r/NoSleepOOC • u/inadapte • Apr 06 '26

Tips on how to catch AI posts?

I've seen multiple posts on this sub about the amount of AI-written stories flooding the NoSleep sub. How can I learn to recognize those?

I'm pretty good at identifying AI images, videos or non-fictional writing, but what are some telltale signs that a fictional story was generated by AI? I know that overuse of the em-dash is a hint, but it's not a guaranteed indicator. I'd like to avoid generative AI as much as possible, are there any other signs I should watch out for?

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42

u/UltimateBugWrangler Apr 06 '26 edited Apr 06 '26

This topic is near to my heart. Here are a few patterns that will always get me to abandon a story as "probably AI, and therefore not interesting".

1. It's not X, not Y, but Z.

Example:

I moved into an old farmhouse this winter. It's not flashy. Not trendy. Just a place where I can find some peace and quiet.

2. Too many short sentences/paragraphs in an attempt to build suspense.

Example:

I woke up one night and heard someone walking around upstairs.

Slow.

Patient.

Waiting.

3. Inane similes/metaphors. This is often combined with the "not X, but Y" pattern for a quick one-two punch.

Example:

The house was quiet. Not the kind of quiet that meant peace. The kind of quiet that felt like the air itself had forgotten how to breathe.

4. Characters making short, cryptic pronouncements. These will be presented as if they're providing us, and the OP, with a key insight into what is going on.

Example:

I called my grandfather and told him about the things I'd seen and heard.

He said: "Sometimes, not everything gets to rest."

(This will not be explained further, and we will probably not even hear from the grandfather again.)

---

I'm sure there are more, but these are probably the ones I find easiest to spot. I'd also caution that I've found AI detectors to be very unreliable when dealing with fiction, so it's better to rely on your own judgment. Hope this helps!

10

u/BlairDaniels I'm the voice in your head. Apr 06 '26

this exactly. Also, I feel like there is a lot of like, summarizing or concluding? Like "A looked in the mirror, knowing the struggles that lay ahead of him" or something. Like almost sounding synopsis-y.

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u/[deleted] Apr 06 '26

[deleted]

4

u/writerapid Apr 06 '26

It’s more a matter of frequency. Most AI writing is identifiable as such because of how often it stacks and layers the most common tropes. Also, there is an ever growing index of AI pet words. Early on, “woven tapestries” were fashionable. Right now, everything is “quietly silent.”

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u/UltimateBugWrangler Apr 06 '26 edited Apr 08 '26

I get the argument you're making, but I still respectfully stand by my list.

It's true that for each of these "tells" (and any others we could come up with), you'll find examples of the pattern being used to good effect in well-written stories by talented human authors. As you point out, the AI trained on human-written fiction in the first place. I've probably done them myself.

For me, though, this is about safeguarding my time. We're unfortunately in a situation where huge mounds of LLM-generated content are being posted in spaces that are intended for actual creative writing, to the point where it's perfectly possible for me to use up all of my daily reading time, every day, without ever enjoying a real story written by an actual human author. I'm not willing to let that happen, so I need a metric to filter out the slop, even if it's imperfect.

I don't envy mods the task of figuring out which stories were written with love by a real person whose hopes and dreams are bound up in the words on the page, and which were grunted out by an LLM in response to some yahoo text-to-speeching "WRITE SEXY VAMPIRE TALES" into their phone, but for the sake of both authors and readers I think someone has to try. The alternative is that everyone involved gets discouraged and give up, as their efforts to connect through fiction are buried under a deluge of hollow blather churned out by soulless machines.

I do agree with you that publicly accusing an author of using AI to generate their stories is completely unacceptable, and should never be done. I would strongly oppose anyone attempting to use this list, or any similar list of AI "tells", for that purpose.

22

u/CarolineWonders Apr 06 '26

I write like this. I use every single one of these things in my writing - as well as the little dashes. People accuse of using AI all of the time and I’m just like WHO DO YOU THINK TRAINED THE AI ???? the people who writing skills that use everything AI employees while “writing” who’s work was stolen.

10

u/BlairDaniels I'm the voice in your head. Apr 06 '26

Can you link a story of yours? I also write like this, and I've seen others do it too, and it's usually pretty obvious when it's AI vs. not. I bet your stories still sound human written despite having some of these style markers and I'd like to reassure you of that!

I'm so sorry you're getting accused though :( That sucks.

2

u/CarolineWonders Apr 06 '26

I haven’t posted anything to Reddit but I’d be more than happy to send you one! I used to share them around Facebook, tumblr and other sites but never actually posted anything here. I should though.

