This is not unique to Facebook. Reddit has seen a large uptick in AI-generated posts, or repeated posts from the past.

I think we need to recognize that social media of 2026 is not the same as what we had in 2006. AI generated content, regardless of if it is image, video, or text, is here to stay. And it will only get better and more convincing as the technology improves.

What people really need to ask is this - what do they want to get out of social media? Is it personal relationships and status updates? Is it entertainment? Is it something in between?

The harsh truth is most people at this point use social media for entertainment, and AI content is entertaining, or at least engaging, to most people. Remember that 54% of USA adults read below a 6th grade reading level [1]. It is not perfect, but it is convincing enough that a large enough number of people are beginning to accept it as "real".

[1]: https://www.nu.edu/blog/49-adult-literacy-statistics-and-fac...

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__lain__ 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

The reddit bots are quite nefarious. Even in technical communities where no advertisement is happening there are so many posts made by bots either recycling old posts or masquerading as humans doing banal things like complaining about end users or something. Hundreds of bots that do nothing more than pretend to be people complaining about work, really curious what the goal of the operators is with these ones. Makes me wonder if they are bots supplied by reddit to artificially boost engagement.

	▲	themafia 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Points are often presented as a proxy for trustworthiness. They're even implicit on sites like HN where certain features only become available once you've crossed a threshold. It's a bad tool. I always think of the Bill Bur joke talking about Netflix going from 1-5 stars to thumbs up/down. "It's like.. stubbed my toe.. thumbs down. Hitler.. thumbs down. There's too big of a gap in 'thumbs down.'"

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Zak 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's not about what users want. It's about what's profitable for the company.

What I want from Facebook is to see what original words, images, or videos my friends and family thought was worth sharing with the world today, and I want to see clearly when I've reached the end of that. I probably don't need to spend more than ten minutes once a day on that.

It's profitable for Facebook to show me as many ads as possible. If I wasn't an aggressive adblock user, the thing I want would have much less potential profit than all the third-party content they want to show me.

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strangattractor 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Coining HNs Law

Any mode of communication that depends on advertising for funding will over time t monotonically approach total BullShit Grifting as t increases.

	▲	munificent an hour ago \| parent [-]
		It already has a name: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification

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jcgrillo 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It doesn't matter to any of these companies what their users get out of it so long as those "dumb fucks[1]" keep coming back to the trough and slurping up the slop. Eat your rage bait and like it, piggy. Keep that attention economy roaring!

[1] https://www.theregister.com/2010/05/14/facebook_trust_dumb/

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monero-xmr 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

[flagged]

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thrance 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Weren't you the one telling us X.com should replace legacy media? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46891442

As a reminder, a glimpse at X's front page a few weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46504404

I think it's very telling how you went to Reddit first when complaining about politics on social media, one of the only big ones that still hasn't been completely invaded by MAGA sycophants. Just admit you take no issues with politics on social media, you just want them to align with your views.

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monero-xmr 3 hours ago | parent [-]

X is the most mainstream online community for free speech. It has wildly free speech

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ceejayoz 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Sure it does. https://techcrunch.com/2024/05/14/on-elons-whim-x-now-treats...

> If you write the words “cis” or “cisgender” on X, you might be served this full-screen message: “This post contains language that may be considered a slur by X and could be used in a harmful manner in violation of our rules,” the warning says. You can continue to publish the post or delete it.

	▲	SamuelAdams an hour ago \| parent [-]
		“There are two types of freedom: freedom to and freedom from.” Margret Atwood, the Handmaids Tale.

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jahsome 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

It's pretty funny how you tried to completely sidestep the accusation, but still managed to confirm it

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thrance 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Have you opened the second link? It's mind-boggling how anyone can still claim that.

	▲	monero-xmr 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		All of those topics can be found other places if you look, then it updates your algorithm. I mean vaccine skepticism? Youtube and instagram have a million videos

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3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[deleted]

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jmye 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Why do you think? Enragement = engagement. You could generously assume that it's users optimizing for posts that get them likes/karma/whatever, or ungenerously assume that the platform itself is gaming engagement via AI or bots, but the effect is the same and it's pervasive. The only out is finding tiny communities that are still communities, and praying they don't grow.

Everyone saw the Facebook model and adopted it. It's why Reddit has the valuation it does (and why it's still insane to me people intentionally use it as a recommendation or information tool).

	▲	monero-xmr 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		[flagged]