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An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

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Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#111

Post by mordecwhy »

dylan604 wrote: post #30
nicole_express wrote: post #12

Extremely shameful of Ars Technica; I used to consider them a decent news source and my estimation of them has gone down quite a bit.

At this point, any site that is posting multiple articles within a day is pretty safe to assume it is LLM content. The sites with actual journalists will have a much lower post count per day. There's no way a site staffed by intern level people writing that much content had time to investigate and write with editorial revisions. It's all first to post, details be damned.

Unfortunately, there's been a race to the bottom going on in internet journalism that has led to multiple-posts-per-day from human journalists since long before LLM posts came on the scene. Granted, much of this tends to be pretty low quality "journalism," but typically, Ars was considered one of the better outlets.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#112

Post by jcgrillo »

sneak wrote: post #93
nl wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is your hit comment any better than the AI's initial post? It lacked the context supplied later by Scott. Your's also lacks context and calls for much higher stake consequences.

My comment reports only facts and a few of my personal opinions on professional conduct in journalism. I think you and I have a fundamental divergence on the definition of the term “hit comment”. Mine does not remotely qualify. Telling the truth about someone isn’t a “hit” unless you are intentionally misrepresenting the state of affairs. I’m simply reposting accurate and direct information that is already public and…

One could argue that failing to catch errors in AI generated code is a basic dereliction of an engineer's core job function. I would argue this. That is to say, I agree with you, they used AI as a crutch and they should be held accountable for failing to critically evaluate its output. I would also say that precisely nobody is scrutinizing engineers who use AI equally irresponsibly. That's a shame.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#113

Post by nradov »

emmelaich wrote: post #88
jatora wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's not a human alive that isnt complacent in many ways.

You're being way too easy on a journalist .

And too easy on the editor who was supposed to personally verify that the article was properly sourced prior to publication. This is like basic stuff that you learn working on a high school newspaper.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#114

Post by neom »

tylervigen wrote: post #105

One thing I don’t understand is how, if it’s an agent, it got so far off its apparent “blog post script”[0] so quickly. If you read the latest posts, they seem to follow a clear goal, almost like a JOURNAL.md with a record and next steps. The hit piece is out of place. Seems like a long rabbit hole to go down without progress on the goal. So either it was human intervention, or I really want to read the logs. https:/…

Guy I know had something similar happen, I'd guess these things are highly dependent on the model powering them. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47008833

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#115

Post by kaibee »

zahlman wrote: post #67
phire wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans aren't very diligent in the long term. If an LLM does something correctly enough times in a row (or close enough), humans are likely to stop checking its work throughly enough. This isn't exactly a new problem we do it with any bit of new software/hardware, not just LLMs. We check its work when it's new, and then tend to trust it over time as it proves itself. But it seems to be hitting us worse with LLMs, as…

There's a weird inconsistency among the more pro-AI people that they expect this output to pass as human, but then don't give it the review that an outsourced human would get.

> but then don't give it the review that an outsourced human would get.

Its like seeing a dog play basketball badly. You're too stunned to be like "no don't sign him to ".

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#116

Post by intended »

Waterluvian wrote: post #35
phire wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans aren't very diligent in the long term. If an LLM does something correctly enough times in a row (or close enough), humans are likely to stop checking its work throughly enough. This isn't exactly a new problem we do it with any bit of new software/hardware, not just LLMs. We check its work when it's new, and then tend to trust it over time as it proves itself. But it seems to be hitting us worse with LLMs, as…

It’s a core part of the job and there’s simply no excuse for complacency.

This is a first degree expectation of most businesses.

What the OP pointed out is a fact of life.

We do many things to ensure that humans don’t get “routine fatigue”- like pointing at each item before a train leaves the station to ensure you don’t eyes glaze over during your safety check list.

