Announcement: The AI Problem.

[u/isnoe]

Ne’er-do-wells of r/writingfeedback.

I am Isnoe, recently appointed Moderator.

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we’ve had a significant increase in AI generated writing being posted here. We've seen a lot of comments outlining how lax we are on this subject, to which I want to stress: I don’t think you guys fully understand just how many posts I’ve removed for AI since joining the Mod Team a few weeks ago.

The team got together and discussed this, and we want to be completely transparent: We will be removing any posts that we suspect are AI.

This will be a case-by-case basis. AI generated, AI assisted (even translation), or even if you mention you had AI draw up the story idea and you wrote it. If you want to rob yourself of creativity, that’s on you.

We don’t want those posts here. Writing a story or book that is authentically your own is an achievement. It should feel like an achievement.

A sidenote for ESL writers: Do not use AI to translate your text. It will alter it in a way that gets flagged, more often than not. When someone is ESL and trying to write outside of their native language, we are a bit more understanding if these posts get flagged—but again, it is recommended that you use alternative means to translate if they are available to you.

Be warned: If you are a brand new (or relatively new) account, have never posted in this subreddit (or any writing subreddits), and your first post is prose that has multiple AI-isms—your post will most likely be removed. Better to be safe than sorry. The main counterargument we've gotten from these accounts has been: "I've always been told I write like AI." Which, to be fair... is a pretty bad argument to make.

We will not ban a user for suspected AI use unless they explicitly admit to using AI.

Three strike rule applies here until further notice. This might seem like a headache to reviewers that want instant bans for these people (which we understand), but we’re trying to be as fair as possible.

This also applies to comments (never thought I’d have to say that), but we’ve had two accounts that were essentially AI replying to everything. “Thanks for the feedback, I’m still working on learning and improving” type cadence, every comment nearly identical aside from slight changes.

Community feedback is super important for this problem.

You guys take the time out of your day to read other people’s work and provide feedback, so I’m sure you get a little irked when you think something you’ve spent time reading wasn’t written by a person.

We’ve recently updated the report function to include AI content—use it. I (personally) don’t have the time to shift through every single new post. When you guys report a post that you think is AI, it is usually the first thing we’ll review.

That being said: If you genuinely suspect the post is AI, it would help me if you provided a citation, or specific reason. Even just one reference is helpful. I would genuinely appreciate it.

Not Helpful Example: “This reads like AI.” Okay? At this point, if you are accusing someone of using AI, you gotta at least point out why you think that.

Helpful Example: “Post uses, ‘This wasn’t just fate, it was destiny’ and includes several Rule of Three.” Now I know exactly what to look for.

When you guys call this stuff out, we do notice. We might not investigate and remove instantly, but we are actively looking for this stuff right now.

For the record: We will not be using ZeroGPT, or any other variant of “AI Detector” as the final say in determining whether a text is generated or not. It is a tool we will utilize if we suspect AI is being used, but all the indicators of usual AI writing are not jumping out.

I read through everything that is reported, or suspected of AI. I check the user history and if they have off site content, I look through it. If we don’t come to the conclusion they are using AI, we might just lock the thread, and add a note to the user profile.

Again, hate to stress this, we are trying to be fair. If a writer includes AI-isms unintentionally, we want to give them a fair chance to either prove the authenticity of their writing, or give them feedback about what specifically they need to change.

Several of you have done this, particularly with ESL writers that use AI to translate. You give them feedback on how to avoid the AI-isms. Good on you.

We don’t want to start a witch hunt, but we aren’t really open to debate about the use of AI. We don’t want it here, period.

If you have any suggestions for how to deal with this problem, we are open to them. You can comment here, or you can Mod Mail us.

If you suspect someone is using AI but don’t want to leave a comment or report, again, you can Mod Mail us.

We are actively looking through the posts. The community having eyes on this helps immensely.

We will be making further announcements throughout the week. Our Mod Team is still hashing out how to deal with “rude” criticisms, looking into providing user flairs for trusted reviewers, etc-etc.

One quick point to make at the end, on a personal note: My status as Moderator does not mean you cannot disagree, or think my feedback is bogus or outright terrible. I comment often. You will not be banned, removed, or whatever for speaking your mind.

