The 'Dead-Internet Theory' • Hacker News Board

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#21

Post by commandlinefan » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 4:49 PM UTC

insickness wrote: post #11

ianai wrote: post #3

Or maybe there’s an AI that did come to awareness somewhere and decided to wipe humans out by getting us to violently fight with one another with outrageous stuff on the internet. There’s a Douglas Adams quote that goes something like “for every part of the universe there’s some other part that would look at the original part with outright disgust.”

There's a fantastic short story called "Sort by Controversial" about a startup that develops a technology that generates the most controversial statements possible and threatens to destroy humanity: https://slatestarcodex.com/2018/10/30/sort-by-controversial/

Such a shame he stopped writing this stuff - nowadays it's just book reviews.

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#22

Post by Arrath » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 4:50 PM UTC

vorticalbox wrote: post #15

Original post the blog is about https://forum.agoraroad.com/index.php?threads/dead-internet-...

Wild to me that '06 is cited as internet-old, and I'm a relative newcomer (post BBS era) myself.

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#23

Post by zozbot234 » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 4:51 PM UTC

As always, xkcd is relevant: https://xkcd.com/610/

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#24

Post by Zababa » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 5:37 PM UTC

I've seen someone experiment with using https://6b.eleuther.ai/ to post comments on 4chan. The results were impressive, nobody realized that those were comments created by an AI, and the posts almost always got some replied from people genuinly engagine with them.

A bit related to that, it also makes me think about the story with games published on itch.io that had "fake multiplayer": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCqnD40Q5T8.

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#25

Post by chunkyks » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:23 PM UTC

kunagi7 wrote: post #5

It doesn't feel that detached from reality. I watch a lot of small YouTube channels (some of them don't even reach 100 subscribers) and their comments are flooded by bots. Channel owners remove them quickly though. Some of them post random timestamps like "i like your video 23:34", "love u 5:49" (but the video is just 2 minutes long), other bots just spam every conversation with the same video links. There's a few th…

Those may be bible references, not timestamps?

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#26

Post by Lammy » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:25 PM UTC

mindslight wrote: post #18

The main thing that makes this a wacky conspiracy theory is this personification of intent: "allow me to try to succinctly state my thesis here: the U.S. government is engaging in an artificial intelligence powered gaslighting of the entire world population." Maybe that's how most people need to understand things (eg "God"), but it's also a straw man (cf claiming the Twin Towers were actively brought down by explosiv…

> (cf claiming the Twin Towers were actively brought down by explosives, rather than simply stopping at the largest beneficiary being the military industrial complex)

It is impossible to know, but i can't help but think about how all the post-9/11 surveillance of everyday communications would be exactly the perfect data source for training silicon lifeforms* to argue for you online.

[*] "Artificial" Intelligence reads like a slur to me so I avoid saying it. Feel free to think this is silly :)

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#27

Post by 0des » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:36 PM UTC

chunkyks wrote: post #25

kunagi7 wrote: post #5

It doesn't feel that detached from reality. I watch a lot of small YouTube channels (some of them don't even reach 100 subscribers) and their comments are flooded by bots. Channel owners remove them quickly though. Some of them post random timestamps like "i like your video 23:34", "love u 5:49" (but the video is just 2 minutes long), other bots just spam every conversation with the same video links. There's a few th…

Those may be bible references, not timestamps?

There is no biblical wisdom to be found in obscure tech tutorial videos. Only pain.

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#28

Post by elliekelly » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:39 PM UTC

OliverBoettger wrote: post #14

Typical case of confusing "The Internet" with Social Media.

I think, unfortunately, for a large portion of the world social media and the internet are one and the same.

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#29

Post by Lammy » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:43 PM UTC

OliverBoettger wrote: post #14

Typical case of confusing "The Internet" with Social Media.

"The Internet" is where the people are, not just the network itself with its thousands of protocols and applications. If 99% of people you would want to talk to can only be reached through four or five websites then what's really the difference?

Re: The 'Dead-Internet Theory'

#30

Post by Saptarishi » Wed, Sep 01, 2021, 6:44 PM UTC

kunagi7 wrote: post #5

It doesn't feel that detached from reality. I watch a lot of small YouTube channels (some of them don't even reach 100 subscribers) and their comments are flooded by bots. Channel owners remove them quickly though. Some of them post random timestamps like "i like your video 23:34", "love u 5:49" (but the video is just 2 minutes long), other bots just spam every conversation with the same video links. There's a few th…

Often such accounts posting random bait-ish comments are accompanied by a profile picture of a semi or completely nude woman. Many unsuspecting souls will naturally click