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Ars Technica Fires Reporter After AI Controversy Involving Fabricated Quotes (futurism.com)
submitted 8 months ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] 35 points 8 months ago* (13 children)

The problem with your attitude towards this is that these companies are forcing "AI" down everyone's throat. It's a requirement now to churn out more bullshit than humanly possible.

This person was simply fired because they didn't catch the false information, and not because they used the tools forced upon them.

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  • [–] 60 points 8 months ago (4 children)

    To be fair to Ars Technica, that doesn't sound like the case to me.

    The "journalist" in question seems to be suggesting that this was their own bad judgment to use AI to "find relevant quotes" from the source material.

    Having said that, there's also a senior editor on the by-line who hasn't been held accountable for clearly failing to do their job, which as I understand it, is to read, edit and verify the contents of the article. So in a way Ars seems to have a problem with quality whether or not the use of AI was mandated.

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  • [–] 31 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    Ars is owned by Conde Nast who has multiple whistleblowers saying AI is being forced on them. Think that's kind of relevant.

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  • [–] 12 points 8 months ago

    Is there any evidence this is happening at Ars Technica? They're pretty transparent about their methods, and obviously tech-savvy. Just because it happened at Teen Vogue doesn't mean it's happening at Ars. Conde Nast publications seem to be run pretty independently. Take The New Yorker, their content remains amazing and seems fully independent.

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  • [–] 10 points 8 months ago

    I don't work at Ars, and maybe you know something I don't, but I have seen nothing to suggest that they're one of the companies doing that. It seems like they are pretty open about how they do not allow AI to be used in the process. Have they said something to indicate otherwise and I just misssed it?

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  • [–] 9 points 8 months ago* (4 children)

    Sifting through information to find out what's true and what's not, before presenting it to the public, is a pretty crucial task and ability for an actual journalist though. It is probably one of the most important parts of their job to verify the correctness of their sources and what they write regardless of whether or not they use AI tools.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (1 child)

    You're absolutely correct. But the problem is bigger than the rogue journalist. Separation of duties is a well known requirement for robust, reliable processes immune to single points of failure (whether malicious or, as I suspect in this case, merely grossly negligent and irresponsible). It is necessary but not sufficient to hold just the journalist who used AI responsible for the publication of false statements.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    The problem here is you are both characterizing Ars as you would other companies that have these AI mandates. Ars is the opposite, they have a mandate NOT to use AI.

    While I agree a separation of responsibilities is important, they had two coauthors for exactly that reason. One trusted the other for the references, not knowing that they used AI.

    Either way, the initial comment is certainly not "absolutely correct" when it comes to Ars.

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  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 child)

    Then maybe they shouldn't be using these tools in the first place. Other Conde Nast employees have already been blowing the whistle about this, which is funny because they sued all the AI companies for stealing content.

    Whether there is a news article about it or not, these shitty tools are being shoved down everyone's throats. From developers, to authors.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago

    Then maybe they shouldn't be using these tools in the first place

    I absolutely agree, they should not write articles with LLMs. I'm just saying they're not absolved of basic journalistic responsibility because they're instructed to use LLM tools.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Absolutely not. Ars has a no AI policy, it's the exact opposite. Guessing you are a nice little bot.

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