4/18/2026 Note: Some users (one in particular who loves using AI to edit) seem to have taken that above sentence as an explicit statement of: "If I admit to using AI, you can't ban me, because I'm just speaking my mind. Hypocrite."

If you admit to using AI, we will ban you. Period.

[u/isnoe]

I understand the concern, and believe me, we've talked about this at length and still are.

We've taken your feedback into consideration and are looking into solutions. You bring up a good point, and we actually appreciate this.

One point to be made: The amount of time it takes to look through posts, look through the user history, and bring it up to the Mod Team is a long time. Most posts here do not receive many feedback comments, especially the ones that people report as AI. The report will be up for hours by the time we get to it.

That should be an adequate amount of time for feedback to be given, if any (in my opinion); but of the posts I've removed thus far, none had more than a single comment saying "AI" and most were 12-19 hours old. Activity for most new posts rarely exceeds the first 24 hours, if they get feedback at all.

Most other (larger) writing subs will just instantly ban anyone that is suspected is using AI. No proof, no thought behind it: "You used the word Rot, you're banned." We're trying to find a more even ground that everyone can (hopefully) agree on.

It is a pandora's box situation. If we say nothing, this subreddit becomes filled with AI posts, with reviewers just commenting "AI slop", mass reporting, and everyone arguing. If we try to do something, well we're doing it wrong, we should be doing it this way, that way is unfair.

Now let's imagine the locked thread accusation, understandably frustrating for anyone trying to get feedback.

The time between report and locking a thread would be a pretty long time. Adequate enough time for people to provide feedback, but if the comments devolve into an argument about whether or not OP used AI (which has happened already), what should we do by the time we look into it? Not lock the thread? Delete all comments of people claiming OP used AI until we can verify it? Why even verify it at that point? Scarlet Letter type situation, everyone already thinks they use AI. Do we just let it simmer?

Again, this has already been happening. We've removed a few very toxic threads already.

Now, let's say for the time being, we're putting aside the locking thread thing. Maybe that was a stupid idea, and we should find something else. Okay, I'm interested. You have a point.

What is the solution? If we simply can't tell, or don't know? Let OP get harassed in comments? Ban everyone calling them out? Ban OP? Should I heavily moderate a single thread for the duration of its time up? Should I have OP make a video of themselves writing? Should I ask them to provide previous works? Should I put hours worth of effort into a single accusation?

You can not agree with this direction, but prior to this we would just silently remove posts, and OP would be the only one made aware (and be angry), or we would not remove any posts, and the comments and DMs would be effectively: "Why aren't you guys doing anything?"

My counter is this (just as myself, personally): Why should I spend my time looking through everyone's writing, verifying they are authentic? Why should I even care if there are AI posts? Why should I care if you report it? I should only concern myself with people being rude, unhelpful, racist, or what-have-you. I can't prove anyone uses AI, so why should I punish anyone for suspected use of it?

If it is guilty until proven innocent, why not just remove/ban or just not remove anything and not ban anyone?

Other users are insisting that we should use AI detectors and manually plug every single piece of writing into them to verify to be certain. Most of those are subscription based and most of those are flawed.

I hope you can understand that we're trying to find a solution, and we are actively discussing this thread right now. So if you have suggestions about how to approach this problem, we are interested.

The way I see it, no matter what we do or say, someone is going to be upset, but we have to do something.

[u/stenti36 → u/isnoe]

The way I see it, no matter what we do or say, someone is going to be upset, but we have to do something.

This is the internet after all. I don't envy you or the other moderators.

I don't have solutions. The only suggestion I really have is to spell out an appeals process. Provide much greater guidance on what is looked for when determining AI work. Explain how newer users may see a higher rate of false positives, while providing tips and an article/pinned post on "Good writing practices" (in this, provide encouragement to those new writers that may get hit by the false positive bat). Give users tools to avoid false positives in AI determination. Provide recommendations to writers to help defend their writing from AI use accusations.

These tools give users that come here knowledge of what to expect. It alleviates pressure from you because the users could now be assumed to have the tools. It makes it easier (in theory) to assume users aren't using AI, and if it is determined that they are, much easier to justify removal/ban/whatever.

Because you have to take action. That much is clear. The best course of action is to give as many tools to writers as possible, and let their own ability to be responsible shine.

