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by rsynnott 1075 days ago
> I find ChatGPT creates overly verbose corporate gobbledygook whenever I ask it to generate text

I feel like this doesn't get enough attention; its writing style is _incredibly_ grating. It's not just corporate gobbledygook; it's a parody of corporate gobbledygook. Just awful.
2 comments
spideymans 1075 days ago
If you ask ChatGPT an exceedingly trivial question, it’ll typically spend the next 60 seconds spewing out five paragraphs of corporate gobbledygook. And of course, because ChatGPT will lie to you, I often end up back on Google anyways to validate it’s claims.

Meanwhile, I could’ve found conclusive and correct answers directly from Google in about 10 seconds (I’m a fast Googler).

There are exceedingly few situations where I find ChatGPT is worth the effort. At least for factual Q&A-style queries like this.

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ragequitta 1074 days ago
I think the pull for most of us who use chatgpt is that google lies far, far more often than chatgpt ever will. Or is just otherwise inconclusive / does not give the relevant information you're looking for. The amount of SEO clickbait or quora/stack overflow answers that are either just incorrect or highly opinionated makes google very difficult to use for many things. As someone new to/learning Fedora it gives me the right answer 95% of the time, google gives me the right answer in the top 5 links far less.
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AnimalMuppet 1075 days ago
Very much this. Back in the day, the Cluetrain Manifesto said that corporate writing sounded "literally inhuman" - like it didn't come from a human being. You can't hear the person in it.

ChatGPT reads similarly. There's no personal voice. It's like food with no seasoning; it's just... blah.

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zikzak 1075 days ago
I write fiction for fun (just for me, don't ask) and asked it to generate a plot for an elevator pitch version of my big idea at the time. The plot was literally my plot. This confirmed my suspicions that I am a mediocre, at best, storyteller but it also made me wonder how much of what each person thinks makes them individually smart or talented is just mundane crap no better than this system can produce. Chilling to some, maybe, but confirmed my idea that what I'm doing is just for me to enjoy and that's ok.
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