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Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

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Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#371

Post by permo-w »

kuschku wrote: post #366
permo-w wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you're ignoring survivorship bias. anything text-based you can tell was made with AI input is something that was made using the AI poorly

If that was the case, that'd be great. I don't necessarily care how something was achieved, as long as the software engineering and architecture was properly done, requirements were properly considered, edge cases documented, tests written, and bugs reported upstream. But it's not the case. Of course, I could be wrong – maybe it's not AI, maybe it's just actual incompetence instead. That said, humans usually don't ap…

this doesn't really negate or address the fact that the sample you're basing your position upon clearly doesn't account for the content that you couldn't tell was made using AI

I only gave AI coding assistants as a secondary example as to why AI obviously isn't something that people are suddenly going to realise they don't need, and you're over-focusing on it because clearly you have an existing and well-thought out position on the topic, but it's completely beside the point

this thread is about AI generated text content online

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#372

Post by DontForgetMe »

amelius wrote: post #140
justinclift wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you aware of Kagi (kagi.com)? With them, at least the AI stuff can be turned off. Membership is presently about 61k, and seems to be growing about 2k per month: https://kagi.com/stats

Be aware of: https://www.reddit.com/r/SearchKagi/comments/1gvlqhm/disappo...

I remain amazed by the lack of attention given to this.

Regardless of one's position on the 'everything online is Russian propaganda, Russian bots or misinformation - invest in sickles and hammers, comrade / wtf just use basic common sense and the internet is as safe as it ever was' continuum, such universal enthusiasm for a Russian-owned, Russian-controlled search engine should generate a little more counter-argument, at the very least.

Absolutely no mention of Google, Bing, Startpage, DDG, or even Mojeek search engines usually pass online without somebody detailing the problems, flaws, or why they're not as good as the alternatives. Usually, at least 20% of the comments will be overtly critical, with at least 1 person passionately arguing that this search engine is going to destroy life as we know it / funds genocide / is an abomination unto God.

On open forums and spaces where a variety of users and tastes are represented, that minimum level of criticism usually applies to absolutely everything from movies to toothbrushing techniques to kids' TV to low-carb breakfasts. If more than 3 people care enough about something to discuss it, at least 1 of those people will hate it and feel the need to enunciate why.

Except Kagi. Kagi must enjoy the highest praise-criticism ratio of anything I've ever seen on the web, including concepts like sunshine and heaven and the eradication of polio.

Seriously. The only 'real' criticism I ever see of Kagi is like 'I personally don't like it because I don't think a search engine is worth more than $19.99' or 'unfortunately I need x feature', and it's always followed by a reply saying 'Ah, well Kagi is now available for $19.50' or 'you'll be thrilled to know that x feature can be enabled in Kagi by following these steps'.

And the occasional 'I don't use it because it seemed a bit wierd and wasn't worth it' comment languishing on the outskirts of the discussion.

So yeah. I do not expect this comment to stir much discussion, mainly because it's like 24 hours after the main debate and is on a pretty low-impact thread on hacker news from an uninspiring new ish account. But also because Kagi critical comments are written in sand, whatever the discussion or authority or audience.

That should make people more suspicious.

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#374

Post by permo-w »

123malware321 wrote: post #221
permo-w wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

surely that would be eternal November then

everything is dead after november passes

oof I only caught the meaning of this on the third read. depressing

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#375

Post by permo-w »

system2 wrote: post #34
permo-w wrote: post #29

besides for training future models, is this really such a big deal? most of the AI-gened text content is just replacing content-farm SEO-spam anyway. the same stuff that any half-awares person wouldn't have read in the past is now slightly better written, using more em dashes and instances of the word "delve". if you're consistently being caught out by this stuff then likely you need to improve your search hygiene, n…

Yes indeed, it is a problem. Now the old good sites have turned into AI-slop sites because they can't fight the spammers by writing slowly with humans.

if a potential defense is to simply the spammers, then the site was previously just as likely to start hiring content-farm human slop writers as they are now likely to use AI, i.e. the site probably wasn't that great in the first place and had equal potential to deteriorate, AI or no

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#376

Post by permo-w »

darkwater wrote: post #100
permo-w wrote: post #29

besides for training future models, is this really such a big deal? most of the AI-gened text content is just replacing content-farm SEO-spam anyway. the same stuff that any half-awares person wouldn't have read in the past is now slightly better written, using more em dashes and instances of the word "delve". if you're consistently being caught out by this stuff then likely you need to improve your search hygiene, n…

> besides for training future models, is this really such a big deal? most of the AI-gened text content is just replacing content-farm SEO-spam anyway. Yes, it is because of the other side of the coin. If you are writing human-generated, curated content, previously you would just do it in your small patch of Internet, and probably SEs (Google...) will pick it up anyway because it was good quality content. You just di…

this is basically the equivalent of saying that content-farm writers might read your content and bastardise it into seo slop. okay, sure, it's true, but it was always true and AI doesn't change it significantly

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#377

Post by mrbungie »

scotty79 wrote: post #360
teiferer wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends what you mean with "AI". Actual intelligence? Yeah, maybe. LLM? No, they don't actually reason, an activity that Einstein did a lot of and without which coming up with his theory would have been impossible. He didn't just go on a random walk like what LLM temperature is doing.

Who knew that such a huge amount of software development problems can be solved without ever "actually" reasoning.

Well, depends on the software project itself and where you are in its development lifecycle but:

- (1) A lot of developing can be just chores around managing scaffolds and repeatable work, and due to this macros, autogenerated code and other tools have been a thing at many layers for a long time; and

- (2) I remember copy-pasting from Google/StackOverflow (i.e. mostly search + pattern matching with some minimal reasoning) being criticized as a low-effort mode of development during the 2010s, before ChatGPT and AI assisted coding tools took over that part.

So yes, I'd argue a huge amount of software development problems can be solved without ever actually reasoning from first principles, AI tools just made that more visible.

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#378

Post by xjm »

actionfromafar wrote: post #107
juvoly wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I guess that analogously, we might find that X years after some future AI content production ban, we could similarly start ignoring the low background token issue?

We used a rather low number of atmospheric bombs, while we are carpet bombing the internet every day with AI marketing copy.

We used a low number _and_ it was a while ago (it would be different if we used the same number spread out on the same time span)

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#379

Post by DANmode »

kortilla wrote: post #196
eirini1 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree with this logic. It implies that people who use Google, Bing and a million other products made by US-based companies are supportive of the huge amount of attrocities commited or aided by the United States. Or other countries. It feels very odd to single out Russia's invasion of Ukraine but to minimize the Israeli genocide of palestinians in Gaza, the multiple unjust wars waged by the United States all o…

Google doesn’t censor those atrocities for the US government. That’s the key difference.

Not overtly - and not all of the things the US as a whole may want.

But Google does censor.

Re: Search tool that only returns content created before ChatGPT's public release

#380

Post by Ajakks »

tkgally wrote: post #16

Somewhat related, the leaderboard of em-dash users on HN before ChatGPT: https://www.gally.net/miscellaneous/hn-em-dash-user-leaderbo...

I have used a dash - like that for almost 20 years, 100% of the time I ought to use a semi-colon and about half of the time for commas - it let's me just keep talking about things, the comma is harder pause. I've recently started seriously writing at a literary level, and I have fallen in love with the em dash - it has a fantastic function within established professional writing, where it is used often - its why the AI uses it so much.
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