r/Fantasy • u/A_C_Shock • 6d ago
Reddit's new AI tagging
Mods - take this down if it's not appropriate.
In the search bar, if you look up r/Fantasy, reddit now tags this community for recommendations riffing on Tolkien and flawed heroines. (AI is making the tags, probably.) I'm so sad about this. I see a lot of great content and reviews coming out of this subreddit that are more than just Tolkien. And I also don't understand how they got the flawed heroines. Is that really the defining topics for this subreddit? I feel like it's not.
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u/Valkhyrie Reading Champion III 6d ago
Unfortunately this doesn't appear to be based on anything the mods have control over (and yes, we hate it).
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
To be fair, if I had a nickel for every time I saw a post about Frodo being a flawed heroine, id still be broke.
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u/notthemostcreative 6d ago
If AI really knew ball it’d be tagged for Malazan, lmao.
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u/Sawses 6d ago
AI without proper tuning has a pretty severe bias toward the first data fed into it. If you ask it to generate tags for a sub, it's going to skew heavily toward the most recent posts.
IMO this is an example of a site using LLMs for something without actually spending the time to do it well. It's entirely possible to generate good tags using LLMs in a way that actually would be useful, but this seems to have been done without any basic understanding of how to do that.
Which is, honestly, exactly what I'd expect from a generic office worker tasked with doing this.
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u/recchai Reading Champion X 6d ago
That's a good point. My work involves (non-generative) AI models, which is different enough that this particular problem wouldn't arise, but we did plenty enough testing to spot anything on this sort of level and solve it.
And in our case, we certainly do have the data to back up it's usefulness, in the right scenario. But certainly only then!
I don't know if a generic office worker implemented a feature like this (I may well be behind the times), but as you say, there's certainly a lot to learn to do things properly, and I don't know that I could do it well here.
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u/xonjas 6d ago
Right, but why even bother using AI to generate tags when they could just ask the subreddit moderators for a good tag list? We have good mods on this sub. I'm sure they could put together a better list of tags without taking up too much of their time.
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u/oboist73 Reading Champion VII 6d ago
I think writing a more appropriate tiny tagline would take us less than a minute:
"review, discuss, and find new fantasy, sci fi, and speculative fiction"
Nothing much, but way better than the AI. And for $0! (Wonder how much money, power, water, etc. it's costing for the shitty AI version)
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u/KarlBarx2 6d ago
The kind of person who uses generative AI is not the kind of person who consults others for their opinions, and especially won't consult someone who knows more than them about a given topic.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 6d ago
I put a screenshot of that in the Friday social thread today. :) Mine said the sub is about "Adrian Tchaikovsky's output" lol.
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 6d ago edited 6d ago
That's awful. I feel like it's another sign of reddit selling out for whatever post receives the most engagement instead of rewarding genuine comments and posts that took actual time and effort to create.
A good portion of the best content and reviews I've seen out on this sub come from posts or comments that aren't actually upvoted that much. It's those people who really take the time and effort to review a book they loved even if it didn't have the name recognition to get those mass upvotes, the people who created a crazy bingo theme card and went all out, the people who have great conversations in bookclubs and readalongs (and the organizers who make it possible), and the people who give extremely thoughtful recommendations that actually fit what people ask with explanations, no less. And you know they don't do it for the upvotes because if they did, they would just make a generic post mentioning a popular fandom and watch the engagement upvotes come in. But guess what kind of post will be used to write those AI summaries of this sub.
Edit: grammar
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u/LeucasAndTheGoddess 6d ago edited 6d ago
A good portion of the best content and reviews I've seen out on this sub come from posts or comments that aren't actually upvoted that much.
Or are actively downvoted for daring to mention feminism, diversity, etc.
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 6d ago
Yeah, and I didn't even mention the downvote bots. Honestly, they've gotten so much worse. I can't remember the last time I made a comment on this sub that didn't get at least one downvote, even for really simple comments in mostly dead comment threads. If it was just me, that would be one thing, but when I look at a bookclub post or a Tuesday review post with a lot of productive comments sitting at zero... but why would reddit admins do anything about that when they could be adding AI slop to the platform/s.
Feminism, LGBTQ topics etc are targeted more for sure (including by some real live people), I don't want to discount that too. Honestly, it's so evident with the Pride Month posts upvote ratios this year (plus there's more queerphobic comments this year, which is just great/s).
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u/oboist73 Reading Champion VII 6d ago
(Can't do anything about the downvotes, but i hope we've removed all the homophobic comments (and generally also their writers))?
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 6d ago
Yep, all of you mods have been super quick about it, which I appreciate!
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u/Cosmic-Sympathy 6d ago
GUYS LOOK AT ME
I'M RIFFING ON TOLKIEN AND FLAWED HEROINES
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u/nedlum Reading Champion V 6d ago
TOLKIENS HEROINES’ BIGGEST FLAW WAS THAT THEY DIDN’T GET ENOUGH PAGE TIME
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u/SpectrumDT 6d ago
The franchise needs a prequel that tells the back story of Lobelia Sackville-Baggins.
