AI Allegations Thread

[ElectricBlue]

That's what I did. The first two parts of mine were taken down - the third has had four rejections and then the pending time reset this morning. I had the second part taken down when the third was first rejected but it was put back up after only one attempt. The fact it's been taken down again, along with the first part and in one hit, was the worst thing. My anxiety went through the roof, but I've slipped into a lovely feeling of nothingness so there's that

The pending reset thing is odd. I've not heard of of that before.

Hopefully it means it is being looked at by a human being, and something will eventually flush through the system. Cross fingers, and do something else for a little while .

 

[EmilyMiller]

Oh no, I'm done. I absolutely appreciate your empathy about that. I definitely was not calm seeing that happen in realtime. Portly_Penguin saw it happen to theirs too, and when we dared to talk about what was going on, someone who claims to be on a first-name basis with Laurel claimed that Portly_Penguin is an alt account of mine. I know I should not have taken the bait, but I've already been accused of enough. (And there is no way Portly_Penguin could be me; they are far too nice and levelheaded! ) But we saw this simultaneously happen, after we spoke out in the thread I created (and by god, I wish I'd never created this thread, because I DID NOT want anyone else to penalized for speaking out there). But you can read back over the posts while they were happening. You don't find the timing REALLY weird? I mean, if not, okay. But I find it REALLY weird.

Don’t get me started on allegations about alts!

Em

 

[Stimtheone]

Interesting thread. I have little to offer since none of my stories were rejected at all. And that is despite my writing being AI-assisted (read: I use Grammarly, which is AI-powered, but it's mostly to spell check or fix grammar. And yet I still ignore it two thirds of the time). Then again, that's assisted and not fully generated. But neither do I have much to say on the subject. My experience with generative AI for writing has filled me with confidence as AI is unable to even come close to the quality of a decent human being. Yeah, might be tempting to fill these spots where I have no damned idea what to say, but the slope be slippery.

 

[EmilyMiller]

You have behaved like a polite and civil penguin throughout all this. You have done everything you were supposed to. I have no idea why your stories were pulled at the same time mine were. I hope I can be forgiven for being suspicious. Especially when someone who claims to know the owner on a first-name basis chimes in right as our stories are being pulled and accuses you of being my alt account and then says I should take up the challenge not to write like Chat GPT. It felt punitive, and some long-time writers here piling on at that moment absolutely inflamed the situation.

If I can say one thing, Lit conspiracy theories seldom match reality. Something else is going on. Assume snafu before malice.

Em

 

[MelissaBaby]

I haven't had this happen to me, and I'm sympathetic to those who have gone/are going through it.

But lashing out at people who are, for the most part, trying to understand the situation, playing alt games and accusing people of gaslighting, does nothing to solve the problem.

Just my way of thinking, but I thought you started out with a smart approach that has gotten lost along the way. Not your fault, it's fair to say the thread was hijacked and diverted from its original intent. The smart thing to do is to get as much info as possible from the affected parties and try to find any common denominators among them. But that will take time and patience. I don't blame you if you don't have it. Best luck to you wherever you go next

 

[MelissaBaby]

The thread definitely has not served its purpose. I'm going to delete the first post and change the title. Maybe that will let the topic subside.

If you are still interested in trying to solve this, and not just give up, I'd suggest you get pro-active and search through recent threads to find as many people as you can who have had an issue, and invite them all to a group chat, where you can compare notes without distractions.

 

[nice90sguy]

Loving the new thead title, BTW

 

[djrip]

Okay, holy heck. I logged into my computer to type this because there are just so many points. I'll probably forget a lot of them but I just read the whole thread (well, except the name change and demand to stop posting at the end, I just saw that) so bear with me.

I definitely saw all this today.

MourningWarbler, you are frustrated, completely understandably. But you were the one attacking other members, when they were asking questions and making suggestions to try to solve the issue. You don't think their suggestions are good, I get it. I don't either! But still you were the one who turned it from conversation to argument, like a guy who goes to a mechanic for a car problem, and when the machanic goes "well, maybe it's the radiator...", the guy goes "Don't you think I checked the fucking radiator? You're calling me a terrible car owner, saying I wouldn't have fucking checked the radiator!"