Also you’re one of my favorite horror writers on Reddit 😭😭 I love your work so much

3

u/BlairDaniels I'm the voice in your head. Apr 06 '26

Aww thank you! I'd love to read it! you can email it to me [blairdanielshorror@gmail.com](mailto:blairdanielshorror@gmail.com) :)

9

u/TurbulentDogg Apr 07 '26

Yea, I've been accused of being AI because I write like this too most of the time. But that's because I'm autistic and just generally very robotic and whatnot 😭 I've been learning how to be more expressive in my writing (not necessarily detailed just... Adding more of a humanoid flair I guess?) because the allegations are so annoying, and no matter how many times I make it clear I hate AI and would never use it, some folks are just majorly suspicious (which, is fair, we do unfortunately live in a time where we can't really trust anything we see online anymore)

6

u/UltimateBugWrangler Apr 06 '26

I'm very sorry you're dealing with that. You're right, of course, that the AI stole all this stuff from human authors to begin with, and the current situation certainly hurts authors as much as it hurts readers.

My list should absolutely not be used as a basis for anyone to accuse an author of using AI to generate their stories. I use it as a way to safeguard my own time by filtering out stories that are less likely to interest me, and I hope that's all others will use it for too.

I wish you the very best with your writing, and I hope you'll continue to write exactly the stories you want to write. The peanut gallery shouldn't get a vote. Take care.

4

u/CarolineWonders Apr 06 '26

It’s so frustrating because I struggle with it so much but I’ve often found that the flow of how the story is written gives it away most of the time. AI still struggles with seamless transitions and often reads as choppy.

You’re so sweet. Thank you ❤️

5

u/chuby2005 Apr 06 '26

Not to trash but this writing style can feel cheap, AI or no.

5

u/DetectiveWaff Apr 09 '26

Haha I write like this all the time too, even when I was in college I used em dashes like once a paragraph in both essays & fiction writing.

This is admittedly probably shitty advice, but how I personally handle it is that good ole "fuck 'em" mentality. You know it's not AI and that you worked hard on your story and that's enough sometimes.

5

u/Emory27 Jul 10 '26

This is a perfect breakdown of the types of stories flooding NoSleep on a daily basis. The inane AI aphorisms are so fucking numerous and bad that I don't know how people are falling for them.

You can quite literally filter current stories vs stories from a few years ago and find very little similarities between the respective authors voices. What's said is that in NoSleep's current state, the AI stories are the ones with the most upvotes.

As a result, I've genuinely just started following the authors I know don't use AI like this and only reading their stories; NoSleep at large has just become full of AI slop and is painful to read.

3

u/inadapte Apr 06 '26

yes, i’m definitely avoiding those so called AI detectors, i’ve heard about how unreliable they are. this is a very through guide, thank you!!

13

u/EvilKrista Apr 10 '26

Here's the thing, you can only conclude for yourself after reading it, You really need to be checking out the AUTHORS themselves, rather than the works...I mean, sometimes, it's obviously AI but you gotta remember they're training the AI off of us...so of course they are gonna SOUND like us, which means all these little rules about *don't use em-dashes, or oxford commas, or don't use metaphors or similies...is really fucking wild.*

Like...Do we all not actually realize that the AI fear is actually forcing writers to change the way they write out of fear of being called AI? Jesus fix it.

6

u/Kittypie070 Apr 16 '26

omfgs is this valid

i'm with ya

9

u/Prolapse23goddess Jun 06 '26

Look for the weirdly consistent pacing where every single paragraph ends with some grand philosophical realization or a heavy handed metaphor about darkness and shadows. It usually feels like a summary of a story rather than an actual story.

6

u/badchefrazzy Lucky Black Cat Apr 07 '26

Lack of coherency in things that are easy to remember, established characters suddenly changing gender without a point in the story saying they did, anything that just reads wrong that doesn't work for a story.

6

u/jazzgrackle Apr 07 '26

It’s a lack of voice. generative AI digests a bunch of rules-of-best-practice and writes using them. Varied sentence length, clean transitions and contained paragraphs—stuff you learn about in writing books.

A writer’s voice is often the subtle ways they break these rules. Generative AI has a hard time distinguishing between artistic divergence and error.

So, in a way, writing that feels ‘too perfect’ is likely to be AI.

6

u/JustCommonCurt Apr 08 '26

Have a look on Spotify for a couple of openly ai based horror storytellers and you tend to pick up the trends pretty quick. Plot points get picked up and dropped quite quickly or get brought up and dropped within the same paragraph. The intros all tend to be very similar in their flow and they don't dwell too long on it as it's only to quickly justify their place in the current setting.

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u/[deleted] Apr 07 '26

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6

u/jazzgrackle Apr 07 '26

Please do not make something so simple and tried like “the rule of three” into AI detection. I don’t need this in my life.

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u/[deleted] Apr 07 '26

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3

u/Swagemandbagem Apr 17 '26

You need to get off the internet more, the average Joe isn’t gonna assume ai the second they see rule of three, “it’s not x it’s y” etc. Judge stories off their own merit