4 ms·

"free book" "no paywall and nothing to buy." Might this not actually be a reasonable purpose for AI? I can tolerate the quirky style and AI signatures for some

by eth0up 3mo ago

"free book" "no paywall and nothing to buy." Might this not actually be a reasonable purpose for AI? I can tolerate the quirky style and AI signatures for something honest and free.

rwmj 3mo ago
But prompting an AI adds nothing. Journalism is about research, interviewing the people involved, finding new facts, and then presenting that to your audience in a way they can understand. Getting an AI to write about something is just diluting the signal for future researchers.
- jersmtpd 3mo ago
  You can have an AI help write it while still having done research yourself, they're not mutually exclusive. I'm not claiming whether he actually did that or not. Like, for me personally, I'm terrible at writing, so I'll gladly have some AI throw together a draft, which I then verify and edit.
  - eth0up 3mo ago
    exactly. If I am writing a free book with solid information, well, I am not writing it, because I am not writing free books -- I don't have time. But if AI can arrange my data, thoughts, perspective, and articulate it effectively, then I will let AI write the free book. If the book contains new, or previously unarticulated data and insight, then why not? But I see the very thought is hotly contested here.
bandrami 3mo ago
Why not just post the prompt you used? I have access to LLMs too.
- eth0up 3mo ago
  I have over 6gb of material resulting from interactions with AI. Even a micro-essay of mediocre quality requires dozens of prompts. Why post dozens and dozens of prompts if the final product is cleaner, and easier to process? I see utterly zero reason. Edit: One of the things I learned quickly while working with LLMs, is that the quality of the user, the input, determines the quality of the output. Not everyone's input is of equal quality.
- rpdillon 3mo ago
  You think if he gave you the "prompt" you'd be able to produce that book? Heck, I should put money on this. Start a competition: I give folks a prompt, and tell them to write a book about a subject with AI. I'm the sole judge of quality. Winner gets $2000. Then let's examine the variance in the entries. In short: using AI is a skill. It's silly to pretend otherwise.
  - eth0up 3mo ago
    Are you the only reasonable person on HN today? Others are framing this author as some official journalist who must be held to rigorous standards and has violated every rule of the trade, with wanton contempt. The author has failed to produce new data. The author is bad. This seems deranged and extraordinarily unfair. The front page explicitly states the book is for general readers and is non-technical. I do not see anything claiming official original research or boasting academic credentials. No ads. Free. No download registration. Just there. The result of work, tokens, time -- didn't 'just happen'. The Gladwell-style of conceptual-synthesis is the foundation for half the popular-science books in the world, and the bedrock for the majority of general-reader material out there. And this book happens to have a truly fascinating and extremely relevant and rich theme at its core, sufficiently rich that any motivated idiot could churn out half-decent content with. Yet it gets flagged, insulted and framed as abuse of AI, a tool specifically designed as a force multiplier and tool. Damned if you do, damned if you don't, and how dare anyone generate something of value with it. I sincerely find this all highly suspicious. The only explanation is hypersensitive AI allergy in a highly unstable immune system, or the topic itself is making some nervous and, ironically, insecure... I could totally understand disagreement, and complaining. But a comment that simply states acceptance of the book as possibly of value, being flagged? Who not hiding something trounces on a friendly comment to flag it? It's gray already, but that's not dead enough? Kill it til it's dead!? I say this because on a completely different post, I mentioned Jia Tan and several of the very concepts highlighted in this book, and I was flagged for it. I have said some stupid shit around here and not been flagged. But this subject really seems to bring out seriously inspired opponents. One would think, gee wiz, security, potentially many lives or billions of dollars or FOSS at stake -- there's no such thing as too much security, by all means, obsess on it, stay focused and talk about it, there are real world dangers here. But no. Something seems fishy. Anyway, glad someone had the courage to question the outrage. And I will promptly warn my author friends of the coming witch-hunt and to be very quiet about the tools they're using.

by eth0up 3mo ago

"free book" "no paywall and nothing to buy." Might this not actually be a reasonable purpose for AI? I can tolerate the quirky style and AI signatures for something honest and free.

rwmj 3mo ago

But prompting an AI adds nothing. Journalism is about research, interviewing the people involved, finding new facts, and then presenting that to your audience in a way they can understand. Getting an AI to write about something is just diluting the signal for future researchers.

jersmtpd 3mo ago
You can have an AI help write it while still having done research yourself, they're not mutually exclusive. I'm not claiming whether he actually did that or not. Like, for me personally, I'm terrible at writing, so I'll gladly have some AI throw together a draft, which I then verify and edit.
- eth0up 3mo ago
  exactly. If I am writing a free book with solid information, well, I am not writing it, because I am not writing free books -- I don't have time. But if AI can arrange my data, thoughts, perspective, and articulate it effectively, then I will let AI write the free book. If the book contains new, or previously unarticulated data and insight, then why not? But I see the very thought is hotly contested here.

bandrami 3mo ago

Why not just post the prompt you used? I have access to LLMs too.

eth0up 3mo ago
I have over 6gb of material resulting from interactions with AI. Even a micro-essay of mediocre quality requires dozens of prompts. Why post dozens and dozens of prompts if the final product is cleaner, and easier to process? I see utterly zero reason. Edit: One of the things I learned quickly while working with LLMs, is that the quality of the user, the input, determines the quality of the output. Not everyone's input is of equal quality.
rpdillon 3mo ago
You think if he gave you the "prompt" you'd be able to produce that book? Heck, I should put money on this. Start a competition: I give folks a prompt, and tell them to write a book about a subject with AI. I'm the sole judge of quality. Winner gets $2000. Then let's examine the variance in the entries. In short: using AI is a skill. It's silly to pretend otherwise.
- eth0up 3mo ago
  Are you the only reasonable person on HN today? Others are framing this author as some official journalist who must be held to rigorous standards and has violated every rule of the trade, with wanton contempt. The author has failed to produce new data. The author is bad. This seems deranged and extraordinarily unfair. The front page explicitly states the book is for general readers and is non-technical. I do not see anything claiming official original research or boasting academic credentials. No ads. Free. No download registration. Just there. The result of work, tokens, time -- didn't 'just happen'. The Gladwell-style of conceptual-synthesis is the foundation for half the popular-science books in the world, and the bedrock for the majority of general-reader material out there. And this book happens to have a truly fascinating and extremely relevant and rich theme at its core, sufficiently rich that any motivated idiot could churn out half-decent content with. Yet it gets flagged, insulted and framed as abuse of AI, a tool specifically designed as a force multiplier and tool. Damned if you do, damned if you don't, and how dare anyone generate something of value with it. I sincerely find this all highly suspicious. The only explanation is hypersensitive AI allergy in a highly unstable immune system, or the topic itself is making some nervous and, ironically, insecure... I could totally understand disagreement, and complaining. But a comment that simply states acceptance of the book as possibly of value, being flagged? Who not hiding something trounces on a friendly comment to flag it? It's gray already, but that's not dead enough? Kill it til it's dead!? I say this because on a completely different post, I mentioned Jia Tan and several of the very concepts highlighted in this book, and I was flagged for it. I have said some stupid shit around here and not been flagged. But this subject really seems to bring out seriously inspired opponents. One would think, gee wiz, security, potentially many lives or billions of dollars or FOSS at stake -- there's no such thing as too much security, by all means, obsess on it, stay focused and talk about it, there are real world dangers here. But no. Something seems fishy. Anyway, glad someone had the courage to question the outrage. And I will promptly warn my author friends of the coming witch-hunt and to be very quiet about the tools they're using.