Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by metaquestions 21 days ago
how do one tell when text is ai generated - honest question. What are the tell tale signs?
7 comments

Not X, not Y, just Z.

The whole site is very jarring to read.

I have collected some links about AI's writing style and how to recognize it: https://dbohdan.com/ai-writing-style. You can start with https://buildingalone.substack.com/p/your-words.

The most reliable automatic detector right now must be https://www.pangram.com/. If Pangram says something is AI, it is very likely AI. Sometimes it concludes more unusual AI text is human-written; Talkie tricks it! (https://x.com/aliceisplaying/status/2059778915275567129.)

It's the UI design that screams it for me -- i didn't even read anything, the initial page load just screeched "AI design". There are definite cliches in web UI that they always go for. I'd be hard pressed to fully explain it all here but if you take note, you'll see many more sites with the same pattern (like click any of the example apps on the homepage--they have practically identical website design)

Eta: gradients on text, gradients everywhere, monospace badges, cards for everything, emojis everywhere...

Perry and Hone and the dB meter link all have the same homepage with slightly different spin

vibrant colours that don't match

X. Y. SUPER Z. heading

X. Y. SUPER Z. in subheading

excessive purple and gradients

--> arrows

cards, cards, cards, cards

doesn't just X, emdash, it [SUPER Y]

more cards

ridiculous awful contrast in copy that makes things unreadable (grey on black etc)

In regards to the site, all of them follow almost the same templates.

Once you see a few, it becomes obvious

if /comprehensive/ then ai
I use this website, https://tropes.fyi/vetter, it apparently detectes Perry as pure ai slop website.

There is also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Signs_of_AI_writing