Live data from Hacker News

Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

mastodon.lawprofs.org

31–40 of 59 posts

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#31
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know. People have been saying quite confidently that "AI" is "going to" "take over" the web since ChatGPT was announced. I live online and my only exposure to AI-generated content (that I recognize, of course, but that's another discussion) has been on purpose - when I look for it, use it myself, or others share what they're doing with it. I guess I'm still waiting for it to take over? I think what people mea…

> when I look for it, use it myself, or others share what they're doing with it. I guess I'm still waiting for it to take over Dunno if you follow gaming news at all, but AI spam has become the rule if you look for anything on new popular games If you want to know how to solve a puzzle or compare two characters or something, it is almost guaranteed that you will come across pages of search results that seem like gene…

> Dunno if you follow gaming news at all, but AI spam has become the rule if you look for anything on new popular games

At least in regards to game articles, this has been my experience for at least a decade. It wasn't AI spam, but it was spam everywhere non-the-less. I'm sure it's even worse now, but it was bad enough even 10 years ago that I've stopped bothering using google to find most game information years ago.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> when I look for it, use it myself, or others share what they're doing with it. I guess I'm still waiting for it to take over Dunno if you follow gaming news at all, but AI spam has become the rule if you look for anything on new popular games If you want to know how to solve a puzzle or compare two characters or something, it is almost guaranteed that you will come across pages of search results that seem like gene…

Current amount of SEO spam is nowhere near the 2007 levels, when the entire first page of Google results was your search query with stuff like "xxx", "2007 crack", or "download free" attached to it. >If you want to know how to solve a puzzle or compare two characters or something, it is almost guaranteed that you will come across pages of search results that seem like generated content This kind of content was never…

> This kind of content was never genuine.

Maybe not in your lifetime, but in mine, high-quality game walkthroughs with in-depth statistics were pretty ordinary for even fairly niche games.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#33

>> In the last few months, the constant flood of algorithmically generated junk content has kicked into an AI-powered overdrive, and it is cutting a swath of destruction as it overwhelms search engines, filters, and moderation systems Nothing that wasn't happening already since some 15 years or so.

[deleted]

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#34
post #28

I ran into this today while searching for a way to merge channels in Slack. A google search turned up this result https://www.process.st/how-to/merge-channels-in-slack/ which describes an in-app method that does not exist . That entire website should be banned from Google.

It should also be banned from AI training data sets. Good luck to anyone trying to train an AI!

As far as I can tell, GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 are extremely aggressive about making up features of widely used software that don’t actually exist. I lost count of how many tables and columns in MySQL’s INFORMATION_SCHEMA they made up for me yesterday, often complete with elaborate SQL commands to query them.

The next generation of models will train on this crap.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#35
post #20

What's interesting to me is how quickly AI generated art came to be expected, unexceptional. Every random blog post has a couple AI generated images now, they are completely unremarkable and uninteresting. The novelty wore off basically instantaneously. They're just the new corporate art style.

It’s only been a year. As SORA shows, state of the art images and videos will soon be undetectable by human eye and it’s very soon coming to proliferate every “content” you interact with.

>> What's interesting to me is how quickly AI generated art came to be expected, unexceptional. Every random blog post has a couple AI generated images now, they are completely unremarkable and uninteresting. The novelty wore off basically instantaneously. They're just the new corporate art style.

> It’s only been a year. As SORA shows, state of the art images and videos will soon be undetectable by human eye and it’s very soon coming to proliferate every “content” you interact with.

Even if the "AI" generated images will be "undetectable by human eye," they'll still be at least "completely unremarkable and uninteresting" and more likely crappy and stupid (even if all the people have the right number of fingers now).

I predict the floodgate of that "AI" generated stuff will reduce the production of actually good and creative art and images and make what is produced harder to find.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#36
post #18

Some of the articles linked, are basically issues I was already aware of (such as all product review sites are turning into copy-pasta). I at least have sympathy for the folks at: https://housefresh.com/david-vs-digital-goliaths/ However, mostly Google's included comment is personally hilarious. The weird craziness some people at Google must have to deal with. > Lily Ray, 'when we told our client, they said "that's l…

I somehow missed that article when it first appeared on HN[0], thanks for linking to it!

Surprised to "^F FTC" the article and comments, and not find any mention of the Federal Trade Commission. Given some of their prior rulemaking and caselaw around fake reviews and undisclosed compensation for endorsements, it seems the sort of thing that could be easily be prosecuted under false advertising laws. Unfortunately, I'm inclined to believe that the decision to let dying legacy media companies get away with fraud is probably a political one.

[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39433451

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#38
post #8

"Google is taking action against algorithmically generated spam. The search engine giant just announced upcoming changes, including a revamped spam policy, designed in part to keep AI clickbait out of its search results." Even before the AI floodgates were opened, there was a huge problem with ads and SEO-optimized junk written by humans clogging up Google, and pushing the good stuff into the SERP netherworld. People…

This is the opportunity old media has been waiting for. The only d tense against all this is an established name brand with some trust.

Information networks will increase in value over people that are knowledgeable from aggregation of third hand sources.

They'll drop the ball of course.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#39
post #20

What's interesting to me is how quickly AI generated art came to be expected, unexceptional. Every random blog post has a couple AI generated images now, they are completely unremarkable and uninteresting. The novelty wore off basically instantaneously. They're just the new corporate art style.

It’s only been a year. As SORA shows, state of the art images and videos will soon be undetectable by human eye and it’s very soon coming to proliferate every “content” you interact with.

Sora costs a fortune, like dollars per minute. It's DOA. Also when handpicked demo content shows cats sprouting and losing limbs in a 15 second clip and that's the best they got, not sure anyone has to worry about undetectable fakes, certainly not with the total lack of creativity I've seen on the image side of things.

Re: Something exceptionally grim is happening on the Internet

#40

Maybe it will put emphasis on the social aspect of internet. Maybe people will be more sceptikal. by having t know your source, having small but trustworthy network based on real people... maybe that will change the shape of internet and lead to premium internet service where experts are paid to provide currated informations. does not sounds too bad tbh.

I had a family dinner last week, in the Pacific North West. One topic that came up was evil government regulations that required heat pumps, with the follow-up claim being that they do not work below -5C.

I cannot express the amount of shit I took for stating, un-movingly, that heat pumps work below -5C. I was shown Google search results, webpages, and was hit with professional experience from my brother, the red seal gas-fitter. I don't expect a "That's too bad" - I already know I'm right, and the US DoE agrees with me [0].

I think your comment is wrong. People don't search to find correct information, they Google to confirm pre-concieved biases and "verify" what they're already certain of. And I think computer-generated websites and answer boxes will only exacerbate the issue.

[0] https://www.energy.gov/energysaver/air-source-heat-pumps: "...air-source heat pump technology has advanced so that it now offers a legitimate space heating alternative in colder regions"

Post reply on HN