this post was submitted on 20 May 2025
158 points (95.9% liked)

Fuck AI

2837 readers
491 users here now

"We did it, Patrick! We made a technological breakthrough!"

A place for all those who loathe AI to discuss things, post articles, and ridicule the AI hype. Proud supporter of working people. And proud booer of SXSW 2024.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

I just went down an interesting rabbit hole. I'm a huge car guy. Started off by some news videos about Koenigsegg that turned out to be long AI narrated videos of generic footage with very short interview clips with Christian von Koenigsegg himself interspersed in between. Tbh I only watched one, the rest I clicked on just to confirm my suspicion that they're all bs. Discovered the following YouTube disclaimer on some of the videos:

How this content was made Altered or synthetic content Sound or visuals were significantly edited or digitally generated.

Now those videos were clickbait and misleading, but they're far from the worst. They get some hundreds of thousands of views each, and get shat out by these channels at a rapid pace.

Things get more interesting with fake car reviews and such. Years ago you'd see videos that were looking at photos of concept cars and narrating them with a bunch of bullshit.

Now they have AI generate the concept car imagery. The supposed new car looks different in every "photo". Like completely different designs, down to the entire body shape. AI narrator talking about conservative styling on the Mercedes S-Class saying "around the back you see slimmer taillights" while the image being shown is the front quarter of an extremely low grand tourer type car that couldn't clear a speed bump, has tire only on the bottom of the wheel (it just disappears as you go higher up the wheel), has no possibility of suspension travel as there's no distance between the wheel and the top of the wheel well, the wheel itself isn't entirely round, the brakes look like a cartoon, and while there's a visible separation between the front bumper and the front quarter panel... There isn't one between the quarter panel and the hood, or the hood and the front bumper. So really it's all one piece that can never be removed. I'm surprised the door is separate from the front quarter panel at this point. This video is here. The S-Class is a luxury sedan, available also as a coupe or convertible, but never has it been whatever... this is.

Buick is also bringing back the Series 40 after a century. Looks almost the same too!. Featuring a rear license plate saying "Series 80" in the lovely font called AI slop.

These videos get shat out at an even more rapid pace. Most have relatively few views, some have quite a lot, and there are people asking if they can buy these cars for real. They come up on google when doing highly specific searches to see if some manufacturer has a car in some category, etc.

So it's similar to the fake movie trailers that have already been talked about, but this is distracting people looking for actual products. It might just be cars in my examples, but I'm sure the same is happening in all kinds of video genres and different product types. I know a lot of you already know about it too, but I was shocked to find out how prevalent it really is.

Also YouTube has the disclaimer that video uploaders can use, and that their own AI tools automatically add, so there's already a database field they could check. But thay have added no AI content filtering.

top 27 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] niktemadur@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Thing is, there is a lot of extraordinary educational content on YouTube, made by people who have a knack for it and do it as a labor or love.

Thanks to some YouTube channels like 3Blue1Brown, WelchLabs and Numberphile, I'm getting the hang of Riemann Surfaces, vector spaces and higher dimensions, the importance of prime numbers and Fourier Transforms... there is an embarrassment of riches bubbling behind so much bad faith A.I.-fabricated clickbait garbage that the algorithm pushes.

There are university professors uploading semester-long courses on cosmology or particle physics. Science channels like ParallaxNick, PBS Spacetime, The History Of The Universe, Terra Physics, The Science Asylum and Ask A Spaceman... many, many others.

But this YouTube treasure may not appear at first glance, and once you select a good path to follow, you have to cultivate that unavoidable algorithm: subscribing to the proper channels, blocking a seemingly endless barrage pseudo-science and conspiracy bullshit and blocking entire topics and keywords (like Roswell, Niburu, etc).

Sometimes the algorithm will suggest new things and it will deliver gold, you can feel the power of the tool and it is awesome, but unfortunately it will also often be clickbait crap, and now more and more often it's with these god-awful A.I. images and pseudo-friendly emotionless generic narrations. Time to take out the digital machete again and hack away ruthlessly, blocking channels and erasing their videos from one's watch history.

In fact, right now if anything has so much as a synthetic scent after a minute of watching, it will be purged and blocked.

But also often, I come across content creators excitedly and clearly explaining the quantum spin of electrons in a two hour video, and it is a glorious sight to behold. Case in point - look up Highly Entropic Mind and his two videos "Understanding QFT". QFT being Quantum Field Theory.
In this case, I also check out the channels that they recommend on their account page. That's a good way of pulling the thread.

Many of these well-meaning content creators are being drowned by those gaming the algorithm and flooding feeds with crap. So I created a Patreon account and chip in, trying to be a little bit of wind beneath their wings.

[–] Absaroka@lemmy.world 22 points 3 days ago (1 children)

YouTube's slide started the moment they decided to embrace the algorithm.

And I'm not sure of a single social media platform that didn't begin rotting the moment they started monetizing content.

It just promotes stealing and folks taking all sorts of shortcuts to try and generate revenue.

[–] lost_faith@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 days ago

I miss the long (1hish) content my favs used to do, but to earn their living they need income. So my favs went from long content, that their regulars enjoyed to short(not "shorts") form to keep the algo putting them on pages, to under 20 mins and some now barely hit the 10 min mark. The ones that keep doing long form regardless are suffering by not being shown as often.

I'd also like the ability to block the AI crap, using an AI image as the thumbnail is... OKish but the full on AI voice, fully AI generated content etc can go die like the ISOs did just before Legacy

[–] danielquinn@lemmy.ca 26 points 3 days ago (2 children)

I can recommend Nebula as an alternative. It's all real humans creating high quality videos.

