AI now dominates Hacker News: 60% of the front page is AI-related or AI-written

> In the first half of the month, roughly 60% of the daily HN lineup was AI-related or AI-generated, tapering off to ~50% as we approached the end of the month. This is up from 40% in February.

This aligns with my much less scientific research. Every now and again, when I remember to do it, I will skim the top 10 stories and count how many are AI-related. I find it is very consistently in the 4-6 bracket. Probably a majority of the time, 5 out of 10 articles are AI-related, and very rarely does it drop below 4 out of 10. It also rarely goes over 6 out of 10, but I can remember it happening a couple of times.

In fact, the proportion of AI representation in the top 10 is so consistent (in my, again, unscientific experience) that I wonder if it is being moderated one way or the other.

Personally I find it boring that one topic gets so much discussion but who am I to argue. I do my bit by making sure to upvote non-AI stories that I find interesting.

The worst IMO is the bot accounts. And the worst of that IMO are the people that behave as if they were bot accounts.

The self-promoting thought-leading experts (usually on AI) with a skin as thick as a single cell membrane.

At the moment, half of this site on a given day is terrible ads with a swarm of the same people defending each other's attempts at either becoming or staying relevant - utilizing the latest gold rush topic to do so.

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I'm not quite sure what could be done about this. The moderation does do a good job, so it's not that.

I also see that not everyone feels repulsed by the self-promotion. So maybe there is no problem and/or the problem is me. But I kinda doubt that too.

Maybe the time of voting systems for ... uh.. "social media" is somewhat over-ish? Though if I was truly signed up on that thought, I would not be commenting here but on I guess lobsters?

My reaction is: that's an appropriate amount. AI is probably the biggest thing to happen (in tech) in the last two decades, so I think it's fair that it's taking up a lot of the discourse.

AI has turned me away from HN more and more.

Most of the content is about using some data center based ML provider. My view is how so many ignore the environmental harm these constructs are doing; increasing ambient temperatures, inducing heavy metals into the water table, decreasing the access to water for human consumption in numerous drought areas, hostel ambient noise ... The wealth who are the majority finical backers do not care about these issues.

ML is a tool and hardly focused on it being able to operate as a local based solution. Frameworks are tie to expensive hardware. This creates a hyper pay-to-play scenario. While hand written coding can be done on a computer from 20 years ago. Local based solutions are the only means to decrease the wealth gap. Data center solutions increase the wealth gap.

I don't find value in ML summaries. I want to consume the answer and the ideas around them that lead to the answer. This creates more long-term value.

_Lobsters_ has now becoming my go-to with their posts being focused on ideas and concepts versus advertisements for large corporation ML based solutions.

Democratization of access has its victims.

I miss the old newsgroups. I wish we could land again in that weird, colorful oceans of geeky individuals with their quirks and interesting nerdy takes.

15 years ago, HN was about bootstrapping and early YC stars.

10 years ago, HN was in full VC-enterprise sauce.

5 years ago, it was crypto and NFTs, and how I switch jobs every quarter.

Now it is a blurry view into the future through the black mirror of AI.

How could we jump back into the cozy past again?

I do not have a clear answer, but what seems to work for you are small groups of friends and friends of friends hanging out on WhatsApp or Discord, discussing geeky news together in the context of their backgrounds. But these are very curated and very closed groups, still operating on the social media platforms of behemoths.

Would now be the right time to restart self-hosted message boards or Mattermost/Campfire instances?

I'm curious if anybody has tried to figure out roughly the % of bot comments? I keep seeing the "ai-talking cliches", but wonder if I'm crazy because people (or... other bots???) take it at face value.

HN really needs an AI filter. Most posts are AI company promotion now.

It's not just HN, have you seen mainstream news recently? It's just a hot topic and I think it's normal for people to talk about those a lot.

If quantum computing ever goes mainstream, I'm sure you'll see a lot of articles about that as well.

Reading about tech has become gradually less and less fun for me over the past 16 years.

Does anyone remember the awe that was felt the first time we encountered an iPhone. Or an iPad? I remember those days I would read tech news and sites like Ars Technica and comments were sometimes snarky and indignant but generally people were enthusiastic about reading tech because it offered glimpses into more technically advanced futures.

I wasn't browsing HN back then but I imaging the same thing was true of HN in the late 2000's and early 2010's.

Now tech sites like Ars Technica consistently have comment sections filled with immense negativity cynicism indigation and just plain old boiling rage. I avoid those comment sections now because reading such things negatively affects my mood and certainly isn't fun.

And over the past few years HN has gradually become more negative and nasty.

All this sucks. This isn't why I became interested in tech. This isn't why I used to spend time reading about technology and science.