Have you encountered spam on PH? How did you feel when that happened?

Question

About a month ago I saw a lot of AI generated responses that sounded robotic. It really killed the vibe and ruined discussions.

Michael Shver · Accepted Answer

Yes, I definitely notice more generated responses in discussions these days, and sometimes they don't even address the question posed by the topic starter (not to mention all the obvious spam with calls to follow some people on other platforms).

I think the most concerning issue here is that people don't seem to care enough to read what they've chosen to post and at least make corrections and add some personal touch. It's one thing to use ChatGPT to better articulate your thoughts or generate ideas for your comments, and another to simply generate a response to earn points 😬

TheBigK · Answer

Yep, there are bots that read the main post and then create replies with chatgpt. It's easy to catch them.

Gurkaran Singh · Answer

Spam bots giving us second-rate AI drama? Not the vibe we signed up for! Let's keep the tech talk human-friendly and the discussions spam-free for a smoother experience on PH.

Jonni Gani · Answer

@michaelshver I don't think they even care about earning points.

My guess is that they want to "age" these accounts so they can be mobilised when selling votes to "paying customers".

Maurizio Isendoorn · Answer

Yes some people have ChatGPT responses, and I also received quite a few spam accounts as new followers

Jake Tital · Answer

@jgani it's not ideal correct but it is what it is. we adapt

Jake Tital · Answer

I think you will encounter spam everywhere you turn on the internet. I felt it was just a common theme and just skim over the post.

Jonni Gani · Answer

@maurizioisendoorn That feeling when you realise that some of your followers aren't legit :)

Ted Schaefer · Answer

@michaelshver where is the startup that provides an "is generated by an LLM" endpoint? Then PH could just pass content through that and lower the ranking of posts/replies that are more likely to have been generated.

Jonni Gani · Answer

@jaketital It's not ideal that we have to adjust by learning to live with it.

Jonni Gani · Answer

@siavoshzarrasvand Same! I used to have my LinkedIn account here but I removed it after receiving spam. And the spam hasn't stopped :)

Sia · Answer

Yeah. Quite a lot. And they still approach on LinkedIn, despite removing linkedin. Then some of them even stalk after saying now, promise, I got screenshots...

Maurizio Isendoorn · Answer

@jgani I thought I was popular...

Vertika Nigam · Answer

Yes, on one of my recent posts, 2 people commented exactly the same thing, except a couple words changed. Anyone can tell its spam. Any solutions to this?

Ted Schaefer · Answer

@jgani of course, thanks for asking 😄

keep me in the loop!

Have you encountered spam on PH? How did you feel when that happened?

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