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>1) None of those had an Em dash I was responding in particular to the "you write like a late night kitchen gizmo ad?" ... which would be a speech pattern peop

by jasode 10mo ago

>1) None of those had an Em dash I was responding in particular to the "you write like a late night kitchen gizmo ad?" ... which would be a speech pattern people hear. In the audio case, it doesn't matter what punctuation symbol separates the "it isn't/it's" pattern because the comma or em dash would be invisible. E.g. a blog author also complains about "it isn't/it's" separated by a comma here: https://saigaddam.medium.com/it-isnt-just-x-it-s-y-54cb403d61a8 https://saigaddam.medium.com/it-isnt-just-x-it-s-y-54cb403d6... >There are maybe 4 unique examples in the search over the past 15 years, No, (1) the Algolia search engine HN uses is not exhaustive and always returns incomplete results, and (2) I couldn't construct a regex to capture all occurrences. It didn't capture the dozens of times I used it before 2022. More pre-2022 examples that match the "it isn't/it's" pattern that the blog author is complaining about : 2012 It Isn't Just Buzz, It's About Relationships : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4567529 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4567529 2019 It Isn’t the Kids. It’s the Cost of Raising Them : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19468214 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19468214 2021 It isn't Facebook, it's us : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29402146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29402146 2017 It isn't trig, or geometry, or analysis: it's maths : https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14310575 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14310575 The same gp mentioned that it's also common in "ad copy". That's also true with the famous Navy's "It's not just a job. It's an adventure.". E.g. 1981 tv commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tc9g2tagYms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tc9g2tagYms That's a slogan people heard rather than read with an em dash. LLM engines picked up on a common phrasing used for decades.

NewsaHackO 10mo ago
I understand that there are multiple people in this conversation, but you are attempting to pick and choose points to discuss at the expense of your own internal consistency. If you were responding to "which would be a speech pattern people hear," why did you only quote written examples from the HN search and not provide video or audio clips?
- jasode 10mo ago
  >why did you only quote written examples from the HN search and not provide video or audio clips? At the risk of stating the obvious, highlighting the HN _texts_ demonstrates in a very literal way the "write like" fragment in gp's question, "You write like a late night kitchen gizmo ad?. The other fragment was the "late night kitchen gizmo ad" which is the audio comparison. The gp was making that comparison between the writing style and the speech style when asking the question. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165248 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165248) Providing audio links would not show the "writes like". The gp (and you) already know what the "It isn't/It's" audio pattern sounds like. It's the written text the gp was wondering about. The point is people really did write text like that (no em dashes required) before ChatGPT existed. EDIT reply to: >He just said that it is traditionally associated with late-night ads, and that the explosion in use of the phrase (especially with the em-dash) Actually, the gp (0_____0) I was responding to didn't mention the em dash in either of the 2 comments. Gp used a comma instead of em dash. Gp only mentioned the comparison to ad copy. The em dash wasn't relevant in the subthread we're in. That's something extra you brought up that's not related to gp's specific question. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165237 EDIT reply to: >Quick HN tip: It is usually better to reply to a post instead of editing the original post. I agree but the "reply" option was not available. This is a "cool down" mechanism HN uses to discourage flame wars. I don't know if it's 30 minutes or what the value is before the reply link shows up. It was just easier to reply in my post rather than wait an indeterminate time. >This statement is incorrect, as the original post mentioned, "'it's not just x — it's y' format is the hallmark Yes but that's not the ggp (ceroxylon) I was responding to. Instead, I was responding t gp (0_____0)'s question and the 2 times the writing was compared to ad copy with no mention of em dashes. Sorry for not making that clear. >Showing fewer than a dozen uses of the phrase Again, there are thousands of examples but the Algolia search engine will not show all of them.
  - NewsaHackO 10mo ago
    >The point is people really did write text like that (no em dashes required) before ChatGPT existed. OK, I think I can see your point, but at best it is irrelevant. At no point did the original poster imply that ChatGPT created the phrase, or that it wasn’t in spoken or written language before then. He just said that it is traditionally associated with late-night ads, and that the explosion in use of the phrase (especially with the em-dash) is most likely attributed to increased LLM use.

by jasode 10mo ago

NewsaHackO 10mo ago

I understand that there are multiple people in this conversation, but you are attempting to pick and choose points to discuss at the expense of your own internal consistency. If you were responding to "which would be a speech pattern people hear," why did you only quote written examples from the HN search and not provide video or audio clips?

jasode 10mo ago
>why did you only quote written examples from the HN search and not provide video or audio clips? At the risk of stating the obvious, highlighting the HN _texts_ demonstrates in a very literal way the "write like" fragment in gp's question, "You write like a late night kitchen gizmo ad?. The other fragment was the "late night kitchen gizmo ad" which is the audio comparison. The gp was making that comparison between the writing style and the speech style when asking the question. (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165248 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165248) Providing audio links would not show the "writes like". The gp (and you) already know what the "It isn't/It's" audio pattern sounds like. It's the written text the gp was wondering about. The point is people really did write text like that (no em dashes required) before ChatGPT existed. EDIT reply to: >He just said that it is traditionally associated with late-night ads, and that the explosion in use of the phrase (especially with the em-dash) Actually, the gp (0_____0) I was responding to didn't mention the em dash in either of the 2 comments. Gp used a comma instead of em dash. Gp only mentioned the comparison to ad copy. The em dash wasn't relevant in the subthread we're in. That's something extra you brought up that's not related to gp's specific question. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165237 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46165237 EDIT reply to: >Quick HN tip: It is usually better to reply to a post instead of editing the original post. I agree but the "reply" option was not available. This is a "cool down" mechanism HN uses to discourage flame wars. I don't know if it's 30 minutes or what the value is before the reply link shows up. It was just easier to reply in my post rather than wait an indeterminate time. >This statement is incorrect, as the original post mentioned, "'it's not just x — it's y' format is the hallmark Yes but that's not the ggp (ceroxylon) I was responding to. Instead, I was responding t gp (0_____0)'s question and the 2 times the writing was compared to ad copy with no mention of em dashes. Sorry for not making that clear. >Showing fewer than a dozen uses of the phrase Again, there are thousands of examples but the Algolia search engine will not show all of them.
- NewsaHackO 10mo ago
  >The point is people really did write text like that (no em dashes required) before ChatGPT existed. OK, I think I can see your point, but at best it is irrelevant. At no point did the original poster imply that ChatGPT created the phrase, or that it wasn’t in spoken or written language before then. He just said that it is traditionally associated with late-night ads, and that the explosion in use of the phrase (especially with the em-dash) is most likely attributed to increased LLM use.