CNET "quietly publishing" AI-generated news articles

Originally published at: CNET "quietly publishing" AI-generated news articles | Boing Boing

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First, the machine came for the coders, the very people who designed it. And only a few complained.
Then, the machine came for artists. And despite the hue and cry, a blind eye was turned on their plight.
Now, the machine is coming for the writers; what will be done about that?

And who will the machine target next?

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Editor, “Cheap, fast and dependable; what’s to dislike?”

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once we allowed the advertisers to re-label all non-ad real estate on webpages, podcast, tv shows, etc… as “content,” treating it as mildly useful but interchangeable negative space, this was inevitable…

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My favourite writer is Lorem Ipsum.

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I quoted him this morning!

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Can we all just remember the better times when our world was enriched and humanized by bespoke, artisanal, viral listicles made with the authentic human touch of an expendable subcontractor deep in the content mills working to immiserating quotas?

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For that extra dash of insult the advertising scum appropriated the term ‘creative’ for their noxious product and dismissed everything else as mere ‘content’.

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People still read CNET?

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The editors?

This article was assisted by an AI engine and reviewed, fact-checked and edited by our editorial staff AI.

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When AI text generation is paired with AI fact checking, that will be something.

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Relevant:

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So, when all this AI generated content (books, voices, art, auto-driving, thinking, problem solving) comes online in our brave new world, would that usher in this fabled age of leisure for us humans that progress has promised or are we just shuttled below ground oiling the machines?

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Maybe the next big dystopia is not an apocalyptic disaster of zombies, nukes, climate crisis, or aliens. Maybe it’s humans outliving their originality and creativity, and the earth is non-human utopia of AIs creating literature, art, architecture, music… for an audience of other smart AIs that crunch and combine and learn and create new derivative forms.

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They poisoned our asses

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reviewed, fact-checked and edited by our editorial staff.

I never thought I’d look back with nostalgia on the days when soon-to-be-terminated workers were forced to spend their last two weeks training their poorly paid outsourced replacements. Now they’re being made to check and refine the work of machines before they’re inevitably let go. But here we are.

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The robots can have my job, I am too old and busted to keep putting all these pipes together.

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“This article was assisted by an AI engine and reviewed, fact-checked and edited by our editorial staff.”

By the editorial staff? So they say.

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In my second year with my first “real” employer management asked me to get with a soon-to-be-forcibly-retired greybeard structural engineer in our department and learn as much as I could about his particular role and projects therein even though I was (and still am) a fluids guy. I hate structures. I love fluids. So be it, I got with him but was instantly met with, in effect, this: “I’m sorry… but I hate these people, so I really can’t help you. It’s nothing personal.” Notwithstanding the lurch he left me in, I couldn’t really blame him since he was being treated rather shabbily, so he made the only “statement” safely available to him (given his age and 40+ years with the company and bennies retained). I’ll make a big assumption here that those CNET employees are not likely to have the same ability to deliver a similar “fuck you” to their employer, although --depending on their skills – may be of a mind to plant a little this or that in the system that’ll make an appearance after references have been secured and they are out and working elsewhere. More power to shabbily treated employees.

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So charming, the byline they gave it. CNET Money? Referring to the money labour typically demands in exchange for labour I expect.

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