A Small Publisher's Observations on Amazon and the Over-production of AI Generated Content – aka “AI Slop”
Over the last year or two, the phenomenon of “AI Slop” has increased significantly. For those few who haven’t yet been introduced to the term, it refers to content (text, code, pictures and video) that has been generated by generative AI algorithms. These are enormous deep-learning neural-net based programs that are fed tremendous amounts of data (called ‘training data’) that then generate new data, based on the input prompts given by human users.
There are a lot of issues with this process that generally fall into the categories of financial, ecological and social. There is a lot that can be said on any of these categories, but in this blog I am focusing on the social side, though that naturally has interactions with the financial and ecological sides of the question. My main issue will be about how generative AI is affecting human-created creative efforts and how the use of the technology is affecting the platforms (such as Amazon) that are used to transmit and market these creative efforts.
For what it is worth, here are some personal observations from running a small book business, primarily on Amazon:
Over the last couple of years, the amount of our free promotion downloads has declined quite significantly, by about half.
On the other hand, the amount of our paid sales (purchase and page-reads) has held fairly steady.
New books seem to be harmed more than older books. This is partly due to the proliferation of content in general, but this has been super-accelerated by AI slop.
One gets the impression that people are using publication date as a way to filter out AI generated content.
If this is the case, Amazon and similar sites should make a policy of forcing people to identify AI usage when they upload. They already require this information when uploading a book, but they don’t seem to be revealing it to potential customers.
This is probably a good example of how companies are conflicted – they want the increased content of AI generated content , but don’t want people to know which stuff is AI generated. In the long run, I don’t see how they can have it both ways.
On a related matter, I have noticed a lot of content on Quora that seems to be AI generated. I tend to avoid that and its prevalence on the site has made me less willing to contribute my own content and/or consume other content.
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An article from the Globe and Mail (sourced as New York Times News Service) provides much of the data for the comments below. The title of the article is “Like many consumers, tech giants are sick of AI slop”.
The article goes on to describe the problems that companies such as Google, Meta (e.g. Facebook) and Amazon are having with generative AI content swamping their sites. These include things like google searches, Amazon’s book platform and Facebook’s feed. Naturally, there are plenty more companies facing the same problem (e.g. most other social media sites). It is, of course, ironic that the very companies that are spending extraordinary amounts of money and other resources on AI development are also being harmed by the output of these technologies. The phrase “hoist on their own petard” comes to mind.
Here are a few examples of what these companies have done:
Spotify removed tens of millions of “spammy” uploads, presumably generated by AI or at least facilitated by AI in the upload process.
Linkedin has added a button for users to notify them of content that seems like it was generated by AI.
Youtube had wiped hundreds of thousands of channels in recent months, that appear to be low-quality AI generated ‘slop’.
TikTok has removed hundreds of thousands of videos recently for violating their AI policies.
Messaging apps, review sites, academic archives and dating services are also attempting to get rid of AI generated spam and slop.
App sites (such as the Apple store) are being flooded with vibe-coded content, another type of AI generated content.
X has banned apps that facilitate AI slop (it is estimated that over half of short tweets (less than 50 words) are AI generated).
Substack is actively scanning posts for AI useage.
Unfortunately, the article doesn’t say what Amazon is doing about slop, though it does note that it is an ongoing concern for them.
The article goes on to note that these companies have mixed and contrary strategies and incentives. On the one hand, AI generated content can initially increase engagement on their sites, just by sheer volume. That can mean gains in revenue and/or investment dollars. However, people can quickly tire of this deluge of AI slop and turn away for using the site. That can negate all those gains and ultimately poison the site.
This might all be considered part of the “tragedy of the commons”. Slop is cheap (sometimes free) to make and market. That attracts slop developers who see a quick buck, that is there for the taking. That works for a while, but the profusion of slop soon saturates the site and people then tend to desert it.
This problem may resolve itself, once the AI investment bubble is over. If Tech companies have to recover costs and make sustainable profits, the cost of using generative AI may become too high to be profitable for the slop producers. As an example, if it takes a lot of energy and computer chips to produce a novel, it may well be cheaper for novels to be written exclusively by humans.
There is also the fact that humans just naturally seem to dislike AI generated content, once the novelty wears off. This may also lead to the reduction, if not elimination, of AI slop.
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And here is a science-fiction novel, featuring a galactic AI threat which might well be considered the ultimate in the AI threat (the book itself is human-generated).
The Magnetic Anomaly – A Science Fiction Novel
The novel version of The Magnetic Anomaly is now available on Amazon (ebook, print version, also audible version soon to come).
Summary
Two young Earth scientists, Alex and Mary, get caught up in a vast conflict, based on an accidental finding that they make at a diamond exploration camp in the far north. Eventually, this discovery leads them on a perilous quest and involvement in an interstellar war, a conflict of literally cosmic proportions with a rogue AI, which considers itself duty-bound to destroy sentient life (or, from its point of view, liberate sentient life).
During this time, they encounter a variety of enigmatic persons, as well as other entities, all of whom are also engaged in this struggle. With some of them they end up allying; with others, they contend in deadly conflict. The struggle takes them around the world, and eventually into the far reaches of the solar system.
During this time their relationship continues to evolve and deepen. Circumstances demand that they grow in courage and confidence, though within the scope of (mostly) normal people, as has been the case for countless people throughout history.
The story also showcases some historical events, relating to different versions of what went on in Antarctica, shortly after World War 2. Several versions of these events, official and unofficial UFO lore are given. This becomes a springboard to much of the action. Some philosophical and scientific concepts are also explored, though not in such a way as to get in the way of the plot.
Amazon:
U.S.: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
France: https://www.amazon.fr/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Italy: https://www.amazon.it/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Netherlands: https://www.amazon.nl/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Spain: https://www.amazon.es/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Japan: https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Mexico: https://www.amazon.com.mx/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Germany: https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
Brazil: https://www.amazon.com.br/dp/B0F9J3HHFW
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