• Chozo@fedia.io
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    1 month ago

    People are taking issue with the fact that the AI was black and queer, not that it wasn’t a real person in the first place. Once again, the right is angry at something that literally does not exist in real life.

    • jaybone@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      Wait it’s the right that’s pissed? I was thinking it would be the left that’s pissed because they would consider this exploitation and astroturfing. Hmm, go figure. (I wasn’t going to read the article.) Maybe Facebook can piss everyone off with this really dumb idea.

    • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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      1 month ago

      The AI being black queer mother of two just seems especially egregious. It’s like they’re just checking boxes with that stuff.

      • sunzu2@thebrainbin.org
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        1 month ago

        Some marketing parasites thought it will resonate with some people… Trigger others. It is provocative and it got people talking.

    • GrammarPolice@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      No, people are taking issue with the fact that Meta is clearly trying to force a stereotype down our throats. At least i am.

      The right probably IS pissed the AI was black and queer.

    • Maxxie@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      1 month ago

      The problem imo is deception. I honestly think bots wouldn’t be out of place on facebook if they were all clearly marked as such, and you could filter all generated content with a single toggle.

      • njordomir@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Honest profile for a bot:

        • Profile pic of a server rack, 3rd from the top, under the Dell PowerEdge, above the UPS
        • Interests are parsing webpages and hallucinating
        • Looking for a server farm to be plugged into
        • Family includes it’s entire private cloud
      • herrvogel@lemmy.world
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        1 month ago

        Don’t know about toggles, but those profiles were officially marked as bots made by meta. They didn’t try to hide that fact.

        Which makes it even weirder imo. At least with a secret AI profile you can tell they are trying to achieve something, shady as it might be. But what is the purpose of a Facebook profile that announces itself as a chat bot that’s role playing as a queer black mother, I have no fucking clue.

        • TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          You see they’re bots if you open their profile and read some subtext.

          Do you see it clearly marked in your feed if one of the bots posts something, shares something, or comments something?

          That’s a genuine question - I don’t actually know. But it should be marked very clearly without having to open the profile, because people generally don’t do that.

        • fine_sandy_bottom@discuss.tchncs.de
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          1 month ago

          I think that an obvious bot can still manipulate users. Fb has infinite resources with which to test this stuff prior to roll out. They skittish do it if it didn’t work for them.

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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    1 month ago

    What’s the business model here? I’ve organically arrived at the South Park meme.

    1. Build ad-supported content silos.
    2. Openly flood those silos with AI slop
    3. ???
    4. Profit
    • ramirezmike@programming.dev
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      1 month ago

      everyone is looking at it wrong expecting these social media companies to show this as engagement.

      That’s not the goal.

      The purpose of the AI profiles is targeted advertising. It probably isn’t going to work on you but it does work on many demographics. It’s the same concept as any other advertisement. They all set the scene of the specific type of person they want to buy their product, whether it’s a TV commercial, a radio ad, a magazine page.

      The only real difference here is that it’s not a real person but when it comes to advertising, will that really matter? That is, will the drop in sales be negligible compared to the massive drop in cost of advertising?

        • ramirezmike@programming.dev
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          1 month ago

          you may not have an account but your friends and family might and if you have similar interests they may vouch for products that were pitched to them via AI… so in that way, they’re still reaching you

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      1 month ago

      The model is that as long as it looks like there are “users” that are “engaging” with the platform, it pleases the shareholders.

      Same model with Reddit.

    • Dave.@aussie.zone
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      1 month ago

      Well you see, engagement is down, and the whole “sponsored content” thing is in a death spiral due to AI slop. So Meta has decided to cut out the middleman and generate their own AI slop, because surely their version of personalised AI slop will solve the whole engagement problem and keep line always going up, because if it’s one thing users love, it’s an endless torrent of AI slop.

      • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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        1 month ago

        That will be why Nick Clegg has ducked out. He may have been a useless politician but at least he knows when to run away, which is better than some of them.

      • sunzu2@thebrainbin.org
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        1 month ago

        Yeah but this model requires stupid boomers to engage with clearly fake bullshit

        Ohh wait…

        • phubarr@lemmy.world
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          1 month ago

          The companies doing the advertising are totally fine with it because it creates fake peer pressure and gives potential customers a fear of missing out on what’s trending. Astroturfing is fine as long as it serves the will of the wealthy.

          • chaosCruiser@futurology.today
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            1 month ago

            And if that works out, you could also use the same method to shape the political atmosphere on the platform. Who knows, you might also disarm the next arab spring before the first demonstrations even happens.

            I’m pretty sure governments are very interested in seeing the results you get from using LLM bots like this.

            • phubarr@lemmy.world
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              30 days ago

              I think you’re completely right. Information warfare is something new to a lot of people. I’ve been following a very credible, insightful teacher about this topic on YouTube, by the name of Ryan McBeth. I highly suggest everyone checks out his channel. He’s retired US infantry, but a current intelligence analyst and content creator who is VERY good at what he does. He’s taught me a lot about misinformation and disinformation, how it’s used, how to spot it, and how to fight it, and showing example of how governments and businesses are using it. Truly someone worth your ear.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    1 month ago

    One fake profile with the name “Becca” uses the likeness of a woman of color while calling itself a “dog mom.” The page is filled with AI-generated images of dogs.

    “Becca?” Did she get adopted by white parents?