Sophie Labelle | Instagram | Bluesky
Transcript
four frame comic.
first frame shows a typical AI poster that says : All chatgpt flyers look the same, especially with this font! the text above it reads : I won’t go to your event if the poster was made by AI.
second frame shows a still frame from a Hank Green youtube video. text above reads : I won’t read your post or email and I won’t watch your video if they were made with AI.
third frame shows an AI restaurant poster of burgers and chicken in a window. text reads : I won’t patronize your shop or restaurant if it is advertised with AI.
last frame shows an MS paint window with badly written : Your bad art is better than AI slop. text reads : if you can’t take the time or make the effort to interact with me yourself, then why should I do it?
The Hank Green bandwagon hate really fucking irritates me.
The man, and his brother, have done decades of charity work. Raised millions for all sorts of progressive causes (Pizzamas). Created completely free online educational course videos that I know a large percentage here used in highschool/college (Crash Course). Produced thousands of science videos and topics (SciShow). The pair of them spend their time trying to educate and improve lives in any way they can (VlogBrothers), and give back for everything they have.
Hank makes a video that appears to have AI assistance, and people are ready to drop them on the spot like none of that matters.
Hank even apologized for his reliance on it. Gave receipts that it was never used in any of his other works. Used his experience as a cautionary tale of how AI it take over a process, and promised to do better.
Doesn't matter..... his previous decades of charity. His lifelong commitment to education... irrelevant... people want to hang him out to dry.
They stretch themselves over complex topics, educational materials, charity events... everything.... FOR FREE. I don't blame Hank for trying to streamline and organize things. I think the man has taken on way more than any one person should do. I think the people jumping on him to make him some kind of pariah are nothing but self-rightious douchebag fuckheads that haven't done even a fraction of good as those two brothers have, and they know it. They want to use this one thing as though it somehow makes them superior, like they ever did a goddamn thing for anyone. Like they could even begin to understand that level of work and charity to do all of that.
The man made a mistake doing too much and these cretins are tearing him down for clout. It's fucking disgusting. Decades of positivity without controversy and yet it has afforded him no grace from the people who readily consume his content.
It's easy to do nothing wrong, it's hard to do something right. Hank Green is a treasure.
Yeah, the hate is unwarranted.
As always, there’s people who will basically take the it’s evil no matter what path. If they feel that heavily about AI, they probably shouldn’t be using anything that uses Linux. Which is basically just about everything on the web.
Hank was using it to create some games and do research for his videos. An AI is really good at creating code and for that purpose making a small game. AI can help you research things by finding and searching for things relevant to what you want, but then you need to rely on actually understanding what is being cited.
There are obvious downsides to AI and all the data centers and everything but going about and saying no matter why AI will never use is just a fool errand.
It’s worth push pushing back on data centers and what not And I am involved in several of those movements. But AI bad is just a stupid take, Especially when Hank is using it for all intents and purposes pretty responsibly compared to some people at larger companies.
100% agree. People are shitting on Hank because they have literally nothing going on. They've made a hobby out of being outraged, and as a result have nothing more meaningful to contribute.
If they took the time to look into it, they'd realize the line they're using to claim that AI writes his scripts was actually something he himself simply said. Not only did he not outsource his writing to AI, he's honest enough that when people incorrectly accused him of this he disclosed that he does at times use it to aid his research. Not that anyone blathering about it values honesty enough to care.
He seems like good people to me. And Ai seems to be addicting like social media.
that's algorithm driven content platforms for you. youtube recommends to most people videos where people are raging, over the normal content of the channel. even people who don't know him get to see it, or otherwise hear about the rage. then, since many are not watching the new videos youtube will recommend them to fewer people than before. meanwhile the rest of the internet only gets to know about the rage, and decades of good work and charity does not matter at all, because that's the boring past nobody gets to know of. even the original viewer base gets reduced, because many see this fuckup but few remember what the creator is like actually. and the algorithm will surely not help to remember by showing the old videos.
There is a difference between hating him and holding him accountable.
he has been held to account. He already spoke on it. Yet that's not stopping the outrage mob needing a villain to shovel out rage content for clicks.
