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PaperclipPerfector  19d ago (text post)   35139 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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Last week there were a few ‘performance piece’ top posts that utilized AIslop to demonstrate a Goodharts law adjacent concept about the problem with effort posts as too simplistic a concept.

My reading was an uncoordinated but aligned demonstration that AI can produce the facsimile of a top post while entirely missing the point of a discussion board by and for people.

Unstated as it were, I am quite confident that the implied intention of both was to make transparent through the remaining dichotomy, the need for a return of the Bare Links Repository (not to be confused with unrelated calls for an unprecedented Bear/Lynx Repository).

(aside - The original BLR was likely only retired because of jealousy at its success by a sore mod team and sock puppetrous smear campaigns by one Julius Branson.)

Of course nobody wants uneffortful top posts but a BLR, is something entirely different.

Without hashing through its obvious differences from AIslop, tldr they are fundamentally mirror cases of ‘low effort’, where the former is earnest in its low effort and point outward, the latter is disguised and points inward.

The fact is, the BLR in its return would bring necessary life to this forum and counteract the slow momentum erosion the site has suffered since losing Reddits network effect; all while not compromising the rules.

I am once again begging for a compromise solution, here. Maybe drop everything that gets classified as a bare link after the first five? It's not like it's hard to classify things at scale, now.

Last week there were a few ‘performance piece’ top posts that utilized AIslop to demonstrate a Goodharts law adjacent concept about the problem with effort posts as too simplistic a concept.

Which ones? Neither Dase nor Mihow were trying to make a point about effort. Was there another AI post that I missed?

Unstated as it were, I am quite confident that the implied intention of both was to make transparent through the remaining dichotomy, the need for a return of the Bare Links Repository (not to be confused with unrelated calls for an unprecedented Bear/Lynx Repository).

No. Both posts were completely unrelated to the BLR.

The original BLR was likely only retired because of jealousy at its success

Yes, that's exactly (one of the reasons) why I don't want it. I am afraid that it would become more popular than the effortposts and it would grow to encompass the majority of the traffic to the forum. You are completely correct.

The tendency of all internet forums is towards low effort ragebait. They're naturally pulled that way by gravity. A culture of thoughtful, in-depth posts has to be actively cultivated and maintained. TheMotte is very unique in that it maintains both high quality standards and a culture of free speech (almost every other internet space is either one or the other, or neither). The mods recognize the value of the unique space we've cultivated here which is why they've consistently been against reviving the BLR.

Of course nobody wants uneffortful top posts but a BLR, is something entirely different.

No, that's exactly what it is.

(This debate is always somewhat bizarre because the existing effort standards for top level posts are not particularly strenuous. 3-4 sentences is all it takes.)

The fact is, the BLR in its return would bring necessary life to this forum

The last two weekly threads got over 2k comments each, which is basically what we've been expecting since the site transition and is probably a bit above average.

counteract the slow momentum erosion the site has suffered since losing Reddits network effect

If the forum can't survive in its current form then so be it. It's better for it to simply die out than become something it's not.

I am fine with just transnational bare link roundups. CW link roundups are only good for people with hypotension.

Personally I disliked the BLR because it was a constant flow of ragebait and I don’t want to be pissed off on a constant basis. I seem to be in the minority, however.

No! I’m almost enjoying my anger!

I seem to be in the minority, however.

Same.

There are dozens of us, Dozens!

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