this post was submitted on 11 Oct 2024
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Wikipedia has a new initiative called WikiProject AI Cleanup. It is a task force of volunteers currently combing through Wikipedia articles, editing or removing false information that appears to have been posted by people using generative AI.

Ilyas Lebleu, a founding member of the cleanup crew, told 404 Media that the crisis began when Wikipedia editors and users began seeing passages that were unmistakably written by a chatbot of some kind.

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[–] schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business 211 points 18 hours ago (9 children)

Further proof that humanity neither deserves nor is capable of having nice things.

Who would set up an AI bot to shit all over the one remaining useful thing on the Internet, and why?

I'm sure the answer is either 'for the lulz' or 'late-stage capitalism', but still: historically humans aren't usually burning down libraries on purpose.

historically humans aren't usually burning down libraries on purpose.

Sometimes they are, Baghdad springs to mind, I'm sure there are other examples. And this library is online so there's less chance of getting caught with a can of petrol and a box of matches.

Then there's every authoritarian regime that tries to ban or burn specific types of books. What we're seeing here could be more like that - an attempt to muddy the waters or introduce misinformation on certain topics.

[–] Schmoo@slrpnk.net 84 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

historically humans aren't usually burning down libraries on purpose.

How on earth have you come to this conclusion.

[–] sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works 28 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

To be fair, it's usually to effect cultural genocide. It's not average people burning libraries, it's usually some kind of authoritarian regime.

[–] SacralPlexus@lemmy.world 24 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago)

* looks around and gestures broadly in agreement*

[–] poszod@lemmy.world 102 points 17 hours ago

State actors could be interested in doing that. Same with the internet archive attacks.

[–] rsuri@lemmy.world 4 points 10 hours ago (2 children)

Yeah but the other thing about humanity is it's mostly harmless. Edits can be reverted, articles can be locked. Wikipedia will be fine.

[–] kent_eh@lemmy.ca 7 points 5 hours ago

Edits can be reverted, articles can be locked.

Sure, but the vandalism has to be identified first. And thar takes time and effort.

[–] LarmyOfLone@lemm.ee 0 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago)

Wikipedia relies on sources, and humans choosing the sources like newspapers. And those newspapers are more and more inside a "bubble" that rejects any evidence or reporting presented by a competing bubble.

Right now wikipedia is covering up one of the greatest acts of mass murder of our times, because the newspapers are covering it up, or rejecting evidence because it's by the "enemy". Part of this is a defensive posture against AI bots and enemy disinformation.

[–] Wrench@lemmy.world 8 points 14 hours ago

Because basement losers can't conquer and raze libraries to the ground.

The internet has shown that assumed anonymity result in people fucking with other people's lives for the hell of it. Viruses, trolling, etc. This is just the next stage of it because of a new easy to use tool.

[–] OpenStars@discuss.online 15 points 17 hours ago

Florida says hello. A bunch of other places too, sadly:-(.

[–] endofline@lemmy.ca 3 points 16 hours ago

It's not about on purpose but usually most people don't care about what's not in their interest. Today interests are usually quite shallow what tiktok shows quite well. Libraries do require money for operating. Even internet archive and wikipedia

[–] SquiffSquiff@lemmy.world 2 points 15 hours ago
[–] Petter1@lemm.ee 1 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago) (1 children)

Maybe a strange way of activism that is trying to poison new AI models 🤔

Which would not work, since all tech giants have already archived preAI internet

[–] schizo@forum.uncomfortable.business 6 points 14 hours ago (3 children)

Ah, so the AI version of the chewbacca defense.

I have to wonder if intentionally shitting on LLMs with plausible nonsense is effective.

Like, you watch for certain user agents and change what data you actually send the bot vs what a real human might see.

[–] T156@lemmy.world 1 points 6 hours ago

I have to wonder if intentionally shitting on LLMs with plausible nonsense is effective.

I don't think so. The volume of data is too large for it to make much of a difference, and a scraper can just mimic a human user agent and work that way.

You'd have to change so much data consistently across so many different places that it would be near-impossible for a single human effort.

[–] Dragonstaff@leminal.space 1 points 12 hours ago

I suspect it would be difficult to generate enough data to intentionally change a dataset. There are certainly little holes, like the glue pizza thing, but finding and exploiting them would be difficult and noticing you and blocking you as a data source would be easy.

[–] Petter1@lemm.ee 0 points 14 hours ago

I never told that I think it is smart…