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AI output right now is like a final exam essay response from an anxious student. Instead of being edited for focus and clarity, it's anti-edited to cram in as many details as possible. Instead of worrying that the reader might get bored or confused, it assumes that the reader has no choice but to read the whole thing, even if they get a headache. It doesn't care about picking the most useful perspective on a problem; it cares about covering every possible angle that a grader might use to dock points from it.

It's basically the work you get from a smart, diligent person who is oblivious to any shared goal and approaches every assignment with a CYA attitude.

help



Pretty good analogy. I'd also compare it to a junior employee who tries to make people care about the how of their work rather than the results.

That, and Every Sentence Is Punchy.

Every sentence sounds like it's trying to be in the trailer for a film.


That's how Henry David Thoreau wrote.

Here's my prompt when I don't know what the hell the AI is saying.

"Expand. Clarify for human. 5 minute read max. Senior engineer audience."


"Be terse."

Also useful words: succinct, concise. Sometimes I use both. Maybe I'll ise all three: be succinct, terse, and concise.

Thanks! I will add this to the tricks. AI is a fuzzy search and a fuzzy function.

"Write short paragraphs with simple words, use bullet lists when appropriate."

"wtf was all that garbage added for? No user needs to know that we're not doing X anymore, just stick to the fucking prompt"

Y'all are much nicer to the clankers than I am, I see.


You just very nicely explained why I sometimes overcommunicate.... That's exactly how it feels

It's not a bad attitude given that I don't trust it did the work right, so the more details it can include, the more opportunities I have to spot errors, which invalidate the whole result - and conversely, if all details seem right and self-consistent, it gives me greater confidence the work is correct.

> final exam essay from an anxious student

It's because so many of these models were trained on corporate content, which is the exact same vibe. "We're going to drone on for pages about how great we are for building the thing without explaining what it can do for you or how to use it, because spending real effort connecting with our customers isn't something we ever learned climbing the corporate ladder"


ironically, this would be useful for a prompt on how not to build build a site.

it's due to how rewards work during RL no? it needs to try to check off all the boxes to get a max score

This is a great analogy



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