[refulgentis]

It's against the rules as of 2 weeks ago, in the short term, you're more likely to get downvoted for complaining than see less of it.

And it's astounding. Because this is awful writing.

Author, one year ago: "you replied to an LLM generated comment. if you look at the posting history you can confirm it"

Now they can't be bothered to take an edit pass on the most rote slop.

[sixhobbits]

Technically it's against the rules to use AI for comments. I don't think you have to be 100% sure that AI wasn't used for a submission before submitting or upvoting

[wwweston]

> Because this is awful writing.

Can you describe what you think is awful (beyond rhetorical choices that have become LLM markers)?

[refulgentis]

TL;DR: 2400 words ~= 18 minutes reading time for "stickers on boxes" (which I am v interested in!) x entry-level LLM markers = worst of both worlds. You're throwing a lot at the reader & it's nakedly obvious some of its computer-generated spam, and they can't tell what they can skim until its too late. I 100% empathize because I've done this too, generally, needs more time with the LLM and also metrics you're shooting for.

I'm assuming you're the original author: the problem is the LLM markers.

But its bigger than you're thinking, I think, otherwise you wouldn't have done what you did.

No matter the discipline, painting, code, etc., people appreciate things that are unique and require unique effort.

You can see this over and over again in art history, and the products / code we appreciate are things share that property.

LLMs are great tools, you should use them. Problem was when it turned into (I'm guessing, because this is what I do) "I wrote too much...god I hate my writing...LLM, do your magic...LGTM! So much shorter and cleaner!"

The failure mode I'm seeing with people posting obvious slop who otherwise wouldn't want to is, the editing makes things shorter but it also tends to make everything repetitive, both locally and across across the essay.

Locally, to the person operating the LLM, it looks like "its so much more approachable!", to a reader, it reads as "the author things I am very dumb and takes 3 sentences to saying something that was 4 words"

Please don't take it personally, btw. We're between a rock & a hard place right now and it's important to tease things like this out over time. I'd rather have an extended dialogue about it, but...in practice, people absorb microsignals about what's appropriate over time. Better to say "It's awful writing" then write an extended essay empathizing via guessing what was in your head and what you actually did.

I enjoyed the essay and it's an interesting idea and right up my alley. It's just a pitch perfect example of something going bad, "I had problem X, it was solved via boxes and stickers" has to be 600 words, tops. And you probably sensed that when you were done, I'm assuming. Just needed to go farther rather than lean into sense of relief.

[wwweston]

Thanks. Not the author (the person who's participated elsewhere in thread with an account of the same name as the site probably is).

But I appreciate the elaboration. I don't generally use LLMs for writing, but I'm interested in what people perceive as good and the gap between that LLM output among other things. I actually liked this piece, and could outline some things that I thought were effective about it as is, but being curious about what other people dislike seemed more likely to be educational.

I especially appreciate the criticism of repetition in this piece and LLM output in general. That's a great one to think about because repetition has a place in rhetoric, especially with some audiences, but probably less so with other audiences (perhaps especially an engineering minded audience). And for any audience there will be a point of diminishing returns. All things LLMs may be poorly positioned to dial in.

> Better to say "It's awful writing" then write an extended essay empathizing via guessing what was in your head and what you actually did.

But you did! Thank you. And FWIW the extended criticism that you eventually provided including attempting to guess at the author's perspective boosts signal for me. When someone does that, it gives me particulars to learn from and makes it seem less likely they're just cranky or grinding an unknown axe. Though of course no one has time for essay responses all the time (and the pay usually isn't great).