[palmotea]

> It's always funny to see people arguing that em-dash use is indicative of LLM usage, yet they don't realize where that training came from in the first place.

The em-dash is indicative of AI usage when it shows up in contexts where it doesn't belong. Like informal context like forum comments and emails (though "smart" substitutions do complicate the picture a bit).

I'd only be funny if they argued it indicated AI usage in context where it does belong, like formal writing.

[JKCalhoun]

Informal contexts are where I get to practice my writing in general. In terms of punctuation, I don't make a distinction. (I just say "bullshit" a lot more in the informal contexts. Durn, I did it again.)

[lamasery]

But the em-dash is a pretty informal mark... I'd tend to re-structure my sentences to avoid it more often in a formal context, than an informal one. It's what you reach for either for a specific effect, or because it's the least-disruptive way to keep writing without having to go back and edit mid-sentence, and end up with something that scans OK. It's super-informal.

[palmotea]

> But the em-dash is a pretty informal mark...

I think you have to make a distinction: there's using a dash as you describe and using the actual em-dash character. Without an smartquotes-type autocorrect-type feature (which admittedly is common in certain apps/platforms like Outlook and Word), an actual em-dash is awkward to type. I'd expect someone using it informally to just use a regular dash (-) or two (--).

I think you're automatically in a pretty formal writing context if you care if you use an em-dash character or not.

Which brings up an interesting idea: would Microsoft turn off it's smartquotes-type autocorrect, because now it makes you look like a dumb AI-user? Probably, if they cared about their users. But I doubt they will because they're so into hyping AI that "Microslop" is a thing.

[lamasery]

It's easy to type, and even easy to discover, on the default Mac keyboard layout. Until recently, the main thing employment of the actual M-dash in web posts indicated was that the user was more likely than not typing their posts on a Mac—not for-sure, but better than even odds, despite Macs having a much smaller share than half the market.

[ranger_danger]

> when it shows up in contexts where it doesn't belong

I have known people that personally used em-dashes in all the wrong places way before AI... entire emails would just be paragraphs-long run-on sentences filled with dashes.