[ExI] The internet bot problem

[efc at disroot.org]

On Sun, 1 Dec 2024, Stuart LaForge via extropy-chat wrote:

> On 2024-11-30 07:27, BillK via extropy-chat wrote:
>> Can humans purge the bots without sacrificing our privacy?
>> "Personhood" credentials could cleanse the internet of bots — but are
>> the costs worth it?
>> By Ross Pomeroy     November 30, 2024
>> 
>> <https://www.freethink.com/the-digital-frontier/personhood-credentials>
>> Quotes:
>> According to the 2024 Imperva Bad Bot Report, the proportion of
>> internet traffic generated by bots hit almost 50% this year, growing
>> 2% from the year prior. It’s hard to get a handle on the share of
>> essentially fake websites, social media accounts, comments, reviews,
>> and emails being churned out by bots, but it is surely vast.
>> 
>> Personhood credentials to the rescue?
>> “To get a personhood credential, you are going to have to show up in
>> person or have a relationship with the government, like a tax ID
>> number,” Tobin South, a graduate student in MIT’s Media Lab and one of
>> the report’s authors, told MIT News.
>> While a PHC proves your humanity, it would not be identification —
>> users would maintain anonymity.
>> But there are genuine risks and challenges.
>> -------------------
>> 
>> Indeed, proving you are human will become increasingly difficult.
>> Even video calls and chats can now be done by bots.
>
> The Dead Internet Theory was considered a conspiracy theory back when it 
> was first discussed in 2021.
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Internet_theory
>
> Is it still just a conspiracy theory?
>

I would say we're getting there. ;) It is fun to see in some discussion 
forums online, that chatgpt answers are starting to flourish. Someone 
calls it out, and the other guy says he was just checking his spelling 
through chatgpt.

I also see it when teaching. Many students, instead of doing labs or 
homework assignments, just paste it into chatgpt and send me the answer. 
The least creative (most stupid?) don't even bother changing the reply, so 
it has happend that I sit with 10 code snippers that are exactly the same 
down to every space and chosen name for the functions.

What I find even more interesting, is that the argument that I couldn't 
care less about their homework and what they learn, and that the only one 
they are cheating is their future self, since any employer quickly will 
see through prompt writers, when they actually need to employ programmers. 
This argument does not seem to work.

But maybe it could be that they do not want to become programmers, but 
they do in fact, want to become prompt writers.

To be continued... as the saying goes!