F2F #92: Thank you, AI slop

I don't know if you also have experienced this: my eyes and brain are immediately detecting AI slop and rejecting it altogether. Maybe it's intuition, maybe it's visual pattern recognition, but the moment I see slop, I flag it instantly and something deep inside of me does not want to see it.

We have been reading AI-generated content for ages, a lot of it before we even labelled it as AI-generated (for instance, Google Translate output), so our brains have adopted this new flavour of content through different model variations, and even adapted to it.

Two years ago, we made fun at images with people with funny fingers or the nightmare-inducing videos of Will Smith eating spaghetti, but nowadays we're nearing the frontier from which we can't tell real from fake. Most of it, it's still obvious, while a smaller fraction of the AI-generated content it's only visibly fake to the trained eye. Both a blessing and a curse, the latter segment is growing larger every day.

Some brains are better than others at pattern recognition. Some flavours of neurodivergent - or neurospicy if you want to use nowadays current correct word - brains (like mine) are especially good at pattern recognition, and AI-generated content follows very specific, albeit subtle, patterns.

Now, when I open a website and I see not only AI-generated text, but even the HTML & design too, my brain forces me to look away. It's preventing me from reading it to spare me from the brainrot. And before you all tell me "but there's good content that's only using AI to make it look better", I will tell you that I'm fine with the trade-off. I will continue reading every Derek Sivers' blog post because it looks authentic. I will miss out on very cool shit out there, but my brain is telling me that I'm approaching my limits and I risk some sort of AI-induced burnout.

We all have self-defence mechanisms for other aspects in life. My brain has developed this one and I'm fully embracing it. No more being overwhelmed by the sheer amount of content I have yet to consume. I'm done. I'll spend my time elsewhere: working, exercising, spending quality time with my family or playing Pokopia.

Now, I don't fully blame AI for this. Slop has always existed. Low-quality content has always existed. Humans are good at optimising for the least-level of effort that yields an acceptable output and will continue to do so for aeons to come. AI is just a catalyser of this laziness that most people refuse to use it for useful things that empower and embellish our species. While a few bright minds are using it to cure cancer, most people will just use it to write stupid shit on linkedin, generate cringe-worthy fake images and look to score virality on social media.

The slop won't stop. Long live the slop (but far away from me).

PS: I ran this article by Claude to ask it if it was AI-generated and it says that 80% is most likely human-authored but a few tells of AI here and there, and that the other 20% is surely AI-written. I have written it all myself with no AI use, so the accuracy of these tools is still debatable.

PPS: The cover image is AI slop surely? Can you tell? 🤨