an allergy or a status thing is a little too glib. I’ve read and reviewed, conservatively, hundreds of AI generated documents for work, and “written”/commissioned a bunch too. My biggest issue is that it’s impossible to engage with and give feedback on an AI written document, because it’s impossible to know whether misconceptions or gaps are because the author doesn’t understand the material…
That's interesting, thank you! My only pushback is that my bit about "allergy" and "status" is about the audience response here, whereas you seem to be talking on a somewhat different level.
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#209We don't allow genai text on HN itself - see https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html#generated and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47340079 . How to enforce it is a separate question, of course, but the rule exists. We don't have a similar rule yet about article content but my sense is that the community mostly doesn't want to read it—or, to put it more conservatively, discounts it. This is why we see s…
The times I've pointed point out pretty blatant AI comments, I get nuked with downvotes. So often that I've stopped pointing them out. Before you say I'm just falsely calling them out, it's typical ChatGPT style of either very amicable or Nobel Laureate tone, lots of formatting, with a couple of paragraphs and then a clever one-line punchline at the end. If you look at those commenters their history, it's all like th…
to be honest, I hope you'll also recognize that non-native English speakers have limited vocabulary and phrasing when participating in HN.
Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles
#210Earlier quoted context omitted.
> In private conversation with you, you have confirmed that if I flag/vouch stuff you mods don’t agree with, I get the privilege taken away, even if I genuinely believe a post to fall outside of the guidelines. People love to make vague claims like this based on things we supposedly said. How about you quote what exactly what I literally said so readers can make up their own minds? Sorry if that is testy (well, it is…
Sure, quoting select passages over multiple emails with you personally. > I'm afraid we took vouching privileges away from your account because you vouched for too many comments that were unsubstantive and/or flamebait and/or otherwise broke the site guidelines > If you want to build up a track record for a while of vouching for good comments only, and then email so we can look at the recent vouches Wondering how doe…
Kudos to you for responding exactly as I asked! That is rare to begin with, and more so when I'm being irritable. Big respect.
I can see how using the word "good" was confusing, but I just meant the opposite of "comments that were unsubstantive and/or flamebait and/or otherwise broke the site guidelines". It just boils down to: what fits the guidelines or not.
> Wondering how does one tell what is ‘good’ in your mind
Since you can't read my mind (at least I assume you can't, and if you could you wouldn't have this question), that's not doable. What you can do is assess things according to your own reading of the site guidelines. If you assimilate https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and evaluate comments based on that and not just on what you like/dislike, then I imagine you won't end up too far from where the mods are, because that's what we're also trying to do.
I'm sure there will always be individual cases where we disagree—even tomhow and I disagree on individual cases—but they should be a minority.
If there are specific cases where you think we got it wrong, I'd be interested to see links, and we're always willing to hear a contrary argument.