I think a mistake you're making is, thinking there's any difference between you and anyone else here. We are all authors with no power or influence over the website. Get over that "first name basis" bit! That was a joke - "I'm on a first name basis with Laural. Her first name is Laurel." Get it? Anyway, no, none of us are special, and I highly doubt anything is happening on the basis of followers and favorites, but I guess you never know. And the important thing to remember is, none of us here have special insights; if we say something about how it works, we're just saying what we think, just like you. So if you start citing what various people have said like it's some kind of gotcha, it's not. It just means various ones of us think different things, and none of those things are necessarily true concerning how the site works. We're all in this same boat together, just feeling around blindly and making guesses about how things work. Some of your responses read like you're arguing back to tech support; we aren't tech support. We are the other customers who don't know any more about it than you.

Now, some constructive points. I think all or most of us here agree that this AI rejection stuff that's happening is bullshit. All of us agree it would be very shitty to have works rejected for false accusations of AI. None of us are accusing you of writing badly; rather, some of us have made suggestions about how to not trigger the AI detection.

BUT! I agree, none of those suggestions are likely to be worthwhile, because 1, AI detection is complete bullshit, 2, changing things won't necessarily stop the detector (be that software or just Laurel's opinion) from thinking it's AI, and 3, we shouldn't be changing what we wrote anyway. If the issue is human written work, then changing it to avoid triggering an AI thinking it's AI is actually letting the AI influence what is written. It should be what the human put down originally; any change made to appease a software checking program is moving it away from human-written and toward AI influenced.

I think we should all be pretty pissed about what's apparently happening. I find it infuriating and it didn't even happen to me. 30ish stories pulled is fucked up! With absolutely no accountability, no proof anything was wrong with them, no apparent regard given to assurances that the work is not written with AI. I scanned the beginning of one of Mourning's remaining stories and it was obviously not AI. Stuff that is written by AI, it is impossible to tell if it is or not, because a human can write in a dry style just like the AI can. But stuff written by a human can be obviously not AI, because it's clearly not a dry technical piece of writing - it has personality, a distinct voice, errors, unexpected things. And Laurel's quoted comments - "it reads like AI." Come the fuck on. AI reads like technically correct English writing. Is technically correct English writing prohibited? FFS.

The original idea in this thread was to build a dataset - all the authors willing to come forward and report on their "AI' rejections, with details such that we'll then have some information to work with. It's still a good idea. I also think it's an important data point that Mourning's stories got pulled during this. We need to settle down on some of the conspiracy theories, but I do think it seems like either this thread, or the back and forth with resubmissions of rejected stories, brought attention to the other stories, and Laurel thought they were all AI and rejected them. Alternatively, attention was brought to them and one or more people reported them, triggering automatic takedown. This seems less likely to me, for so many stories at once. Anyway, some data that would be good to have: Did you get rejection notices for them? Boilerplate messages? Same AI one for all? Or were they just taken down silently?

 

[EmilyMiller]

Okay, holy heck. I logged into my computer to type this because there are just so many points. I'll probably forget a lot of them but I just read the whole thread (well, except the name change and demand to stop posting at the end, I just saw that) so bear with me.


MourningWarbler, you are frustrated, completely understandably. But you were the one attacking other members, when they were asking questions and making suggestions to try to solve the issue. You don't think their suggestions are good, I get it. I don't either! But still you were the one who turned it from conversation to argument, like a guy who goes to a mechanic for a car problem, and when the machanic goes "well, maybe it's the radiator...", the guy goes "Don't you think I checked the fucking radiator? You're calling me a terrible car owner, saying I wouldn't have fucking checked the radiator!"

I think a mistake you're making is, thinking there's any difference between you and anyone else here. We are all authors with no power or influence over the website. Get over that "first name basis" bit! That was a joke - "I'm on a first name basis with Laural. Her first name is Laurel." Get it? Anyway, no, none of us are special, and I highly doubt anything is happening on the basis of followers and favorites, but I guess you never know. And the important thing to remember is, none of us here have special insights; if we say something about how it works, we're just saying what we think, just like you. So if you start citing what various people have said like it's some kind of gotcha, it's not. It just means various ones of us think different things, and none of those things are necessarily true concerning how the site works. We're all in this same boat together, just feeling around blindly and making guesses about how things work. Some of your responses read like you're arguing back to tech support; we aren't tech support. We are the other customers who don't know any more about it than you.