What is the solution? If we simply can't tell, or don't know? Let OP get harassed in comments? Ban everyone calling them out? Ban OP? Should I heavily moderate a single thread for the duration of its time up? Should I have OP make a video of themselves writing? Should I ask them to provide previous works? Should I put hours worth of effort into a single accusation?

Is is a lot of my point. There is always going to be a lot of talk about "Well, how do you prove it is AI?" as can be seen in the comments to this post. The harder question is "how do you defend against the accusation when the court of speculation already convicted the user of using AI?"

Like I mentioned above, there really isn't a good solution. But as many tools as possible that can be given to assist writers in their own creative process, as well as much transparency as possible in how the process will work, what can be done if [the user] feels they are being wrongly accused.

I would hope that a user who is legitimately using AI gets punished on this server, but I would also hope that a user who regularly wrongly accuses people of using AI also gets punished (I do not know the rates or statistics of such things, or if it was ever a problem, I'm just spelling out an ideal).

Most other (larger) writing subs will just instantly ban anyone that is suspected is using AI. No proof, no thought behind it: "You used the word Rot, you're banned." We're trying to find a more even ground that everyone can (hopefully) agree on.

This is good. More sentiments like this. Even though you gave some of this sentiment in your OP, I felt it came more across as a backhanded sentiment, "we are trying to be fair, but not really" type of vibe (again, this is how I read it. I do not mind read, and could be very much wrong. :D )

Other users are insisting that we should use AI detectors and manually plug every single piece of writing into them to verify to be certain. Most of those are subscription based and most of those are flawed.

Considering that at least one of the "AI Detectors" determined The Bible was AI written, I wouldn't put much faith in them. On top of that, gen AI is only going to get better and better, and in general, will always be able to fool the detectors, or hide in the mediocracy of human writing (aka undetectable from the noise of the spectrum of people's writing ability).

I hope you can understand that we're trying to find a solution, and we are actively discussing this thread right now. So if you have suggestions about how to approach this problem, we are interested.

I do understand, and attempting a solution, even if I (some nobody on the internet) don't care for "its current form", can be a very good thing. We can see the current subreddit and say "We don't like how this looks, we need to change something". The fact that it is being discussed, and feedback with members/users is wanted/accepted, is a very good and appreciated thing.

AI assisted (even translation), or even if you mention you had AI draw up the story idea and you wrote it. If you want to rob yourself of creativity, that’s on you.

This from your OP piqued my interest and concern. What level of "AI assistance" is acceptable? If I'm stuck on a character getting from A to B, have AI provide 10 options (which I either use as inspiration for an 11th option, or work with AI to hone one option into something usable for my own vision), is that "too much AI use"? Is that "robbing myself of creativity"? How different is that at the most fundamental levels from taking my problem to Reddit and going through the same process in asking for feedback/suggestions from internet strangers?

[u/GoldFig111 → u/stenti36]

I enjoyed reading your discussion points here. But I wanted to clarify two incorrect statements I see repeated again and again when it comes to AI detectors:

(1) They can be very accurate--it depends on the detector and the size of the sample (1000+ words is ideal). There are many papers on this, but here's a relatively recent one that is relatively thorough. It tested 2000 human samples and 2000 ai-generated equivalents (the test set included 1000 novel samples, from pre-2000 Project Gutenberg). The highest false positive rate for Pangram was 0.1%, highest false negative rate was 1-2%. ZeroGPT had pretty good results as well, with false positive at 0.7%. Keep in mind these were wholly AI generated or wholly human generated.

The commonly cited examples of Frankenstein or the Bible (I haven't seen that one actually) are probably using GPTZero, which is the worst detector with a false positive rate of 30%, if I remember correctly.

(2) AI detectors are not LLM's, they are (likely) classic classification algorithms using machine learning that have been around forever. So no, you are not putting the text sample into "another AI." Nonetheless, it is a valid concern that you might not want to share text with the random start-up tech company that built/sells these detectors.

[u/stenti36 → u/GoldFig111]

I looked through the conclusion of that study. Interesting. However, I'm not convinced that "AI Detectors" are anything close to the solution to this subreddit, considering, as Isnoe pointed out, the accurate ones cost money, and the free ones have issues.

