The Social Contract of Writing

(jola.dev)

4 points | by zdw 11 hours ago ago

1 comments

  • cstever 10 minutes ago ago

    > "All writing is homogenizing, slowly turning into the same slop. You see the same patterns everywhere, “it’s not x, it’s why”, em-dashes, or why not: “you’re not imagining it, the problem is real”. "

    I think it says something about Humans in a way. I've heard it different ways throughout my life: everything is derivitive. And LLMs are riffing on that conformity.

    We are taught bland writing in school. Praised for conforming for sounding "just right". Five paragraphs: perfect. Three points: right on.

    Consumers devour easy reads.You hit all the "standard" plot points for my favorite genre: I'll buy it!

    And so these LLMs are trained on the mass production and produce, well, mass production.