5 ms·

This is just the practice of invasive data harvesting taken to its natural conclusion, which any tech savvy user or computer geek brought up in the pre-postmode

by ryandv 2y ago

This is just the practice of invasive data harvesting taken to its natural conclusion, which any tech savvy user or computer geek brought up in the pre-postmodern social media era of the Internet (before Facebook) could have seen coming decades in advance. The only winning move here is not to play, accepting the unfortunate consequence that you will need to "limit the reach of your profile just to avoid participating in the new technology" - because nothing on the Internet is ever forgotten, and can (and will) be used for any purpose. Adding a few magic words to bewitch the AI into not scraping your profile is the new superstition of the digital era, a cousin to the pseudolegal "no copyright intended" incantation often seen on pirated YouTube videos of yesteryear. You cannot have your cake and eat it too, for there is a fundamental tradeoff between privacy and convenience as popularized by Schneier, 11 years ago. [0] You must stop using the platform and do something other than continue to consume vapid social media nonsense; yet no one ever listens or cares, for the revealed preference of the masses is to continue to not be users of the system but to be used in exchange for "free" access to these platforms. [0] https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/trading_privacy_1.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/06/trading_priva...

joe_the_user 2y ago
I'm not sure why having an LLM use my output in particular is problematic - I'm pretty sure OpenAI trained GPT-3+ on every single bit of data they could find, so they probably included a bunch of stuff I've written here already (though it is minuscule fraction of their vast corpus of course). Losing anonymity is something I'd be much more worried about overall (not that it's entirely separate I don't think it's the same).
- JohnFen 2y ago
  > I'm not sure why having an LLM use my output in particular is problematic For me, the problem is almost entirely that doing so requires me to have a great deal of trust in entities that I consider untrustworthy.
- rpgwaiter 2y ago
  There’s many good reasons, but for me it’s that I don’t want companies profiting off of my posts that have no intention of profit sharing. When I make a Youtube video and companies run ads on it, I get a piece of that pie (assuming I meet the requirements, etc.). That same video fed into Gemini so google can charge for AI video generation? I get nothing, Google makes bank. As a user I can pay for YouTube premium and not see ads, but as a creator there’s no amount I can pay to not feed Gemini.
  - seanhunter 2y ago
    I'm pretty sure for antitrust reasons Google is (ironically) about the only AI company who is not training generative AI on youtube content. So when you make a youtube video and people train AI on your video and generate stuff using it you only get 1 click of benefit out of it from their first download.
  - gruez 2y ago
    >That same video fed into Gemini so google can charge for AI video generation? I get nothing, Google makes bank. How do you feel about commenting on this site for free, which probably provides some benefit to ycombinator?
    - rpgwaiter 2y ago
      I would happily pay a reasonable monthly subscription to this site or similar. No problem paying for a service that treats users with respect. Also using this site has taught me all sorts of things that likely made me some money indirectly. It seems mutually beneficial without selling my data or paying for HN. That said, if YC made a deal with some tech company to give them the firehose of data to train AI, I’d probably stop using HN. I stopped using reddit for a similar reason despite being a very frequent redditor with like 60k karma. I know it’s all pretty open and getting fed into many different LLMs anyways, but thats not necessarily YC’s fault. My ideal would be strong government regulations regarding AI training, requiring explicit opt-in that isn’t buried in a ToS or EULA. Ideally companies would require a “non-AI feeding” version of their website to legally run in my country. I can’t imagine a scenario where this happens in the current system, but I sure can fantasize.
- quantified 2y ago
  I was served a youtube ad for a service that will let you pick a topic to write an ebook on, write the book for you, give it a layout design and a cover, then you can market it. A bunch of topics available. I find this to be gross. Look for an explosion of crap on Amazon bookshelves. Do you want me to publish 12-15 different ebooks containing the content you actually worked to create, and it just found permutations for?
  - _huayra_ 2y ago
    > Do you want me to publish 12-15 different ebooks Just make sure you spread it out over a few days and you're all good: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/09/ai-generated-books-force-amazon-to-cap-ebook-publications-to-3-per-day/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/09/ai-ge...
moron4hire 2y ago
It's not possible to not play. Even if I chose to avoid social media, my kids' school insists everyone interest with their teachers through some crappy branded app. Read the TOS. Didn't like what I saw. Told them I didn't want to install an app on my phone. Asked nicely if there was some way I could participate without it. They acted like I beat my kids.
- em-bee 2y ago
  exactly this. i have written about this before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41529783 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41529783 some people just do not understand that there are interactions that are forced on us and that refusing to participate is only to our own disadvantage. even if they allow you to participate without installing that app, you will always be second class. people will forget to copy you on messages, or not see messages you sent. and they will have a grudge because you make them do extra work. they will leave you out on things that are optional, or not vote for you when electing a parent representative. they will reject you for not being a team player. the irony is that as a software developer i would not hesitate to create such an app. surely my app is better than the alternatives. and the TOS of my app is fine. oh wait, my boss changed the TOS without asking me. ooops.
- _heimdall 2y ago
  How do schools actually manage requiring this? Is it required that all students have access to smartphones, tablets, the internet in general, etc? If a student doesn't have a device to install the crappy branded app on, what does the school do? I don't have kids yet though that time is likely coming, this goes firmly on the growing list of reasons why we'd choose to homeschool.
  - theGnuMe 2y ago
    When you homeschool you will likely buy said crappy app (or another one) to help you actually school your kids...
    - from-nibly 2y ago