Now, some constructive points. I think all or most of us here agree that this AI rejection stuff that's happening is bullshit. All of us agree it would be very shitty to have works rejected for false accusations of AI. None of us are accusing you of writing badly; rather, some of us have made suggestions about how to not trigger the AI detection.

BUT! I agree, none of those suggestions are likely to be worthwhile, because 1, AI detection is complete bullshit, 2, changing things won't necessarily stop the detector (be that software or just Laurel's opinion) from thinking it's AI, and 3, we shouldn't be changing what we wrote anyway. If the issue is human written work, then changing it to avoid triggering an AI thinking it's AI is actually letting the AI influence what is written. It should be what the human put down originally; any change made to appease a software checking program is moving it away from human-written and toward AI influenced.

I think we should all be pretty pissed about what's apparently happening. I find it infuriating and it didn't even happen to me. 30ish stories pulled is fucked up! With absolutely no accountability, no proof anything was wrong with them, no apparent regard given to assurances that the work is not written with AI. I scanned the beginning of one of Mourning's remaining stories and it was obviously not AI. Stuff that is written by AI, it is impossible to tell if it is or not, because a human can write in a dry style just like the AI can. But stuff written by a human can be obviously not AI, because it's clearly not a dry technical piece of writing - it has personality, a distinct voice, errors, unexpected things. And Laurel's quoted comments - "it reads like AI." Come the fuck on. AI reads like technically correct English writing. Is technically correct English writing prohibited? FFS.

The original idea in this thread was to build a dataset - all the authors willing to come forward and report on their "AI' rejections, with details such that we'll then have some information to work with. It's still a good idea. I also think it's an important data point that Mourning's stories got pulled during this. We need to settle down on some of the conspiracy theories, but I do think it seems like either this thread, or the back and forth with resubmissions of rejected stories, brought attention to the other stories, and Laurel thought they were all AI and rejected them. Alternatively, attention was brought to them and one or more people reported them, triggering automatic takedown. This seems less likely to me, for so many stories at once. Anyway, some data that would be good to have: Did you get rejection notices for them? Boilerplate messages? Same AI one for all? Or were they just taken down silently?

Very measured and sensible.

Em

 

[nice90sguy]

and long, too

 

[djrip]

and long, too

I've been doing exercises.

 

[nice90sguy]

Ah the endorphins have kicked in nicely

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

I haven't trudge through this entire thread, but I feel for all of those who've been hurt by the erroneous accusations of AI usage.

 

[Voboy]

No one will have the courage to speak up now, after they've seen what's happened to us. That is NOT right.

I don't think anything "happened to you" in this thread that'll prevent others from speaking up. You're exaggerating.

Something certainly did happen to you, but your mistake lay in assuming anyone but Laurel had any ability to explain what it was. Your further mistake lay in blaming people who were speculating, because they genuinely didn't know and were trying to problem-solve when you chose to believe they were teasing you. Fact is? NOBODY here has the answers you seek, and continually asking for them in a frustrated and increasingly bitter manner wasn't ever going to make anyone magically have those answers.

That's my view, as an outsider who's just perusing this thread. I think it's unfortunate that your work got yanked. I don't know why it happened, and I don't blame you for being hurt and confused. But lashing out here was never the answer. The denizens of the AH are as clueless as you are.

 

[Voboy]

If you don't think that looks punitive, then we'll just have to agree to disagree.

When did I say I thought it didn't look punitive? I told you: I have no idea why it happened. Neither do you, to be blunt.

This is what you've been doing: reading things into peoples' replies that are not there. I think it's as confusing as anything else that happened here.

People were trying to help you. It's unfortunate that you didn't realize that.

 

[Voboy]

Can we all agree that there needs to be transparency about what is being rejected for this? Will it fall only on the shoulders of those affected to call for that transparency?

No. Many, many, many, many, many of us "longtime writers" have been calling for transparency on all sorts of issues since long before you got here. We have paid our dues and dealt with the site and many of us have concluded that there are battles worth fighting, and ways to fight them, that don't include posting reactionary threads in the AH. Folks tried to tell you that.

I think it's a bit presumptuous to assume you're the lone voice, crying out in the wilderness. You're entitled to your own opinions, but you're not entitled to your own facts.

 

[Voboy]

I'm signing off now, but since I'm entitled to my opinion, I'll say that you seem like a sexist creep who gaslights women by telling them they're exaggerating, and you absolutely must have the last word. I'll let you have it. You deserve it, since you've paid your dues.