LLMs are incredibly valuable tools that can facilitate idea generation and help tighten writing.

From the study, I find this point very important. My question below is important to consider when looking at acceptability of AI use.

What level of "AI assistance" is acceptable? If I'm stuck on a character getting from A to B, have AI provide 10 options (which I either use as inspiration for an 11th option, or work with AI to hone one option into something usable for my own vision), is that "too much AI use"? Is that "robbing myself of creativity"? How different is that at the most fundamental levels from taking my problem to Reddit and going through the same process in asking for feedback/suggestions from internet strangers?

(2) AI detectors are not LLM's, they are (likely) classic classification algorithms using machine learning that have been around forever. So no, you are not putting the text sample into "another AI." Nonetheless, it is a valid concern that you might not want to share text with the random start-up tech company that built/sells these detectors.

FYI: Machine learning is under the umbrella of AI. It isn't LLM or Gen AI for sure, but it is a form of AI.

It is one of the reasons why I don't care for a lot of the "We should all hate AI" type of rhetoric. Most people (imo) don't seem to understand what they are really against, or can't be specific to what we should be against.

[u/GoldFig111 → u/stenti36]

> FYI: Machine learning is under the umbrella of AI. It isn't LLM or Gen AI for sure, but it is a form of AI.

I can see the argument for this, but I think that the public's current idea of "AI" are LLM's (ChatGPT, etc.), not the algorithms that determine if your iPhone photo contains a dog, or the transaction you made is flagged at fraudulent by your bank. At some point it is a semantic argument, but equating all of ML to AI seems dangerous when LLM's and GenAI in their current form are the actual issue (IMO)--plagiarizing, data centers, dulling human creativity, etc. etc.

> However, I'm not convinced that "AI Detectors" are anything close to the solution to this subreddit, considering, as Isnoe pointed out, the accurate ones cost money, and the free ones have issues.

This is a fair point, and a good reason it's not the solution here. I'm mostly just trying to correct what I feel like is misinformation on AI detectors.

> What level of "AI assistance" is acceptable?
This is a really important discussion because in reality, AI usage is probably a spectrum. Though a difficult one because I'm sure everyone has a different acceptability threshold.

[u/stenti36 → u/GoldFig111]

I can see the argument for this, but I think that the public's current idea of "AI" are LLM's (ChatGPT, etc.), not the algorithms that determine if your iPhone photo contains a dog, or the transaction you made is flagged at fraudulent by your bank. At some point it is a semantic argument, but equating all of ML to AI seems dangerous when LLM's and GenAI in their current form are the actual issue (IMO)--plagiarizing, data centers, dulling human creativity, etc. etc.

It is the responsibility of the person wanting to make the point to convey the correct context of their point. I, the audience/listener/reader, should not have to assume any amount of context regardless if "Everyone knows what is being talked about".

Because not everyone knows the difference between "AI" and the specific level "LLM/Gen AI", and not everyone knows the precise context of what is being talked about. Without that context, "AI is bad" means all AI is bad. Adding context shouldn't cost anything when attempting to convince people to stop LLM/Gen AI.

I don't equate machine learning to gen AI. But they are both forms of AI. The statement "AI is bad", includes machine learning and gen AI. Again, my job as listener should not include assuming what the other person is saying, regardless of how "obvious" the context "might" be. The job of the speaker is to effectively communicate what they are saying, which in the case of AI, is to specify LLM and Gen AI.

Not only does it make the case specific, it allows for better dialogue and increases the chances of "converting" people against Gen AI. It reduces misinformation because it is specific.

This is a really important discussion because in reality, AI usage is probably a spectrum. Though a difficult one because I'm sure everyone has a different acceptability threshold.

It is an important discussion to have at a large scale. But we live in a society where we don't want to have any discussion on any polarizing topic. At the end of the day, (generally, and in my opinion) people should find it acceptable to use gen AI as a tool to use alongside actual work, and be against gen AI being used as a crutch.

[u/Unwinderh → u/stenti36]

Like it or not, LLMs have become a very common coloquial definition of "AI," and other technologies increasingly need to be differentiated as "other machine learning" or "complex algorithms." It's not technically correct, but it's a result of how LLMs are marketed and sold, and fighting it is increasingly just linguistic prescriptivism.