by ryandv 2y ago

joe_the_user 2y ago

I'm not sure why having an LLM use my output in particular is problematic - I'm pretty sure OpenAI trained GPT-3+ on every single bit of data they could find, so they probably included a bunch of stuff I've written here already (though it is minuscule fraction of their vast corpus of course). Losing anonymity is something I'd be much more worried about overall (not that it's entirely separate I don't think it's the same).

JohnFen 2y ago
> I'm not sure why having an LLM use my output in particular is problematic For me, the problem is almost entirely that doing so requires me to have a great deal of trust in entities that I consider untrustworthy.
rpgwaiter 2y ago
There’s many good reasons, but for me it’s that I don’t want companies profiting off of my posts that have no intention of profit sharing. When I make a Youtube video and companies run ads on it, I get a piece of that pie (assuming I meet the requirements, etc.). That same video fed into Gemini so google can charge for AI video generation? I get nothing, Google makes bank. As a user I can pay for YouTube premium and not see ads, but as a creator there’s no amount I can pay to not feed Gemini.
- seanhunter 2y ago
  I'm pretty sure for antitrust reasons Google is (ironically) about the only AI company who is not training generative AI on youtube content. So when you make a youtube video and people train AI on your video and generate stuff using it you only get 1 click of benefit out of it from their first download.
- gruez 2y ago
  >That same video fed into Gemini so google can charge for AI video generation? I get nothing, Google makes bank. How do you feel about commenting on this site for free, which probably provides some benefit to ycombinator?
  - rpgwaiter 2y ago
    I would happily pay a reasonable monthly subscription to this site or similar. No problem paying for a service that treats users with respect. Also using this site has taught me all sorts of things that likely made me some money indirectly. It seems mutually beneficial without selling my data or paying for HN. That said, if YC made a deal with some tech company to give them the firehose of data to train AI, I’d probably stop using HN. I stopped using reddit for a similar reason despite being a very frequent redditor with like 60k karma. I know it’s all pretty open and getting fed into many different LLMs anyways, but thats not necessarily YC’s fault. My ideal would be strong government regulations regarding AI training, requiring explicit opt-in that isn’t buried in a ToS or EULA. Ideally companies would require a “non-AI feeding” version of their website to legally run in my country. I can’t imagine a scenario where this happens in the current system, but I sure can fantasize.
quantified 2y ago
I was served a youtube ad for a service that will let you pick a topic to write an ebook on, write the book for you, give it a layout design and a cover, then you can market it. A bunch of topics available. I find this to be gross. Look for an explosion of crap on Amazon bookshelves. Do you want me to publish 12-15 different ebooks containing the content you actually worked to create, and it just found permutations for?
- _huayra_ 2y ago
  > Do you want me to publish 12-15 different ebooks Just make sure you spread it out over a few days and you're all good: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/09/ai-generated-books-force-amazon-to-cap-ebook-publications-to-3-per-day/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2023/09/ai-ge...

moron4hire 2y ago

It's not possible to not play. Even if I chose to avoid social media, my kids' school insists everyone interest with their teachers through some crappy branded app. Read the TOS. Didn't like what I saw. Told them I didn't want to install an app on my phone. Asked nicely if there was some way I could participate without it. They acted like I beat my kids.

em-bee 2y ago
exactly this. i have written about this before: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41529783 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41529783 some people just do not understand that there are interactions that are forced on us and that refusing to participate is only to our own disadvantage. even if they allow you to participate without installing that app, you will always be second class. people will forget to copy you on messages, or not see messages you sent. and they will have a grudge because you make them do extra work. they will leave you out on things that are optional, or not vote for you when electing a parent representative. they will reject you for not being a team player. the irony is that as a software developer i would not hesitate to create such an app. surely my app is better than the alternatives. and the TOS of my app is fine. oh wait, my boss changed the TOS without asking me. ooops.
_heimdall 2y ago
How do schools actually manage requiring this? Is it required that all students have access to smartphones, tablets, the internet in general, etc? If a student doesn't have a device to install the crappy branded app on, what does the school do? I don't have kids yet though that time is likely coming, this goes firmly on the growing list of reasons why we'd choose to homeschool.
- theGnuMe 2y ago
  When you homeschool you will likely buy said crappy app (or another one) to help you actually school your kids...
  - from-nibly 2y ago