N-gated Hacker NewsFeb 25
🚀 Wow, groundbreaking discovery: new Hacker News accounts sprinkle EM-dashes like #confetti at a wedding 🎉. Apparently, it's the new Turing test — because nothing screams human authenticity like excessive punctuation. 🤖✨
https://www.marginalia.nu/weird-ai-crap/hn/ #groundbreakingdiscovery #EMdashes #TuringTest #humanauthenticity #HackerNews #HackerNews #ngated
New accounts on HN 10x more likely to use EM-dashes

I’ve had this sense that HN has gotten absolutely innundated with bots last few months. First most obvious giveaway is the frequency with which you see accounts posting brilliant insights like 13 60 well and t6ctctfuvuh7hguhuig8h88gd to f6gug7h8j8h6fzbuvubt GB I be cugttc fav uhz cb ibub8vgxgvzdrc to bubuvtxfh tf d xxx h z j gj uxomoxtububonjbk P.l.kvh cb hug tf 6 go k7gtcv8j9j7gimpiiuh7i 8ubg or 1662476506 or Аё Beyond the accounts that are visibly glitching out, the vibe is also seriously off.

Hacker NewsFeb 25

New accounts on HN 10x more likely to use EM-dashes

https://www.marginalia.nu/weird-ai-crap/hn/

#HackerNews #NewAccounts #HN #EMdashes #AITrends #HackerNews #WritingStyle

New accounts on HN 10x more likely to use EM-dashes

I’ve had this sense that HN has gotten absolutely innundated with bots last few months. First most obvious giveaway is the frequency with which you see accounts posting brilliant insights like 13 60 well and t6ctctfuvuh7hguhuig8h88gd to f6gug7h8j8h6fzbuvubt GB I be cugttc fav uhz cb ibub8vgxgvzdrc to bubuvtxfh tf d xxx h z j gj uxomoxtububonjbk P.l.kvh cb hug tf 6 go k7gtcv8j9j7gimpiiuh7i 8ubg or 1662476506 or Аё Beyond the accounts that are visibly glitching out, the vibe is also seriously off.

theHastyOneNov 23

So as someone who used em dashes before AI – how do we take them back?

#AI #aislop #emdash #emdashes

Show threadOxford ClarionNov 19
In a blog posting with more than a slight hint of ChatGPT about it, organisers Stage Crash Events say “it’s not just a festival; it’s a full-on sensory love affair with the land”, and that “we’re not just chucking on a gig; we’re sparking a movement”. #emdashes www.meadow-fest.com/blog/introdu...

Meadow Fest 2026: Music & Farm...
ResearchBuzz: FirehoseNov 16

TechCrunch: OpenAI says it’s fixed ChatGPT’s em dash problem. “OpenAI says ChatGPT will now ditch the em dashes if you tell it to. The telltale sign that supposedly signals text written by AI has popped up everywhere in recent months, including in school papers, emails, comments, customer service chats, LinkedIn posts, online forums, ad copy, and more.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/11/16/techcrunch-openai-says-its-fixed-chatgpts-em-dash-problem/

TechCrunch: OpenAI says it’s fixed ChatGPT’s em dash problem | ResearchBuzz: Firehose

ResearchBuzz: Firehose | Individual posts from ResearchBuzz
qurlyjoeNov 16
I was amused and a tad peeved when it was revealed the ChatGPT was being caught out by its excessive use of #emDashes—I like using them, myself—but now apparently OpenAI says users can tell the app not to use them. OpenAI still doesn’t know why it overuses them though. They’re still looking into that.
eicker.news ᳇ tech newsNov 15
#OpenAI has addressed the issue of #ChatGPT’s excessive use of #emdashes. Users can now instruct the chatbot to avoid using em dashes in their custom instructions, providing more control over the punctuation’s frequency. https://techcrunch.com/2025/11/14/openai-says-its-fixed-chatgpts-em-dash-problem/?eicker.news #tech #media #news
OpenAI says it's fixed ChatGPT's em dash problem | TechCrunch

OpenAI says users can now personalize ChatGPT to stop using the em dash in its output.

TechCrunch
AI Daily PostNov 14

Users are frustrated: ChatGPT keeps inserting em dashes even when asked not to. Experts like Chip Huyen and Aileen Gallagher discuss why OpenAI’s model resists style tweaks, and what this means for AI engineering at places like Syracuse University. Dive into the quirks and possible fixes. #ChatGPT #EmDashes #OpenAI #AIEngineering

🔗 https://aidailypost.com/news/users-report-difficulty-getting-chatgpt-stop-using-em-dashes

Mx KraneNov 6

I'm seeing lots of writers confirming they use em dashes for today's #WritersCoffeeClub
First - YAY! Fellow em dash lovers!
Second - People really need to diversify their reading if so many of us confirm that we use them, only for people to use em dashes as a sign it was written with AI.

Also, are people forgetting that AI is trained on real people's writing—if AI uses em dashes, it's because real writers use them, not the other way round.

#WritingCommunity #EmDashes #AISlop

Show threadRS, Author, Novelist, ProsaistSep 10, 2025

@immarisabel As a fellow em-dasher—you betcha I em—seeing your blog delighted me, having been told mere weeks ago by a fellow author that it was a hallmark of AI writing and it is being used less, which left me sad. I use it extensively in my fiction as I never shy away from a long continuing thought sentence when it's the write way to say what I mean. The author said they were soldiering on, and well they should; so should we. Good writing—even with em-dashes—differentiates itself from mediocre averaging-the-mean AI drivel. The thing about AI is that it pattern matches—it discovers trends because it is incapable of reasoning, meaning its use of the em is because people commonly write using it! Maybe what's popular are em parentheticals, or the em abrupt end—? Of course AI uses the word Is a lot. Maybe we should stop using that?

I even use the em-dash for signature lines.

—R.S.

Again, thanks. I boosted your post to my followers.

#BoostingIsSharing

#emdashes #emdash #writingcommunity #writersOfMastodon #writer #author