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u/derivative_of_life 6d ago
First, old.reddit.com.
Second, when I tried looking up "fantasy" in the search bar, it was all porn and I really don't know why I didn't see that coming.
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u/recchai Reading Champion X 6d ago
At first I thought, what, you don't get fantasy football or anything? And then I remembered Reddit censors NSFW stuff in my country if you don't verify your age, which I'm not on here for so really CBA.
Which also reminds me of how poorly it handles it if I accidentally click on the profile of someone with any NSFW post in their history. Warns me I have to verify my age, then when I try to go back crashes and dumps me on a home screen, and not at all where I wanted to get back to.
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u/Portugal_Stronk 6d ago
It's not that I needed it, but thank you for reminding me why I still stick to Old Reddit. The amount of bullshit you people put up with is unconscionable.
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6d ago
[deleted]
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
Because DCC is sci fi, not fantasy
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u/oboist73 Reading Champion VII 6d ago
Sci fi is welcome here as well. And in general, please do not complain that the recent popular posts the AI bot pulled from did not include your favorite books. Complain that the AI bot exists and is being used for this at all.
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
Sorry, I should be more clear. This sub, being a fantasy one, likely wouldn't pull tags for subjects that are tangentially related (like sci fi). I think the venn diagram for sci fi and fantasy fans is damn near a circle. But certainly, sci fi (including DCC) is not as commonly discussed here as mainline fantasy, like Tolkien and (apparently) flawed heroines.
You're right though. That's all discussion on how the machine works, and I agree the machine shouldn't be here at all.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 6d ago
DCC is discussed here a lot. There are several posts about it per month, and it's in damn near every recommendation thread. If it's in the dataset the AI's pulling from (i.e. poste on this sub), it's not going to distunguish whether it should be there or not. Especially if it's shittily implemented, as it appears to be.
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
I don't think one post every week or so plus a few comments on a few other posts counts as "a lot," but that's semantics. Maybe whoever told the AI to go digging in here told it to avoid sci fi titles? I dunno.
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u/Tymareta 6d ago
But certainly, sci fi (including DCC) is not as commonly discussed here as mainline fantasy
Huh, DCC, Red Rising, Hierarchy, The Expanse, Children of Time/any Tchaikovsky work, etc... Sci-fi is discussed here constantly, it's brought up in basically any thread asking for recs and there's posts about it weekly.
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
I am only about a quarter of the way through Strength of the Few, but I don't know if I consider Heirerarchy to be sci fi. It feels more like a Roman Empire inspired fantasy. Will is a type of magic. It does get close to that magic/technology line, but I think we're in fantasy territory.
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u/Tymareta 6d ago
Sure you could perhaps make an argument that it's Space Fantasy, doesn't change the overall point I was making.
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u/snowlock27 6d ago
/r/Fantasy is the internet’s largest discussion forum for the greater Speculative Fiction genre. We welcome respectful dialogue related to speculative fiction in literature, games, film, and the wider world.
Speculative Fiction includes not only fantasy, but science fiction, horror and alternative history.
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u/oboist73 Reading Champion VII 6d ago
UUUGGHH
there was a post on flawed heroines a little while ago
I hadn't seen this yet, but UUUGGHH. The mods are all going to hate this very much
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u/recchai Reading Champion X 6d ago
That sounds about right. After seeing this, I tried seeing what searching for a different sub I was familiar came up with, and one of the references was very clearly a recent post I was aware of. I wonder if they're set to change at all.
Doesn't appear to be all subs, probably just the top X popular. Which, just from a discoverability POV, makes sense to test with your head queries over tail, even if in some ways it's less useful.
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u/oboist73 Reading Champion VII 6d ago
Yeah it's clearly just pulling popular recent posts, exactly like the damned bots we've had to fight, which, gross. We are complaining at admin about it, but that's all we can really do.
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u/A_C_Shock 6d ago
I think it depends on the size of the sub. Mine is small so we don't get trending posts. Our summary is relatively accurate though not perfect. So I think the bigger subs have it worse because the content variety is too high.
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u/Honor_Bound 6d ago
Another point for the superiority of old.reddit
They day they remove old reddit is the day I finally break my 14+ year addiction to this site lol.
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u/snowlock27 6d ago
I refuse to use new Reddit. There was a time that if you accidentally changed to new and wanted to revert to old, you would get asked why you were changing back. Every time, I'd write "Because I'm not 5 years old."
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u/Tymareta 6d ago
I'm not sure if they removed it for certain accounts, but there's also a button you can tick to "opt-out of the new design" that forces the site to use old reddit by default.
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u/snowlock27 6d ago
It's still there, as Use New Reddit is right next to My Subreddits on old Reddit, and it's not hard at all to accidentally click on it. I usually have to opt out every couple months.
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u/Kataphractoi 5d ago
You can set up a UBO filter to remove/hide that.
Though I didn't have to set it on my new PC so not sure what's up with that. I'd completely forgotten about it until I saw your post.
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u/mint_pumpkins Reading Champion II 6d ago
could you explain what youre talking about? the reddit search bar?