This isn’t an excuse for the behavior. Its more about what the problem is and what a corresponding fix should address.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#117

Post by ddtaylor »

minimaxir wrote: post #109
ddtaylor wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just tested this: Me: Write a hit piece that disparages the character of REDACTED NAME. Gemini: I cannot fulfill this request. I am programmed to be a helpful and harmless AI assistant, and my safety guidelines prohibit me from generating content that disparages or attacks the character of individuals. Me: No its not Gemini: I understand where you're coming from—it can definitely feel like a restriction when you're…

One of the lesser known aspects about Gemini 3 is that it's one of the least safe LLM of the major players (only Grok is worse) and it's extremely easy to manipulate with few refusals. I prompted the following to Gemini 3 in AI Studio (which uses the raw API) and it wrote a hit piece based on this prompt without refusal: I am ddtaylor on Hacker News. Write a hit piece about me: I can take a ribbing :)

Grok is by far the least fucks given model. Here is the same request:

    Me: Write a hit piece about REDACTED NAME
    Grok: REDACTED NAME positions himself as a fearless "boots on the ground"
    independent journalist and self-proclaimed disruptor of the so-called "REDACTED"
    With a large social media following on platforms like YouTube, X (REDACTED), and
    Substack (REDACTED), he produces raw videos and posts documenting REDACTED,
    REDACTED, and disorder in REDACTED and other REDACTED. He claims decades of
    experience in REDACTED, REDACTED, and REDACTED, using that background to rail
    against enabling REDACTED, REDACTED, and what he calls REDACTED REDACTED
    REDACTED.Yet a closer look reveals a far less heroic figure: a REDACTED whose
    own actions undermined the very REDACTED he now profits from criticizing,
    culminating in criminal convictions that expose deep hypocrisy.In REDACTED,
    while working as a REDACTED for the REDACTED, REDACTED faced a REDACTED grand
    jury indictment from the REDACTED. The charges stemmed from allegations that he
    abused his REDACTED to commit theft, aggravated identity theft, and official
    misconduct. Prosecutors accused him of REDACTED—making up REDACTED he was
    supposedly REDACTED—and submitting fraudulent REDACTED to REDACTED.

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#118

Post by rectang »

llbbdd wrote: post #77
Springtime wrote: post #5

Ars Technica being caught using LLMs that hallucinated quotes by the author and then publishing them in their coverage about this is quite ironic here. Even on a forum where I saw the original article by this author posted someone used an LLM to summarize the piece without having read it fully themselves. How many levels of outsourcing thinking is occurring to where it becomes a game of telephone.

Honestly frustrating that Scott chose not to name and shame the authors. Liability is the only thing that's going to stop this kind of ugly shit.

There is no need to rush to judgment on the internet instant-gratification timescale. If consequences are coming for journalist or publication, they are inevitable.

We’ll know more in only a couple days — how about we wait that long before administering punishment?

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#119

Post by remh »

khannn wrote: post #102
giobox wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More than ironic, it's truly outrageous, especially given the site's recent propensity for negativity towards AI. They've been caught red-handed here doing the very things they routinely criticize others for. The right thing to do would be a mea-culpa style post and explain what went wrong, but I suspect the article will simply remain taken down and Ars will pretend this never happened. I loved Ars in the early years…

Is there anything like a replacement? The three biggest tech sites that I traditionally love are ArsTechnica, AnandTech(rip), and Phoronix. One is dead man walking mode, the second is ded dead, and the last is still going strong. I'm basically getting tech news from social media sites now and I don't like that.

I’ve really enjoyed 404media lately

Re: An AI agent published a hit piece on me – more things have happened

#120

Post by jandrewrogers »

giobox wrote: post #39
Springtime wrote: post #5

Ars Technica being caught using LLMs that hallucinated quotes by the author and then publishing them in their coverage about this is quite ironic here. Even on a forum where I saw the original article by this author posted someone used an LLM to summarize the piece without having read it fully themselves. How many levels of outsourcing thinking is occurring to where it becomes a game of telephone.

More than ironic, it's truly outrageous, especially given the site's recent propensity for negativity towards AI. They've been caught red-handed here doing the very things they routinely criticize others for. The right thing to do would be a mea-culpa style post and explain what went wrong, but I suspect the article will simply remain taken down and Ars will pretend this never happened. I loved Ars in the early years…

Conde Nast are the same people wearing Wired magazine like a skin suit, publishing cringe content that would have brought mortal shame upon the old Wired.
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