...wow.

Fuck you too.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Sigh.

 

[alohadave]

Not weighing in on any of the foregoing but I did read it all and a peripheral question popped into my head.

Can anyone hazard a guess (or guesses) as to why Laurel chooses not to - or perhaps cannot - go open-kimono regarding the algorithm in use (or human-imposed criteria) for rejecting submissions?

I’m assuming doing so might make it easier to circumvent but there may be other reasons.

I guess the reason I’m asking is because, while Laurel may be an International Woman of Mystery to us, I give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she’d rather be transparent than not. If that’s the case, there must be a reason for keeping the process under wraps.

The simplest answer is that there is no criteria except for Laurel's judgement when she reviews new submissions.

It happens when one person is doing all the work. I've modded large groups before, essentially alone, and there are times where your judgement wavers. No matter how consistent you try to be, you be inconsistent because you are human.

It's not ideal, and at times it can seem capricious for those on the other side of the curtain.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I'm signing off now, but since I'm entitled to my opinion, I'll say that you seem like a sexist creep who gaslights women by telling them they're exaggerating, and you absolutely must have the last word. I'll let you have it. You deserve it, since you've paid your dues.

That's way out of order, uncalled for. You've just unhelped yourself with that one.

 

[Paul_Chance]

Not weighing in on any of the foregoing but I did read it all and a peripheral question popped into my head.

Can anyone hazard a guess (or guesses) as to why Laurel chooses not to - or perhaps cannot - go open-kimono regarding the algorithm in use (or human-imposed criteria) for rejecting submissions?

I’m assuming doing so might make it easier to circumvent but there may be other reasons.

I guess the reason I’m asking is because, while Laurel may be an International Woman of Mystery to us, I give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she’d rather be transparent than not. If that’s the case, there must be a reason for keeping the process under wraps.

From my experience administering other web-sites, you hit on the main reason - if you let people know how or why something is being rejected (especially if you're using an automated tool), then bad actors will attempt to reverse engineer the tool to bypass it or fool it. If you were to expose the algorithm, then those bad actors would simply argue with the algorithm. Best, from a site administration standpoint, just to set your criteria and execute against it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Can anyone hazard a guess (or guesses) as to why Laurel chooses not to - or perhaps cannot - go open-kimono regarding the algorithm in use (or human-imposed criteria) for rejecting submissions?

I’m assuming doing so might make it easier to circumvent but there may be other reasons.

My guess is she's trying to figure out what to do.

My other thought would be, is the site being deluged by AI generated junk, and she's trying to keep her head above water? These rejections might be the tip of an iceberg - we have no idea if/what volumes of junk there might be.

 

[Voboy]

I think Laurel has the same answer for AI as every school, university, publishing house, and web-development company in the world right now: she hasn't got the foggiest notion how to fairly handle it.

That's not her fault.

 

[mirafrida]

I was reading a news story a few days back about how banks can use algorithms to decide you're "shady" and just cancel your account. You get your money back, but only after a period of time, and meanwhile you have no money and no banking. Anyway, the advice was to show up in person, refuse to leave until they solve your problem (at least give a cashier's check), and turn on the waterworks if you can. But in NO CASE shout or get rude, despite the fact that it seems entirely reasonable to be angry - because then they will just make you leave and call the police.

I think if you have an AI rejection, or any rejection, that's probably job-1 on LitE too. No, you can't see Laurel in person. But she does (in my limited experience) seem somewhat accessible IF you stay cool, act reasonable, work to build trust instead of assuming it, etc. After a rejection you may feel totally put upon and entirely justified in feeling angry. I get that. I think the site could often handle these things better. But at the end of the day, if you are actually interested in solving the problem, and not just blowing steam, then I'd focus on tamping down the ire and acting respectful. (The OP may feel s/he did that, but repeated evidence from this thread makes me imagine their PMs veered quickly in the direction of apoplectic or entitled...)

 

[Voboy]

I suspect this thread has run its course - forgive me if I’m wrong. Using that as an excuse to pose other questions…

Like: Why? Why would someone use AI to generate a story on Lit? Not for money obviously (unless hoping to win a contest or something?). Fame? Glory? What?
Hoping to improve scores?

A great many people don't view using AI as any worse than using a calculator. As a non-math guy, I can relate somewhat.

I disagree. But not everyone is like me, and not everyone is any more confident in their writing than I am in my math.