Haha. Was just thinking that as I was reading a comment!
I was thinking, this argument is suspicously cogent!
Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
351–360 of 1001 posts
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#352What if English is my second language? Undoubtedly being well spoken is associated with higher class. Your arguments will come of as stronger to the reader.
> What if English is my second language? Write it broken. Broken and true is more authentic than polished and approximately so. When I see an AI-generated comment or email, I catch myself implicitly assuming it is—best case—bullshit. That isn’t the case if the grammar is off. (If anything, it can be charming.)
Well... for myself personally, that works, but only up to a certain level of broken. Past that I quit reading.
That may be a defect in me. Maybe I should make a stronger effort on such comments. But I suspect I'm not the only one who does that, and at that point it becomes an issue that affects the community as a whole.
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#353This is going to be a tough ask. I am with this 100% for "ai generated" but not "ai edited". What if I'm using AI for spellchecking or correcting bad grammar? what if it is an accessiblity-related use case? or translation?
It's just a tool ffs! there are many issues with LLM abuse, but this sort of over-compensation is exactly the sort of stuff that makes it hard to get abuse under control.
You're still talking with a human!, there is no actual "AI" you're not talking to an actual artificial intelligence. "don't message me unless you've written it with ink, on papyrus". There is a world of difference between grammarly and an autonomous agent creating comments on its own. Specifics, context, and nuance matter.
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#354People aren't good at detecting AI generated/edited comments, so unsure how effective this policy will be. Though I guess there are still some obvious signs of AI speak like emdashes and sycophantic (it's not X, it's Y!) speech. Bit of a shameless plug but I wrote a HN AI comment detector game[0] with AI and most of my friends and fellow HN users who tried it out couldn't detect them. [0]: https://psychosis.hn/ [1]:…
> obvious signs of AI speak like emdashes
Some of us were trained/self taught to write that way. Even "it's not X, it's Y" is a legitimate and subjectively effective communication tool, and there are those of us who either by training modeling have picked it up as a habit. It's not Ai that started this, Ai learned it from us.
Crap - I just did it, didn't I? Awww double crap! Did it again...
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#355Where do we draw the line at AI edited comments. Technically spell check has been "editing" my comments since I first started on here.
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#356Will using a voice-to-text app to create my comment get me banned? Especially if it creates a transcription mistake that might be characteristic of an LLM
I wouldn't expect voice-to-text apps to produce anything that looks "Signature LLM" since it's still your words, your grammar, etc.. The occasional transcription mistake is unlikely to be an issue either, given the prevalence of humans here who use em-dashes, speak ESL, etc..
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#357Sometimes, an AI helps articulate an idea or an intuition. Is that okay, or is it too much already?
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#358[flagged]
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#359I'm absolutely 100% for this policy.
My only caution is that good writers and LLMs look very similar, because LLMs were trained on a corpus of good writers. Good writers use semicolons and em-dashes. Sometimes we used bulleted lists or Oxford commas.
So we should make sure to follow that other HN rule, and assume the person on the other end is a good faith actor, and be cautious about accusing someone of using AI.
(I've been accused multiple times of being an AI after writing long well written comments 100% by hand)
Re: Don't post generated/AI-edited comments. HN is for conversation between humans
#360Does that extend to generated/AI-edited articles? I don't see why the same rationale wouldn't apply.