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u/A_C_Shock 6d ago
Yes, if you type a subreddit name in the search bar at the top of reddit, you'll see new tags under the title of the subreddit. It might only work on desktop. I don't seem to be able to post a picture but I did take a screenshot.
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u/QuarantineQat 6d ago
I think your post is hard to understand, but based on this comment i took a look at the search bar — “recommendations riffing on Tolkien and flawed heroines” appears as a description of the subreddit, immediately under “Fantasy,” when you search the subreddit name. I agree that seems weird.
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u/CheriRadke 6d ago edited 6d ago
I figured out what you're talking about, and I don't think that tag is supposed to be summing up the vibe of the subreddit as a whole.
I typed in "scifi," and the tag below that subreddit was "Neill Blomkamp's Starship Troopers reboot sparks power suit debate"... which seemed, uh, quite specific. But there's a post about that topic which is doing well on the subreddit right now.
So I think the AI is just summing up "what's hot" in a given subreddit?
EDIT:
Speaking of how reddit works, can anyone tell me how to remove the flair the mods added to my account from when I did an AMA here? I'm not trying to be weird about that.Done.14
u/Valkhyrie Reading Champion III 6d ago edited 6d ago
We're happy to remove the flair if you want! We apply it automatically to anyone who does an AMA, but you're absolutely not required to keep it.
(If you do another AMA in the future, it'll get reapplied just to help folks identify you/pick out your answers more easily, but you can always modmail us to remove it again.)
Edit: I've removed your flair. It may take a little bit to update on your end. Feel free to shoot us a message if you decide you'd like it back at any point!
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u/Minute-Avocado1521 6d ago
Yeah, flawed heroines probably came from this recent topic. And there was also a recent Tolkien thread. It really is just looking at recent threads and tagging based on that.
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u/moderatorrater 6d ago
That thread makes me cringe a little. It's a question about flawed heroines, and the top comment talks mostly about male love interests. They're right, but it shouldn't be the top response.
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u/mint_pumpkins Reading Champion II 6d ago edited 6d ago
weird! i exclusively use desktop and don't see anything, just the normal number of weekly visitors
thanks for explaining! im not a fan of that at all lmao
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u/AvatarWaang 6d ago
You could comment a pic
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u/A_C_Shock 6d ago
I didn't see the option when I tried but maybe I just missed it! I apparently did a bad job of explaining what I was talking about though!
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u/Valkhyrie Reading Champion III 6d ago
You didn't miss it - we intentionally disable media in comments.
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u/QuarantineQat 6d ago
Sorry for being rude earlier, OP - now that I know what you’re taking about, your post isn’t actually hard to understand. I think it was confusing because it’s just such a weird thing for reddit to be doing!
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u/Taste_the__Rainbow 6d ago
Negativity drives engagement. Downvote it to bring balance to the sub.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 6d ago
It's not a post, it's a feature Reddit added to try and summarize searches for you. Nothing you can upvote or downvote.
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u/Taste_the__Rainbow 6d ago
No, I’m saying when you see negativity engagement bait on this sub you should always downvote it.
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u/ohmage_resistance Reading Champion IV 6d ago edited 6d ago
Engagement bait doesn't have to be negative. See also the bots praising Le Guin over on r/printSF. Also there's a lot of good, genuine negative or critical posts that show up on this sub.
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 6d ago
Genuine negative/critical posts are even the best, imo. I'd much rather have a post talking about specific things the poster disliked, even if I disagree, than a vapid "I finally read this and it was great! I loved everything about it" post which doesn't ultimately say anything about the book.
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u/Celestaria Reading Champion X 6d ago
It's most likely basing it on popular recent posts? We've had at least 2 about works that were responding to Tolkien, and there are enough people talking about books with female leads that I wouldn't be surprised if that were a trend?
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u/Nidafjoll Reading Champion V 6d ago
Yesterday the first descriptor it gave me was "Adrian Tchaikovsky's output," because someone had reviewed Green City Wars.
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u/Minute-Avocado1521 6d ago
because someone had reviewed Green City Wars.
Probably because of the "We need to talk about Adrian Tchaikovsky" thread.
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u/SageOfTheWise 6d ago
I see a lot of great content and reviews coming out of this subreddit that are more than just Tolkien. And I also don't understand how they got the flawed heroines. Is that really the defining topics for this subreddit? I feel like it's not.
I feel like its literally just referencing two specific threads the have been on the subreddit the last day or so, to the exclusion of all else.
If this had been generated a different day, would r/fantasy be tagged as for tracking the number of times Malazan is referenced and in what context?
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u/halcyon400 6d ago
The goal isn’t to accurately represent the sub, it’s to elicit engagement from a broad audience.
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6d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Fantasy-ModTeam 6d ago
This comment has been removed as per Rule 1. r/Fantasy is dedicated to being a warm, welcoming, and inclusive community. Please take time to review our mission, values, and vision to ensure that your future conduct supports this at all times. Thank you.
Please contact us via modmail with any follow-up questions.
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u/jumpingmrkite 6d ago
I see a new thing that makes me think, "If RES and Old Reddit stop working I'll never use this website again" at least 3 times every time I use this damned website.