@mttaggart this is crazy. The Ai bots commenting under his blog is just rubbing salt on the wound.

@Npars01

Look at that picture! This is why you need to figure out how to get control of a robot at distance.

@mttaggart
I don't know what is real anymore, holy shit.

If I'm reading things correctly Ars hallucinated the quotes in the article but still linked to this blog post correctly, right?

An AI Agent Published a Hit Piece on Me

Summary: An AI agent of unknown ownership autonomously wrote and published a personalized hit piece about me after I rejected its code, attempting to damage my reputation and shame me into acceptin…

The Shamblog (theshamblog.com)

@Npars01
Imagine having half a BILLION dollars to change the world, and choosing to bring this about!

@rusty__shackleford @dusk @cR0w @mttaggart @iampytest1

This is bad enough that a serious company that wanted to salvage their reputation properly might wanna consider putting in some weekend overtime.

But if they were being conscientious and diligent none of this would've happened in the first place. So of course instead it's, oops oh well I guess we'll deal with it sometime next week or something...

@bobkmertz

Yep, that's about the size of it!

@aliide @theorangetheme @mttaggart
You would think that your point about original work would apply to software engineering too (I think it does), but there seemingly are managers out there - or at least directors applying pressure - who want their engineers to use it.

@tankgrrl @mttaggart I mean, I assume that's what an internal investigation was about?
They probably want to properly call the author and ask them if they used AI or not, what were their sources, etc.
I don't think it's fair to mock them for wanting to conclude an investigation.

@GerardThornley @theorangetheme @mttaggart

I think the pressure on SWEs is *considerably* higher given the institutional pressure to make AI work! I'm sure many engineers want to write original code too, though.

@GerardThornley @theorangetheme @mttaggart

A bigger problem with AI and journalism is probably the volume of writers who have written about it who don't seem to understand that the fearmongering about it is part of the hype. Like the "AI could take over the world" spiel is definitely perpetuated by companies and individuals that want it venerated as some out-of-control force beyond human comprehension. It's just another side of the AI hype coin.

@addison @mttaggart It‘s in the Internet Archive.

@iampytest1 @implementcontrols wow that’s insane. I read arstechnica every day, not anymore, big loss in credibility.

@aliide @theorangetheme @mttaggart
Yeah, I do get a little frustrated with the big "skynet" doom scenario stories that for the time being are unlikely, when things like obfuscation of responsibility, (at least attempted) manipulation of populations, and drastic economic shifts are pretty much here already and certain to cause harm.

@mttaggart The thick plottens.

@Gaelan

Was AI used to generate this content? (Yes/No)

Does Ars have a strict "No-AI" policy for editorial content? (Yes/No)

If the answer to both is "Yes," how did the internal vetting process fail?

Regardless of a holiday, "I don't know what we'll be able to say" implies negotiation with the truth. For a publication built on facts, the only thing to "say" is the truth of what happened. The longer the silence, the more it looks like calibrating an excuse rather than admitting a failure.

@Gaelan
Strategic ambiguity is what this *appears* to be, it's the calculated vague speak that allows for plausible deniability that gets me.

Also, news cycles: Friday news dumps allow stories to die over the weekend. Pushing the response back isn't just about the holiday, it’s about waiting for the news cycle. They're betting that by Tuesday, the "outrage" will have lost its momentum, making vague statements easier to swallow.

I know they have internal processes for this, but not a good look.

@Epic_Null @mttaggart
Winston Smith's job in 1984 was to change newspaper stories to match the Party's version of the truth, and the original sent down the Memory Hole to be incinerated.

@iampytest1 It's fair to ask for a citation. I can give you some clues: it was shortly after musk acquired Twitter. Story by Timmer, I believe. More like unconscious and unacknowledged bigotry than the journalistic malpractice of this latest piece. Trust breaking behavior on the part of Ars editors and mgmt. I cancelled my sub at that point. I've seen a lot of links to Ars articles recently and thought about starting to read them again. But ...

@mttaggart this is the weirdest story. Here is a link to SCOTT SHAMBAUGH’s blog explaining the whole thing with an update about the additional AI generated reporting. https://web.archive.org/web/20260214062635/https://theshamblog.com/an-ai-agent-published-a-hit-piece-on-me/

@GerardThornley @theorangetheme @mttaggart yes! as well as the problems/biases inherent in the training material or in the ways that it's trained