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G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

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Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#71
post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Fabricate" has the same problem as "lie" and "hallucinate". All of those terms imply a cognition that isn't actually happening. I think the best way to refer to these things is the more accurate "error". The LLM isn't lying, it's in error.

It doesn't. Hallucination in this context means 'an unfounded or mistaken impression or notion'. There's one side of the current zeitgeist that over-anthropomorphizes these models. But there's another side that seems to be terrified that LLMs could be anything resembling intelligent Both sides are pretty emotion over facts though. A lot of their "human-like" behavior is emergent from things that don't work the same w…

> It doesn't. Hallucination in this context means 'an unfounded or mistaken impression or notion'.

Correct. Which, as near as I can tell, isn't the correct characterization of what's happening with LLMs.

> But there's another side that seems to be terrified that LLMs could be anything resembling intelligent

I certainly have no such fear. I say that only to indicate that my biases are not of that sort.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#72

A few days ago I was searching for some information about a CSS problem I was having. I saw a promising result on a reputable looking webpage. As soon as I started unpacking the example code a little modal window popped up saying this was AI powered and touted it as some revolutionary assistant. First things first, using AI to generate CSS advice is probably the most false positive laden use-case I can imagine. Espec…

AI for CSS sounds like a much better thing than the stuff mentioned here. I find Copilot and ChatGPT really good at writing robust CSS.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#73

It's obvious that people would flood Google with generated content. But it's hard to tell if it would kill Google or somehow make Google works better. There's certain dynamics to the game and nobody can say for sure. As for why it might not make Google worse, just think about YouTube algorithms: 1. One good video is substantially better than hundreds of bad videos, or thousands even. 2. Clickbait works in terms of ge…

> Clickbait works in terms of getting people to click on your video, but if you don't deliver what the clickbait promised people would leave and it would hurt your stats.

This is an interesting take. Google can only "reward" videos that people watch for longer because they own the site. That is, they can tell when people leave. For a good chunk of sites, they still can because of Google's ad market share, but for a really sizeable chunk of sites that isn't the case. For like 80% of users, they also still can because they own Chrome.

I'm not sure I like the idea of allowing Google to reward sites that use their ads or browser monopoly in their search algorithm.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#74
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those 60 people can have a new job: fact checking the lies that the new ais produce

I think it confuses things immensely to anthropomorphize large language models. LLMs don't lie or tell the truth they just spit out text that is in alignment with the training model. Don't give them agency they don't have.

Yes and when you’re using “serverless” services there are actually servers running somewhere. At this point, it’s not insightful for someone to mention either on HN.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#75

It's obvious that people would flood Google with generated content. But it's hard to tell if it would kill Google or somehow make Google works better. There's certain dynamics to the game and nobody can say for sure. As for why it might not make Google worse, just think about YouTube algorithms: 1. One good video is substantially better than hundreds of bad videos, or thousands even. 2. Clickbait works in terms of ge…

> Clickbait works in terms of getting people to click on your video, but if you don't deliver what the clickbait promised people would leave and it would hurt your stats. This is an interesting take. Google can only "reward" videos that people watch for longer because they own the site. That is, they can tell when people leave. For a good chunk of sites, they still can because of Google's ad market share, but for a r…

Unfortunately the worst of the worst clickbait is the ads. Google is never going to do anything about those. Hell, worse videos probably have better click through rates because people will click anything to get out of such a video.

Plus, I've never once seen enshittification reward better quality. I highly doubt this will be the first time.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#76
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those 60 people can have a new job: fact checking the lies that the new ais produce

I think it confuses things immensely to anthropomorphize large language models. LLMs don't lie or tell the truth they just spit out text that is in alignment with the training model. Don't give them agency they don't have.

Absolutely. The lie is in providing the false framework, or a framework with fakery embedded. If the lie is accepted at the framework level, individuals will believe themselves to be saying the truth, unaware that they have already swallowed the larger falsity.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#77
post #6

It's the natural evolution of content marketing & SEO. I work at an IT company where we have ~15 ppl building and managing a few SaaS apps for the travel industry, and we have 50-60 ppl doing marketing as a service for our customers. They write page after page of content that barely get read. It all just exists to make the google bot happy. And that works. They bring in more customers & revenue apparently. (honestly,…

Those 60 people can have a new job: fact checking the lies that the new ais produce

They can become AI-empowered content creators. Their own Miyazakis, Scorseses, and Eilishes. [1]

[1] This isn't sarcasm. I think that's the world we're headed to. Hundreds of thousands of little creators serving their own unique niches. A world without Disney.

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#78

It's obvious that people would flood Google with generated content. But it's hard to tell if it would kill Google or somehow make Google works better. There's certain dynamics to the game and nobody can say for sure. As for why it might not make Google worse, just think about YouTube algorithms: 1. One good video is substantially better than hundreds of bad videos, or thousands even. 2. Clickbait works in terms of ge…

> Clickbait works in terms of getting people to click on your video, but if you don't deliver what the clickbait promised people would leave and it would hurt your stats. This is an interesting take. Google can only "reward" videos that people watch for longer because they own the site. That is, they can tell when people leave. For a good chunk of sites, they still can because of Google's ad market share, but for a r…

Even if I’m not using Chrome, if I search for a term and the first link isn’t helpful, I would quickly go back to the search results and click another link. Google should be able to get a signal from that

Re: G/O media will make more AI-generated stories despite critics

#79
post #36
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it confuses things immensely to anthropomorphize large language models. LLMs don't lie or tell the truth they just spit out text that is in alignment with the training model. Don't give them agency they don't have.

I don't lie either. I just spit out words that is in alignment with my mental model for optimizing my future.

Human social norms; definitions of optimizing for self, do not have to be maintained though; see the decline in religion.

Human society is not fractal; we die off, new social value stores come about; optimize for self could be defined as “not build environment destroying technology.”

A synthetic machine kept running but never allowed new inputs will just exist in long term belief in its old bullshit

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