3 ms·

Did you write this? Pardon me if you did, but your comment sounds ChatGpt heavy, especially the open call for participation at the end.

defrost 2y ago
There's a slew of bot-army template comments from new-ish accounts, getting comment credit to work up to voting rights for a spruiking up-vote spree. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xzxa https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xzxa https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hsag https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hsag https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=kidfkj https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=kidfkj https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=linkjp https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=linkjp https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=lndsh https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=lndsh https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=mnjksd https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=mnjksd https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bhjgjy https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bhjgjy https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bjgiusg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bjgiusg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jhkug https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jhkug https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=dfgdgf https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=dfgdgf etc. etc. Once you see them, they stand out like dog's bollocks.
- WhitneyLand 2y ago
  I guess we have to enjoy the last year or so before better models are indistinguishable from us? With some better/clever prompting I’m not sure they could be as easily detected now.
  - smusamashah 2y ago
    I wouldnt mind a bot writing a comment on HN if it's thoughtful, which is HNs trademark. These comments are so damn void of any thought. You can flag them for being thoughtless alone.
    - dredmorbius 2y ago
      That's the premise of xkcd 810, "Constructive": <https://xkcd.com/810/ https://xkcd.com/810/> It's one of the more spectacular cases in which I think Munroe utterly missed the plot. It's not that it's possible to create bots which at a superficial assessment are making constructive / helpful comments. It's that bots which do this often have covert goals or purposes, "alignments" in the LLM/ML context. These might or might not be known or evident to either the bots' creators or users, and might even be exploited by still other parties. But bots are capable of a scale of operations which fundamentally changes the community dynamics of sites such as HN (or of Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, etc., etc.). It also fundamentally violates the prime directive of HN, "[T]o make thoughtful comments. Thoughtful in both senses: civil and substantial": <https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html> Or as dang so often notes, optimising for intellectual curiosity: <https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20intellectual%20curiousity&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...> Bots, so far as we're aware, are neither intellectual nor curious.
- smusamashah 2y ago
  So an hn comment is just "Praise, repeat, question". These are so fucking shallow.

defrost 2y ago

There's a slew of bot-army template comments from new-ish accounts, getting comment credit to work up to voting rights for a spruiking up-vote spree. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xzxa https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=xzxa https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hsag https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=hsag https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=kidfkj https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=kidfkj https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=linkjp https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=linkjp https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=lndsh https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=lndsh https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=mnjksd https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=mnjksd https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bhjgjy https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bhjgjy https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bjgiusg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bjgiusg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jhkug https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jhkug https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=dfgdgf https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=dfgdgf etc. etc. Once you see them, they stand out like dog's bollocks.

WhitneyLand 2y ago
I guess we have to enjoy the last year or so before better models are indistinguishable from us? With some better/clever prompting I’m not sure they could be as easily detected now.
- smusamashah 2y ago
  I wouldnt mind a bot writing a comment on HN if it's thoughtful, which is HNs trademark. These comments are so damn void of any thought. You can flag them for being thoughtless alone.
  - dredmorbius 2y ago
    That's the premise of xkcd 810, "Constructive": <https://xkcd.com/810/ https://xkcd.com/810/> It's one of the more spectacular cases in which I think Munroe utterly missed the plot. It's not that it's possible to create bots which at a superficial assessment are making constructive / helpful comments. It's that bots which do this often have covert goals or purposes, "alignments" in the LLM/ML context. These might or might not be known or evident to either the bots' creators or users, and might even be exploited by still other parties. But bots are capable of a scale of operations which fundamentally changes the community dynamics of sites such as HN (or of Reddit, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, etc., etc.). It also fundamentally violates the prime directive of HN, "[T]o make thoughtful comments. Thoughtful in both senses: civil and substantial": <https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html> Or as dang so often notes, optimising for intellectual curiosity: <https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20intellectual%20curiousity&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...> Bots, so far as we're aware, are neither intellectual nor curious.
smusamashah 2y ago
So an hn comment is just "Praise, repeat, question". These are so fucking shallow.