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Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

theregister.com

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Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#161

Post by voy707 »

ses1984 wrote: post #75
delis-thumbs-7e wrote: post #42

I personally think “generative AI” is a misnomer. More I understand the mathematics behind machine learning more I am convinced that it should not be used to generate text, images or anything that is meant for people to consume, even if it is the most blandest of email. Sometimes you might get lucky, but most of the time you only get what the most boring person in the most boring cocktail party would say if forced to…

People want the real thing, not artificially flavored tokens. I would rather read the prompt than the generative output, even if it’s just disjointed words and sentence fragments.

I hope "just the prompt please" becomes a common phrase

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#164

Post by JamesBarney »

Retric wrote: post #89
svara wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that mostly depends on how good a writer you are. A lot of people aren't, and the AI legitimately writes better. As in, the prose is easier to understand, free of obvious errors or ambiguities. But then, the writing is also never great. I've tried a couple of times to get it to write in the style of a famous author, sometimes pasting in some example text to model the output on, but it never sounds right.

I find most people can write way better than AI, they simply don’t put in the effort. Which is the real issue, we’re flooding channels not designed for such low effort submissions. AI slop is just SPAM in a different context.

My experience has been

(ordered from best to worst)

1. Author using AI well

2. Author not using AI

3. Author using AI poorly

With the gap between 1 and 2 being driven by the underlying quality of the writer and how well they use AI. A really good writer sees marginal improvements and a really poor one can see vast improvements.

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#165

Post by JamesBarney »

yoyohello13 wrote: post #20
amelius wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sure this can be corrected by AI companies.

The question is… why? What is the actual human benefit (not monetary).

If AI wrote and thought better by default then I wouldn't have to read the AI slop my co-workers send me.

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#166

Post by _79px »

matusp wrote: post #94
stephc_int13 wrote: post #11

The "AI voice" is everywhere now. I see it on recent blog posts, on news articles, obituaries, YT channels. Sometimes mixed with voice impersonation of famous physicists like Feynman or Susskind. I find it genuinely soul-crushing and even depressing, but I may be over sensitive to it as most readers don't seem to notice.

> The "AI voice" is everywhere now. Maybe I'm going crazy but I can smell it in the OP as well.

Yeah I started seeing it too, the article is just full of AI clues.

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#168

Post by [deleted] »

andrewflnr wrote: post #139
Retric wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find most people can write way better than AI, they simply don’t put in the effort. Which is the real issue, we’re flooding channels not designed for such low effort submissions. AI slop is just SPAM in a different context.

You may be in a bubble of smart, educated people. Either way, one of the key ways to "put in the effort" is practice . People who haven't practiced often don't write well even if they're trying hard in the moment. Not even in terms of beautiful writing, just pure comprehensibility.

[deleted]

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#169

Post by aaplok »

svara wrote: post #84
barrkel wrote: post #3

This is a good statement of what I suspect many of us have found when rejecting the rewriting advice of AIs. The "pointiness" of prose gets worn away, until it doesn't say much. Everything is softened. The distinctiveness of the human voice is converted into blandness. The AI even says its preferred rephrasing is "polished" - a term which specifically means the jaggedness has been removed. But it's the jagged edges,…

I think that mostly depends on how good a writer you are. A lot of people aren't, and the AI legitimately writes better. As in, the prose is easier to understand, free of obvious errors or ambiguities. But then, the writing is also never great. I've tried a couple of times to get it to write in the style of a famous author, sometimes pasting in some example text to model the output on, but it never sounds right.

It depends how you define "good writing", which is too often associated with "proper language", and by extension with proper breeding. It is a class marker.

People have a distinct voice when they write, including (perhaps even especially) those without formal training in writing. That this voice is grating to the eyes of a well educated reader is a feature that says as much about the reader as it does about the writer.

Funnily enough, professional writers have long recognised this, as is shown by the never-ending list of authors who tried to capture certain linguistic styles in their work, particularly in American literature.

There are situations where you may want this class marker to be erased, because being associated with a certain social class can have negative impact on your social prospects. But it remains that something is being lost in the process, and that something is the personality and identity of the writer.

Re: Semantic ablation: Why AI writing is generic and boring

#170

Post by crabmusket »

For those who haven't seen it yet, this Wiki page also has what I think is very good advice about writing:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signs_of_AI_writing

While the page's purpose is to help editors detect AI contributions, you can also detect yourself doing these same things sometimes, and fix them.

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