What's going on here? The matplotlib maintainer this story is about correctly notes that all the quotes from his post in the article are made up.

UPDATE: Link was pulled; see below.

https://arstechnica.com/ai/2026/02/after-a-routine-code-rejection-an-ai-agent-published-a-hit-piece-on-someone-by-name

UPDATE: They pulled the story, but I had it up and had SingleFile in my browser, so: https://mttaggart.neocities.org/ars-whoopsie
After a routine code rejection, an AI agent published a hit piece on someone by name

One developer is struggling with the social implications of a drive-by AI character attack.

Ars Technica

This scoop brought to you by the TTI Intel Feed, which also routinely beats commercial threat intel to the punch on important emerging threats.

https://intel.taggartinstitute.org/

· The Taggart Institute Intel Center

Putting this here so all can see it. Ars forum thread where the pull and investigation are mentioned: https://arstechnica.com/civis/threads/journalistic-standards.1511650/
Journalistic standards?

Hi folks, Since Ars is apparently posting partially or fully AI generated articles now, I have to ask - is this going to be a continued policy going forward? That is, will Ars be officially publishing AI generated content from now on? If so, will it be marked? This is obviously pretty concerning.

Ars OpenForum
After a routine code rejection, an AI agent published a hit piece on someone by name

One developer is struggling with the social implications of a drive-by AI character attack. See full article...

Ars OpenForum

@mttaggart

We need some time to 'investigate' whether we are using AI or not. We plumb forgot.

LOL

@tankgrrl @mttaggart I mean, I assume that's what an internal investigation was about?
They probably want to properly call the author and ask them if they used AI or not, what were their sources, etc.
I don't think it's fair to mock them for wanting to conclude an investigation.

@art_codesmith @tankgrrl @mttaggart they have enough information already to justify immediately yanking the article, so "we'll tell you next week" scans to me as "we need to figure out the PR angle on this" more than "we need to find out what happened".

Maybe their explanation will be a good one, but I'm not holding my breath.

@SnoopJ @art_codesmith @tankgrrl @mttaggart I'm waiting to see what happens in a few days to judge. It's clear the quotes are fake and they acknowledged that, but I can see it taking a few days to identify *how* this happened, and how it made it through editorial. I'm worried though, and I don't know if their answer next week is going to satisfy me.