[bonsai_spool]

There are multiple signs of LLM-speak:

> Over the past year, we’ve seen a shift in what Deno Deploy customers are building: platforms where users generate code with LLMs and that code runs immediately without review

This isn't a canonical use of a colon (and the dependent clause isn't even grammatical)!

> This isn’t the traditional “run untrusted plugins” problem. It’s deeper: LLM-generated code, calling external APIs with real credentials, without human review.

Another colon-offset dependent paired with the classic, "This isn't X. It's Y," that we've all grown to recognize.

> Sandboxing the compute isn’t enough. You need to control network egress and protect secrets from exfiltration.

More of the latter—this sort of thing was quite rare outside of a specific rhetorical goal of getting your reader excited about what's to come. LLMs (mis)use it everywhere.

> Deno Sandbox provides both. And when the code is ready, you can deploy it directly to Deno Deploy without rebuilding.

Good writers vary sentence length, but it's also a rhetorical strategy that LLMs use indiscriminately with no dramatic goal or tension to relieve.

'And' at the beginning of sentences is another LLM-tell.

[jonny_eh]

> It’s deeper: LLM-generated code, calling external APIs with real credentials, without human review.

This also follows the rule of 3s, which LLMs love, there ya go.

[johnfn]

Yeah, I feel like this is really the smoking gun. Because it's not actually deeper? An LLM running untrusted code is not some additional level of security violation above a plugin running untrusted code. I feel like the most annoying part of "It's not X, it's Y" is that agents often say "It's not X, it's (slightly rephrased X)", lol, but it takes like 30 seconds to work that out.

[jonny_eh]

It's not just different way of saying something, it's a whole new way to express an idea.

[r00f]

Can it be that after reading so many LLM texts we will just subconciously follow the style, because that's what we are used to? No idea how this works for native English speakers, but I know that I lack my own writing style and it is just a pseudo-llm mix of Reddit/irc/technical documentation, as those were the places where I learned written English

[bonsai_spool]

Yes, I think you're right—I have a hard time imagining how we avoid such an outcome. If it matters to you, my suggestion is to read as widely as you're able to. That way you can at least recognize which constructions are more/less associated with an LLM.

When I was first working toward this, I found the LA Review of Books and the London Review of Books to be helpful examples of longform, erudite writing. (edit - also recommend the old standards of The New Yorker and The Atlantic; I just wanted to highlight options with free articles).

I also recommend reading George Orwell's essay Politics and the English Language.

[nananana9]

Given that a lot of us actively try to avoid this style, and immediately disregard text that uses it as not worth reading (a very useful heuristic given the vast amount of LLM-generated garbage), I don't think that would make us more prone to write in this manner. In fact I've actively caught myself editing text I've written to avoid certain LLMisms.

[tadfisher]

It's unfortunate that, given the entire corpus of human writing, LLMs have seemingly been fine-tuned to reproduce terrible ad copy from old editions of National Geographic.

(Yes, I split the infinitive there, but I hate that rule.)

[twoodfin]

Great list. Another tell is pervasive use of second-person perspective: “We’ve all been there.” “Now you have what you need.”

As you say, this is cargo cult rhetorical style. No purpose other than to look purposeful.