• @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    54 months ago

    Just in my own understanding of life. There are these political think tanks. They are staffed by your old professors professors professor. These guys make big bucks to sit around and do this stuff then figure out attack points. I really think they had this research probably 20 years ago. I figure that’s what the guys do all day. Eventually the results end up in the firm that handles Steven Crowder, Ben Shapiro, that guy living in the Philippines.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    124 months ago

    I’m glad both the mod team and reddit itself are pursuing legal action and formal complaints, this was scummy when Facebook did it, it still is when researchers do it.

  • Sixty
    link
    fedilink
    English
    59
    edit-2
    4 months ago

    Worthless research.

    That subreddit bans you for accusing others of speaking in bad faith or for using ChatGPT.

    Even if a user called it out, they’d be censored.

    Edit: you know what, it’s unlikely they didn’t read the side bar. So, worse than worthless. Bad faith disinfo.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      English
      284 months ago

      accusing others of speaking in bad faith

      You’re not allowed to talk about bad faith in a debate forum? I don’t understand. How could that do anything besides shield the sealions, JAQoffs, and grifters?

      And please don’t tell me it’s about “civility”. Bad faith is the civil accusation when the alternative is your debate partner is a fool.

      • Sixty
        link
        fedilink
        English
        21
        edit-2
        4 months ago

        I won’t tell you.about civiity because

        How could that do anything besides shield the sealions, JAQoffs, and grifters?

        Not shield, but amplify.

        That’s the point of the subreddit. I’m not defending them if that’s at all how I came across.

        ChatGPT debate threads are plaguing /r/debateanatheist too. Mods are silent on the users asking to ban this disgusting behavior.

        I didn’t think it’d be a problem so quickly, but the chuds and theists latched onto ChatGPT instantly for use in debate forums.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          9
          edit-2
          4 months ago

          To be fair for a gish gallop style of bad faith argument the way religious people like to use LLMs are probably a good match. If all you want is a high number of arguments it is probably easy to produce those with an LLM. Not to mention that most of their arguments have been repeated countless times anyway so the training data probably has them in large numbers. It is not as if they ever cared if their arguments were any good anyway.

          • Sixty
            link
            fedilink
            English
            44 months ago

            I agree and recognized that. I’m more emotionally upset about it tbh. The debates aren’t for the debaters, it’s to hopefully disillusion and remove indoctrinated fears from those on the fence willing to read them. It’s oft repeated there when people ask “what’s the point, same stupid debate for centuries.” Well religions unfortunately persist, and haven’t lost any ground globally. Gained, actually. Not our fault they have no new ideas.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        14 months ago

        Just ignore him he got banned for posting his balls in thread about cats wearing clothes.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        154 months ago

        I don’t think lemmy is big enough to be “next”, but this is still a valid concern.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          44 months ago

          Why not? All the work is already done, it’s trivial to push a campaign to a different platform.

      • 𝚝𝚛𝚔
        link
        fedilink
        English
        24 months ago

        Fair point about AI-generated comments. What’s your take on how this affects online discussions? Are we losing genuine interactions or gaining new insights?

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          44 months ago

          On political topics it is very likely that we just gain a few hundred more repetitions of the same arguments that were already going in circles before.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          54 months ago

          Adding more noise does nothing to add insights it just makes it more exhausting to pick a position yourself.

          If everything is nuanced then you can more easily give up on caring in a meaningful way because you believe there is no good answer.

      • ProdigalFrog
        link
        fedilink
        English
        74 months ago

        At least here we have Fediseer to vet instances, and the ability to vet each sign-ups.

        I think eventually when we’re more targeted, we’ll have to circle the wagons so to speak, and only limit communications to more carefully moderated instances that root out the bots.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    1
    edit-2
    4 months ago

    How exactly would they deploy this if they’re losing money on chatgpt responding to users saying “thank you”?

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    64 months ago

    This is the final straw. I deleted my Reddit account.

    From the article: Chief Legal Officer Ben Lee responded to the controversy on Monday, writing that the researchers’ actions were “deeply wrong on both a moral and legal level” and a violation of Reddit’s site-wide rules.

    I don’t believe for one moment Reddit admins didn’t know this was going on especially since it involved mining user data to feed AI. Since when does Reddit have a moral compass? Their compass always points north to maximum shareholder value which right now is looking like anything to do with AI.

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    24 months ago

    Wow, this is pretty concerning. As someone who spends a lot of time on Reddit, I find it really unsettling that researchers would experiment on users without their knowledge. It’s like walking into a coffee shop for a casual chat and unknowingly becoming part of a psychology experiment!

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    134 months ago

    /r/askus was FUCKING OBVIOUS

    Conservatives of Reddit: “Dumbass question no one will truthfully answer.”

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    254 months ago

    CMV: this was a good research akin to something like white hat hackers where the point is to find and expose security exploits. What this research did is point out how easy it is to manipulate people in a “debate” forum that doesn’t allow people from pointing out bad behavior. If this is being done by researchers and publishing it. It’s also being done be nefarious actors that will not disclose it.

  • Dr. Bob
    link
    fedilink
    English
    12
    edit-2
    4 months ago

    With all the bots on the site why complain about these ones?

    Edit: auto$#&"$correct

  • @[email protected]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    74 months ago

    Good i spent at least the last 3 years on reddit making asinine comments, phrases, and punctuation to throw off any AI botS