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1. DamnIn+IK[view] [source] 2023-12-27 18:22:04
>>ssgodd+(OP)
I have deeply mixed feelings about the way LLMs slurp up copyrighted content and regurgitate it as something "new." As a software developer who has dabbled in machine learning, it is exciting to see the field progress. But I am also an author with a large catalog of writings, and my work has been captured by at least one LLM (according to a tool that can allegedly detect these things).

Overall, current LLMs remind me of those bottom-feeder websites that do no original research--those sites that just find an article they like, lazily rewrite it, introduce a few errors, then maybe paste some baloney "sources" (which always seems to disinclude the actual original source). That mode of operation tends to be technically legal, but it's parasitic and lazy and doesn't add much value to the world.

All that aside, I tend to agree with the hypothesis that LLMs are a fad that will mostly pass. For professionals, it is really hard to get past hallucinations and the lack of citations. Imagine being a perpetual fact-checker for a very unreliable author. And laymen will probably mostly use LLMs to generate low-effort content for SEO, which will inevitably degrade the quality of the same LLMs as they breed with their own offspring. "Regression to mediocrity," as Galton put it.

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2. buckyf+hR[view] [source] 2023-12-27 18:57:49
>>DamnIn+IK
I don’t view LLMs as a fad. It’s like drummers and drum machines. Machines and drummers co-exist really well. I think drum machines, among other things, made drummers better.
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3. tremon+nX[view] [source] 2023-12-27 19:34:14
>>buckyf+hR
It mainly made mediocre drummers sound better to the untrained ear.
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4. buckyf+NT3[view] [source] 2023-12-28 18:44:12
>>tremon+nX
It allowed people to see the difference between drum machines and humans. Drummers could practice to sound more like the ‘perfect’ machines, but more importantly the best drummers learned how to differentiate themselves from machines. The best drummers actually became more human. Listen and look at Nate Smith - this guy plays with timing and feel and audience reactions in ways that machines cannot. Sometimes tools let humans expand their creativity in ways previously unheard of. Just like the LLMs are doing right now.
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