Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#421

Post by croisillon » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:08 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #42

We 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 love the allergy hall of fame and i was expecting to find many comments of mine

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#422

Post by minimaxir » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:13 PM UTC

Aachen wrote: post #337

minimaxir wrote: post #38

This is something that works better on paper in practice. Namely, there are a hell of a lot of false positives of AI use which frequently causes shitstorms on social media where someone says "AI?" in bad faith and now the OP has to defend themselves and in the case of writing a blog post there aren't as concrete ways to defend yourself. (no, demanding the edit history of the post is not reasonable) Hacker News adopti…

"bad faith"? As in, that the person posts the accusation while actually believing the opposite? I would think the far, far more common reason for posting that incorrectly is that they legitimately thought it was slop. Of course such low-effort wrongful accusations are bad to post for multiple reasons, but I don't think people frequently post such things falsely

> they legitimately thought it was slop

The issue is that label has expanded to anything that's weird/unusual, and the consequences of being accused of AI are far more severe than the consequences of a false accusation so people do it frequently. It is absolutely a vector for harrassment/trolling.

One subreddit I follow now bans people if they make an accusation of AI-generation that's weak/disproven, which is a rule I like.

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#423

Post by asdff » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:15 PM UTC

kordlessagain wrote: post #366

asdff wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be like driving a v12 down my driveway everytime I want to check the mailbox.

I have a local 12GB GPU doing this, and it's definitely not a v12.

Meanwhile I use no vram to read with my own eyes

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#424

Post by bluefirebrand » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:19 PM UTC

dang wrote: post #232

bluefirebrand wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't envy the position you're in. I think the decision to ban AI submissions is a good one, but ultimately it's going to create this conflict for some time, maybe a really long time until things stabilize around AI in the broader culture I hope eventually AI usage does become a taboo, at least in some fields. Creative fields should be for creative humans, not people who can't even publish an article without the he…

Ok, but we're not talking about all AI usage. We're talking about using AI to process text that gets published for others to read. There are tons of ways to use AI that don't intersect with that.

I'm thinking about it more as a microcosm of how norms will form around AI usage

If it becomes very normal and expected that people just let LLMs speak for them online using their voice, then I don't think any kind of online community has a hope of actually keeping that behavior at bay long-term

For people like me that means the end of online communication entirely, most likely. I don't want to talk to people's LLMs

My hope is there's some broader cultural taboos around AI usage for communication purposes at least.

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#425

Post by spwa4 » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:29 PM UTC

How would you prevent it from just becoming another AI benchmark?

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#426

Post by School-Cotton » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:37 PM UTC

supermatt wrote: post #409

School-Cotton wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well yeah, if people are unable to write, then I don't want to read their writing. That sounds harsh but it's the unfortunate reality. I also don't want to look at paintings made by people who can't paint, or listen to music made by people who are tone-deaf.

[flagged]

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Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#427

Post by supermatt » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:52 PM UTC

School-Cotton wrote: post #426

supermatt wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

[flagged]

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Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#428

Post by heurist » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 4:53 PM UTC

tripzilch wrote: post #320

dang wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

But you wouldn't have called it "allergy" or a "status" problem when considering the audience's response to human written posts of a similar low quality level. It's always been the case that the HN audience has been "allergic" to low effort slop (including human generated). The OP (and my) point was trying to point out how the AI generated stuff might masquerade as something "interesting" if it had been human written…

You are heavily discounting the human side of the generation effort. The first output from an AI might be slop but once you start injecting your own ideas and desires it lands much further away from what any AI would output on its own. (Not that there's no zero-effort slop around - there's a lot).

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#429

Post by abnercoimbre » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 5:06 PM UTC

gruez wrote: post #382

abnercoimbre wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This has the happy flipside that anyone who would like readers to classify their article as high-status rather than low-status can apply the judo move of simply writing it themselves. I really really hope more people take up pen and paper! My last blog post [0] came with proof-of-work attached. [0] https://abner.page/post/are-we-harold-bloom/

>proof-of-work attached. Doesn't seem too hard to fake now, now that AI can generate convincing videos. Failing that, it's definitely within the realm of possibility for AI to create fake pages for a notebook, then generate a blender/unreal engine project to render it.

Imagine the cost involved for this though: I know you know my proof is genuine. Are we saying we’ll soon efficiently automate the generation of believable video evidence… for blog posts?!

Re: Ask HN: Add flag for AI-generated articles

#430

Post by abustamam » Mon, Jul 13, 2026, 5:10 PM UTC

hypfer wrote: post #290

dang wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Completely meta and possibly out-of-place, but this thread was I think my first encounter with dang (the human), and, based on it, I'm filled with respect for him. Good job being you. Please continue doing so.

As opposed to dang the robot? :)