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Friday Fun Thread for February 7, 2025

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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PhysicsForums and the Dead Internet Theory

https://hallofdreams.org/posts/physicsforums/

This isn’t fun at all! But it is unsettling, and I do think it’s relevant to the AI discussion going on here.

I hate that most such conversations immediately devolve into thought-terminating cliches. Why have a serious argument when one can just accuse people of liking “slop”? But I hate the idea of an endless bot circlejerk more. This article is a pretty tasteful way of describing the discomfort without sounding like a Luddite.

"Dead Internet Theory" wasn't an instruction manual! 😭

Literally the Torment Nexus meme.

Fascinating! And deeply creepy. If old internet posts can and will be replaced by LLMs.... oof I don't even want to think what might happen to the information landscape.

Any more blog posts or writings on this?

Only found it on Twitter I’m afraid.

Thanks, fascinating read.

Absolutely fascinating. I can't figure out a reason why the admin would do something like this. Even if he's trying to pump up user numbers on the forum for some reason, I don't see why he would be backdating the posts. If anything, newer posts are better for creating the appearance of activity.