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Comment by lacoolj | Hacker News Reader

emdashes everywhere in this article

did we just do full-circle back to an AI writing about AI writing about AI writing ..?

emdashes are probably the least useful method of recognising AI work nowadays.

I'm pretty sure they've actually popularised their usage by everyday people who're now more aware of their existence and usage.

Which people actively refuse to use because of the association with AI work.

Which is more likely, let's Occam's Razor this. That the AI agents are teaching every individual to "write better" or that the AI agents are crapping out the articles with the emdashes.

Some of us resent the assumption that we're AI because we know how to use the language, and use them more often.

What if, in a terrifying scenario, someone adds "don't use emdashes" to their prompt...

Your cast iron detection mechanism will be gone!

An em dash surrounded by spaces on either side tells you it was AI.

AI: This is how we think about these things — because they're important to think about — when we want to accomplish a task.

More likely human: This is how we think about these things—because they're important to think about—when we want to accomplish a task.

Not bulletproof for obvious reasons but it's easy to spot who was at least lazy with AI using this heuristic.

I mean, no. When I em-dash -- or double-hyphen -- I always surround it with spaces; seems wrong not to.

The most telling sign is when they don’t make sense — for example right here.

A human puts em dashes to emphasize the break in thought or rhythm. Where there is already a break in thought or rhythm a human would just write a comma or nothing.

Another tell is what is inside the em dash. It often doesn’t logically follow – like an ad on a radio show.

Spaces around em-dashes are a convention which changes depending on the style guide.

They are but combined with other AI tropes (It's not this. It's that.), it may as well be a fingerprint.

No, this is American style (long dash without spaces—like this) vs. European style (middle dash with spaces – like this).

I don't think it is useful to detect AI writing. I told my AI not to use em dashes.

highly doubt Jason or 404 is out here just telling AI to write a story.

Their style/level of journalism is pretty much the case study with what’s wrong with the internet. It just happens to align with some cohort of HN types. So not sure why 404 would be above using AI. Not saying they are but don’t think it’s a valid defense

> Their style/level of journalism is pretty much the case study with what’s wrong with the internet.

What makes you say that, specifically?

They appear to stand for nothing nor care for anything but the idea that everything to do with technology is terrible—with exception for pop science discovery.

Tried to think of a less harsh way to say this but they are basically a Fox News/Buzz Feed but for anything anti-tech or AI. Cannot say I have read through all of their articles but the ones I have had are light on the data but have a click baity title.

I think you don't know 404 Media very well, or writing styles for that matter.

or it's a journalist's writing in a somewhat-formal publication?

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