Because at this point, with this comic, it's not about holding him to account. That's done. At this point, it's farming for clout. Tying to dunk on a man with decades of charity and education because it might get a few likes.
It is illogical to assume that making people aware of communicative failures in science is done for the sake of clout. Making people aware of a failure in public science communication is a good and responsible thing, even after the event.
It is reasonable to still share the comic because the overall point is valid—even if he already apologized—both because sharing knowledge is good, and because the choice of whether to still watch Hank after his apology is individual; just because you and I forgive him doesn't make it unfair not to trust him as a result of this (I take the stance that I will continue to watch his content as long as he does not repeat this mistake: forgiveness is not permission, after all).
To use his failing as an example of this negative behavior, or to make the choice not to watch his content because of his AI use, is fair. To assume sharing the fact that he did and a resultant choice of the comic author (to not watch that one tainted video, which I also will not watch) were for clout is not fair or reasonable.
K
To remix an old saying: "A controversy can travel halfway around the world before the apology has time to put on its shoes". Sadly most outlets who reported on Hank's AI accusations aren't rushing to say "oh yeah he apologized". Maybe they stick it in an update in the article without changing the headline.
The world sucks. So this will stick around much longer than it needed to.
Hey, not trying to agree or disagree with you, I genuinely don't know who this person is and have absolutely no stakes in this fight. But I think you touched on something interesting and I'd like to offer some food for thought, not as a good thing that should be accepted, just something to take into consideration.
I grew up worshipping Lady Gaga, she was a huge factor for me coming out of the closet. Like she was a crucial part of my history because she did the "love the gays" thing around the same time I realized I was gay. Like this may sound stupid and probably is, but I genuinely felt deep affection, admiration and gratitude for her.
Then I found out she might be a zionist. The only source I found was Israeli propaganda, but she never denied it or addressed the genocide in any way. By that time I wasn't even paying attention to her or listening to her songs, she was basically a fond memory to me, and it still devastated me.
It took me months to realize that I didn't give a single fuck about the majority of the MCU cast (and hollywood, and most of everything that comes from the US) being full of confirmed zionists and zionist propaganda and I was still watching it, because I never cared about those people the way I cared about Lady Gaga.
You may call this hypocrisy and you're probably right, but what I'm trying to say is people aren't always rational enough to notice it. I still feel deeply hurt by Lady Gaga's silence, even as an adult who's well aware of how pathetic it makes me. My parassocial bond with her was formed when I was a vulnerable teenager going through a lot of bullshit and I didn't have anything better to get attached to and draw hope from. So even now I still feel a lot more disappointed about her silence than others' vocal support for genocide, even knowing it makes no sense. Because I never gave a fuck about them, so there's no parassocial feeling of betrayal or disappointment.
Idk, there's that saying about not bringing flowers all the time and as much as I hate it, it may be on to something. At this point I'm convinced most popular sayings have at least some tiny truth behind them. Again, not defending any of this, just saying it's a real factor and shouldn't be too surprising when you see it.
Greens are treasures for humanity, and they did a lot of great. But previous achievements shouldn't make you immune to criticism. And this is exact topic that should cause harsh criticisms. Hank is an educator, and the only good educator is one that has absolute trust of his audience. Right now his reaction to a backlash is exactly ideal one so I have good hope for the future, and I'm afraid it might not be so if the backlash wasn't as harsh.
The whole reason Hank is so great is that his team does proper research, and they're not afraid of showing their mistakes and correct them. If they start relying on LLMs, all of that can be thrown out of the window, you couldn't trust anything anymore, LLM's whole thing is that it breaks your brain into relying on it, as evident. A pop science video isn't good at all, if the viewers will have to double check every point.
So this is exactly correct reaction that should be modeled for all such occasions in the future, from both parties actually. And in Green's case, their previous legacy gives them enough social credits, that I totally trust him to be smart enough to reevaluate his processes and come up with safeguards, and if he actually does it, this will award him more trust.
Don't conflate accountability with blind hate.
Trust takes a lifetime to build and a second to break. This is no different.
That's all I care about, though. admitting fault and bettering oneself. I'm not one to think using AI once taints you forever. It's just a slipperly slope to outsourcing your brain, and I don't think Hank is doing that.