Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 55 posts

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#21

Post by BizarroLand »

varun_ch wrote: post #18
semiquaver wrote: post #6

> The Verge put the original 586-word Reddit post through several free online AI detectors, in addition to Gemini, ChatGPT, and Claude. The results were mixed: Copyleaks, GPTZero, Pangram, Gemini, and Claude all pegged it as likely AI-generated, but ZeroGPT and QuillBot both reported it as human-written. ChatGPT played it down the middle. Why does anyone, let alone a journalist, trust these? They are worse than usele…

Can you actually ask an LLM if content is AI-generated? Surely that wouldn't work reliably at all?

You can ask, but you can't really trust the results as the differences between AI generated text and human text are getting smaller every day AND LLMs aren't typically created to specifically identify the difference.

LLMs aren't intelligent. They're just very fancy math and a lot of smoke and mirrors.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#22

Post by Corence »

Focusing on the AI content generation aspect of this is disappointing to me, since those tools are fuzzy at best and even if the post was AI generated, it isn't necessarily a red flag since the user could be trying to disguise their writing style.

There are plenty of other signs this story is likely fake. The author claiming to be posting from a library on New Years' Day (most government buildings are closed) and was responding over 10 hours on the account. He's using a throwaway and a "burner laptop" at the library, but he also says he put his two weeks' notice in yesterday (also odd that this is on New Years' Eve) which would make identifying him trivial.

Fake stories get to the front page of Reddit every day, I wish journalists were pointing out the actual signs not to trust something to act as a better example.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#24

Post by CivBase »

varun_ch wrote: post #18
semiquaver wrote: post #6

> The Verge put the original 586-word Reddit post through several free online AI detectors, in addition to Gemini, ChatGPT, and Claude. The results were mixed: Copyleaks, GPTZero, Pangram, Gemini, and Claude all pegged it as likely AI-generated, but ZeroGPT and QuillBot both reported it as human-written. ChatGPT played it down the middle. Why does anyone, let alone a journalist, trust these? They are worse than usele…

Can you actually ask an LLM if content is AI-generated? Surely that wouldn't work reliably at all?

If an LLM were capable of reliably detecting AI-generated content, then it would also be capable of producing content that does not appear to be AI generated.

So either A) LLMs are intentionally, universally making their content look AI-generated despite having the capability to do otherwise or B) LLMs cannot reliably detect AI output and their responses on the subject are complete BS.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#25

Post by li2uR3ce »

g3f32r wrote: post #20
varun_ch wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you actually ask an LLM if content is AI-generated? Surely that wouldn't work reliably at all?

Of course you can ask an LLM if the content is AI-generated. It's easily at least 50% accurate too.

Given the context of what I personally think about the content, the AI is much more accurate than that.

(Is it any wonder why people fall in love with bots that always agree with them?)

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#26

Post by wenc »

nubinetwork wrote: post #3

It sounded too fishy, but a lot of what was written does sound like something uber eats would do.

I took a course on critical thinking once which taught me to at least pause and ask questions when I read something sensationalist.

I’ve learned that when my impulse is to say “It sounds like something X would do,” it often leads me down very wrong paths.

Just because the vibes point in that direction often doesn’t mean it’s the truth.

This is exactly how misinformation starts and real people pay the price for generations. Just look at the MSG (monosodium glutamate) untruth that has hurt many Chinese restaurants and Chinese Americans over the years. Misinformation is not victimless.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#28

Post by miohtama »

huhkerrf wrote: post #19

Is this the same publication that reported on the post without any hedge whatsoever? Yes, it was: https://www.theverge.com/transportation/853018/a-developer-f... "A developer for a ‘major food delivery app’ says the ‘algorithms are rigged against you." "There’s some debate as to whether the claims are as bad as the OP makes them seem, but it seems like there’s general agreement that the gist of the post is legit." An…

Why to retract when rage bait sells clicks.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#29

Post by bryanlarsen »

CivBase wrote: post #24
varun_ch wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you actually ask an LLM if content is AI-generated? Surely that wouldn't work reliably at all?

If an LLM were capable of reliably detecting AI-generated content, then it would also be capable of producing content that does not appear to be AI generated. So either A) LLMs are intentionally, universally making their content look AI-generated despite having the capability to do otherwise or B) LLMs cannot reliably detect AI output and their responses on the subject are complete BS.

> If an LLM were capable of reliably detecting AI-generated content, then it would also be capable of producing content that does not appear to be AI generated.

Those are two very different classes of problems. You do not automatically get one if you have the other, in any resource constrained situation. Yes, you can infinitely iterate a RNG into a content producer given a classifier, but that presumes infinite resources.

Re: That viral Reddit post about food delivery apps was an AI scam

#30

Post by huhkerrf »

Corence wrote: post #22

Focusing on the AI content generation aspect of this is disappointing to me, since those tools are fuzzy at best and even if the post was AI generated, it isn't necessarily a red flag since the user could be trying to disguise their writing style. There are plenty of other signs this story is likely fake. The author claiming to be posting from a library on New Years' Day (most government buildings are closed) and was…

It was a good indication of how things like conspiracy theories spread.

He gave his notice on NYE? Oh, he's probably just fudging that so he's not caught. He doesn't care about getting caught but he's on a burner laptop? Oh, people do weird things when they're stressed. And on and on.

Then, of course, the ultimate fallback: Well it sounds like something they would do. So even if most of this is made up, the bad things are still probably true.

Post reply on HN