I like watching and listening to YouTube videos. Recently my ears have switched into a mode where I'm evaluating if the human speaker is reading LLM copy as they would normally read from a script / teleprompter anyhow.
Often they are not but sometimes I detect that they are and it's very sad to see.
Similar to when GitHub removed their meritocracy rug - it's fundamentally about a view of the world and less about the action. Most universities have signed up to a charter [1] that says that "racism is an everyday facet" of life and needs to be fought against by concrete actions. These universities get official ratings from bronze, silver or gold based on how they do. This current issue is less about the facts and more about a view of the world that's being challenged. People on one side are viewing the world and explaining things through one lens and others are viewing it through another. One problem in this discourse is that on one side they don't know how and why academic institutions operate and the other side sees criticism as justification for and reinforcement of their world view.
The basis for conflict resolution is to encourage people to see their opponents as human similar to themselves and to put themselves in the others shoes to acknowledge common grounds for agreement. It's possible an official inquiry by those experienced in conflict resolution may help this.
Our university has an AI portal where different models are offered (e.g. ChatGPT 5.5).
They set a default system prompt which is full of the usual DEI buzzwords.
The result is, that you sometimes don't get an answer at all. Albeit the question is of valid academic interest. If the system prompt is cleared -- luckily not locked --, the models answer as expected and oneself s able to decide about the issues of that answer.
I actually like the design. It's the product of a human and it's fun. It also feels like it's playing with jokes about brain-rot aesthetic so communicates a contemporary and young point of view. It's cool.
The thing it's selling doesn't appeal to me in the slightest but they have tried and have some human ideas in the webdesign. Cool design if cringe product
I think we will see a hidden motivation behind this as ultimately so the output can have an author, the author can be attributed and finally the output will be copyrighted and so the LLM has more value.
Everyone who invests in AI companies wants to see the value of their investment increase.
I'd give it about 3-5 years until an AI company claims copyright over code their LLM produces. This is a crucial step in that path.
I think you're right that it's actually to do with attribution (i.e. They're not just watermarking your output as claude generated, but watermarking it as claude generated _by claude user id 73684_). I think it's more to do with the growing militarization of the internet. Just another brick in the wall of enter your phone number to create an account, send your id to prove your age, smile for the flock cameras, etc. Allowing the plebs to have privacy and anonymity is not allowed anymore.
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