[mezentius]

"This absolute horror scenario is what happened to writer Michael Berben (not his real name)."

Absolutely didn't happen. You might occasionally credit a story in the NYT or WSJ using an anonymous source—but when one appears in a blog by a "serial entrepreneur active in the content industry," flogging a subscription product aimed at exactly the sort of marginally-employed writer targeted by the story, I would expect the average HN user to be slightly more critical of the claim.

[hotnfresh]

I feel the same. I'm not sure there are many organizations out there applying AI detectors to writers they've had an existing, extensive relationship with, and then also giving a fuck if it pops up as a hit but they have no other complaints about the writing.

My wife's fairly connected to the writing world and I've not heard of this being a thing at all. Doesn't mean it's not anywhere, but if it were widespread I think I'd have heard of it. Most companies are trying to push more use of AI tools in writing, as far as I can tell, and I don't even have insight into content-farm parts of the market, where I assume it's just all AI all the time now.

[ghaff]

My experience is that I have to write some things that often have parts that are, for lack of a better word, somewhat boilerplate, e.g. preamble/background/explain some technical term I used/etc. Necessary but not core technical or otherwise differentiated content.

I've used LLMs for this as a sort of first draft. I edit the output but it's a perfectly serviceable way to get some words down and save me an hour or two.

[spondylosaurus]

In the realm of technical documentation, too, originality isn't a virtue in itself. (And I say this as a technical writer who doesn't even use LLMs regularly.)

If you needed to throw in a sentence or two ahout, e.g., what load balancing is, you're better off lifting a definition from an authoritative source than trying to come up with a "creative" rephrasing for its own sake. Standard terminology is standard because it works.

[wwtdtgotiatl]

Funny because I've been hearing this almost fortnightly on reddit and freelance forums for a few months now.

And the big middleman platforms siding with the client.

Some people prefer their anonymity, especially when they are put into the public sphere over disputes which can cost them future work. Notice the client wasn't named either.

[advisedwang]

The story is pretty plausible though. I hear students being forced to rewrite genuine original work because of plagiarism detectors, and what happens in schools eventually happens in the workforce.

[raincole]

It would be top irony if this story were AI generated.

[caesil]

"AI text detectors" are complete and utter bullshit rife with egregious false positives, so if they are actually used to cut ties with any writer based on such allegations, there is a near-certain chance that many or most such writers are actually innocent.

This might be a bias-confirming fake anecdote, for sure. But the effect is real.