[–] Lazhward@lemmy.world 30 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Whilst Nebula is great, it's still lacking variety in content imo. Sometimes I just want to switch off and watch a let's play or something instead of a documentary or video essay.

They should make a mindless version of Nebula or something, call it 'Numbula'. (Yes, I did write this comment just to share that name idea.)

[–] njordomir@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

I like it. Nothing but Jubilee, Let's Plays, * Reacts, and Tier Lists. :D

How about Crimeula so we can quarantine all the true crime makeup videos? :)

[–] danielquinn@lemmy.ca 6 points 3 days ago

I honestly love that name. The thing about the Nebula business model is that the creators are paid by who watches their stuff, so if they were to add a mountain of "numb" videos, it shouldn't cut into the revenue for the existing creators, but could bolster the total subscriber base. I have no idea why they don't do what you suggest.

[–] HappyFrog@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Dropout is also reay good :3

[–] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

New videos every other Friday keep it kinda stale in between though. You hear me Sam! I see new episodes of Um Actually on YouTube before you upload them!!!

[–] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 33 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Yep, see it all the time. One I run into a lot is fake releases/trailers of shows, books, movies, games, stuff, seemingly anything I'm interested in that turns out to be clickbait slop.

This predates the AI craze, but it's so prevalent and gross now.

Here's some interesting related reading, if you are curious about the underlying causes:

https://www.wheresyoured.at/the-men-who-killed-google/

https://www.wired.com/story/your-kid-may-be-watching-ai-generated-videos-on-youtube/

Never thought I'd cross the line, but I'm accelerationist now. We're beyond fixing this shit. Let the internet burn (except the internet archive), and then we can enjoy the ashes.

Fake trailers and such have been around for a long time. With AI, you really don't need any skill anymore.

If it's not on the studio/official publisher YouTube channel or IGN, I don't bother clicking.

Too many slop channels with made up crap.

[–] Ledericas@lemm.ee 17 points 3 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

youtube has been declining for a long time, as soon they pushed out the small creators, that could not compete with the larger ones, that was the first sign, then people like beast, sniperwolf came about with all the low effort video posting that children watch. and then allowance of right wing content to push through any feeds if your not logged in. AI is just the latest symptom. at least they bury the Mouthy RIGHT wingers with thier diarrhea mouths that love to use curse words to describe certain people.

[–] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 1 points 3 days ago

I kinda miss old La beast. He was a complete liar and bullshitter, but it was funny.

[–] Thrife@feddit.org 16 points 3 days ago (1 children)

It isn't just the AI videos but YouTube itself is destroying normal produced stuff with their automatic translations. A video from someone not in your native language, what you still understand, can suddenly translated into your language with the shittiest speech model under the sky. Happened to me too often and after a support request I got told it's a mandatory feature that cannot be turned off. So every video can be Russian roulette of not legit AI slob or legit but AI voice. Thanks YouTube!

[–] boonhet@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

Oh yeah, I've encountered those. Terrible translations.

[–] TommySoda@lemmy.world 17 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I think at least once a day I see AI generated videos with 20 views recommended to me and I have to block them. It's obnoxious and getting worse every day.

[–] BakerBagel@midwest.social 2 points 3 days ago

I get loads all the time. YouTube has become such trash, but even with a nebula subscription i feel sruck with it

[–] k0e3@lemmy.ca 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I guess people actually watch random videos from channels they don't subscribe to. I'm in my happy little bubble of Kurzgesagt, SciShow, TedEd, and such, so I don't ever see AI slop or garbage I don't want to see. This was the same with Twitter. I was never unhappy with what I saw on my timeline; just that what's his face decided to buy it and read too much about biggots using the platform on Reddit.

[–] boonhet@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

I usually don't, but I turned on the front page suggestions. It was a mistake. The fully AI generated videos are from a channel that came up when doing a super specific search that didn't have a lot of good results.

Normally I have Kurzgesagt, Oversimplified (who posts once a decade), Casually Explained and a lot of car repair channels.

[–] linkshulkdoingit69@lemmy.nz 9 points 3 days ago

I've seen this but with zoo animals or supposed encounters in the wild, when I'm looking for actual, documentary-like quality TRUE footage and explanation?

[–] Akasazh@feddit.nl 5 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Just yesterday I encountered a video that required me to pay to view. That was a new thing.

[–] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 4 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Oh yeah, the new members only thing. I stopped watching, or even being recommended, Royal institute videos the moment I first saw them doing that. Like I'm not angry, I get it. Go get your bag funny speaking man. But I can't be the only one that had that experience, and the vast minority who pay for the privilege can't outweigh the impact of having a broader appeal.

[–] Whateley@lemm.ee 3 points 2 days ago

Worst I've ever seen was someone's "cover" of Resonance by HOME that was literally just an AI butchering of the song set to scuffed as shit generated cyberpunk imagery.

[–] ChapulinColorado@lemmy.world 6 points 3 days ago

For cars specifically some of the old guys from Donut media covered it in their new channel “Speeed”. I think they also touched on how the “channels” automatically adjust the content type or “theme” to try to gather more views for the same low effort dung.

I’ve also encountered a lot of this garbage for highly specific searches like “what to do in XYZ Washington” the result is like 3 videos for small cities with 1 video being the original and the other 2 clearly copying the same list with AI slop and random stock footage over a boring narration. It’s really annoying and makes researching a road trip a big chore.

[–] SunshineJogger@feddit.org 5 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (2 children)

No, not because of AI.

It's because of a lot of bad and greed fueled decisions

[–] boonhet@lemm.ee 2 points 2 days ago

Well to be fair, AI is a tool to accelerate greed.

[–] SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 days ago

People using AI. AI just enables them to pump out slop at an alarming rate.

Honestly, YouTube should crack down on slop since it's basically just saving garbage.