It’s the fifth day of this blogvent, and since it’s currently 10 pm, I’m technically no longer on vacation, it’s just a regular weekend now. I had a great time those past few days, and I’m really happy that I took some time to write every evening. I hope that I’ll find the time to keep writing, painting, and planning TTRPG sessions once I resume work. Time will tell.
This morning, I was reading a blog post that was shared in a newsletter I mostly enjoy. I started reading, one paragraph, two paragraphs, three paragraphs, and then I thought to myself that it wasn’t a really good post. It felt like the author was just saying the same thing over and over again, maybe it was really important to them, or maybe the reformulation was to really get the point across. Once I start a blog post, I usually try to finish it, so I kept reading a bit.
The post did not improve, but what was a bit suspicious to me was that it was not badly written, so as I kept reading, I started to have a daunting thought. Was this AI-generated? I ran the post through Pangram, and it came back as 100% AI-generated. This really upset me for many different reasons.
1. I didn’t catch it
The first reason I was upset was that the idea that it was AI-generated only came to me after at least half the post, and it was a long one. I spot tons of AI-generated blog posts at the end of the first paragraph, or even at the second or third sentence. But this time, I didn’t.
Maybe the post was well generated, this AI post could just be better than all the others I’ve seen before. This is annoying because this means my radar is not up to date anymore. But since I eventually figured it out, this also means that the writing still has tells, and that it’s still slop.
Maybe I didn’t catch it because I trusted the source. It’s also annoying because this newsletter gives me a lot of good blog posts every week. This is a great follow-up to reason #2.
2. How did this post get shared in this newsletter
I used to really like the author of the newsletter. It’s a great newsletter because I disagree on so much with the author, but this means I get plenty of good posts with opposing views!
But I can’t excuse sharing an AI-generated blog post, this still feels very wrong to me. It’s not because an AI was involved in the process, it’s because I think those posts are bad. It’s impossible to know what the author’s true ideas were. It’s often slop, ideas are attenuated, banalized, unpersonified, and I want to read from people who took the time to write. If it makes you write faster, this is not a good reason to use it, taking the time to write meant you also took the time to think.
But what should I do about this newsletter? Is the author too AI-pilled that those posts don’t bother them, or that they don’t even realize it’s AI? I think it’s not the first time they’ve shared an AI-generated post, so I excused the first as inattention, now it’s becoming an issue.
I will start by stashing the post that made me write this blog, and if I find a few more in their newsletter, I will hit them up with the links and the pangram screenshots.
3. I like to read, and I don’t want to become paranoiac
I love to read blog posts. About tech, sure, but also about pretty much anything when it’s shared with passion. I hate that more and more, when I don’t know the author or the source, I start with a sceptical eye, and the tiny little things that could just be coincidences are making me doubt the authorship of the post.
To get better at writing, I want to write more, but I also need to read more. I want to read good posts, good content. This is inspiration, this is ideas. It’s a shame that this activity that I like now starts with a phase of doubt and negativity.
I’ve seen the term AI-paranoia thrown around from time to time, not in the AI-psychosis sense, but more when people start thinking that everything around them is generated by AI. Hard to judge when so many Twitter, Reddit, and LinkedIn posts are completely generated. So many YouTube videos filled with AI visuals, AI voice-over, and AI music. So many blog posts are completely generated to game SEO.
Conclusion
I’m not sure where I wanted to go with this post, mostly sharing my frustration, I think. But despite all that, I’m going to keep reading blog posts. I have to build a little something to collect personal websites where I think the content is authentic, and keep ignoring and blocking the sources where I think the content is generated.