Comment by lich_king
1 day ago
I don't think that "it's more of the same" is a good way to think about it. The internet contained a lot of low-quality content, but even low-quality content used to be fairly expensive and time-consuming to produce. Further, you could immediately discern bottom-of-the-barrel content-farmed nonsense by the writing style alone. Now, LLMs make it practically free to generate unlimited amounts of slop that drowns out human-written stuff, and they can imitate the style hints we used to depend on for quick screening.
Yet how are the alternative ways of thinking about it better? Spending your time angry about what others can do? In any era, that’s a poor life philosophy.
The problem is the same as it has always been. Figure out how to use your time and attention effectively,
A sufficient number of people being angry about something is how you end up with social norms. These norms will shape how the technology is used.
Conversely, if your take is that there's no point being angry and we should just take it in stride, that just emboldens the producers of slop.
You're reading too much into my words if you think I'm suggesting we should take it in stride.
I think we should accept that trying to enforce social norms is a waste of time as that will only work on the politest part of the internet. Instead, focus on what you can control: better mechanisms for managing your attention and time.
Is it possible to be critical without being angry? Are the only options here misplaced ire or total queiescent fatalism? Does the site here even seem excessively angry?
Strategic, directed anger is an important component of using your time effectively. It sends a clear signal that certain kinds of behavior are unacceptable and people who'd like continued access to your time had best not engage in them. You shouldn't go around yelling at people every time you get a bit frustrated, but you should and I do express anger when someone signs their name to LLM-generated Slack responses.