The rules for AI involvement in stories

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Honestly, I don’t like people blocking content just because of their preconception about AI gen.

I agree that AI will cause serious trouble for all creative people, and as such, I understand the frustration and anger about content created with AI.

BUT… as with everything, there is not just black and white. Simply burying one’s head in the ground to avoid getting in touch with anything AI-generated is not the solution.

There is not just one way to use AI, there is not just bad content created as soon as an AI has been used in some way.

And most importantly: There is no secure way to tell whether AI has been used at all.

So what’s the point in blocking based on a tag?

This is the major reason why I actually wanted to get rid of the tag altogether. I don’t want people blindly blocking based on a tag that basically says nothing at all. There could be many stories without the tag that have been created with AI. And there could be great stories that have the tag, because the author used AI in a sensible, creative way.

Using the tag to block is just applying one’s preconceptions. And it won’t change the world.

Some people convinced me not to get rid of the tag for now. But I’m still not happy about it, as it just helps to feed people’s preconceptions. As so many other oversimplifying flags have been in the history of mankind.

I have to admit that I had and still have my own preconceptions, and I frequently avoid stories written with AI. But then I learned that some of the stories I really liked and made me horny as hell were, after all, created with some AI assistance. And that made me wonder. Who am I fooling here?

In the end, what are these sites about? Trying to better the world, or having fun and blowing one’s load?

You decide.

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As a gratuitous note: I also don’t block tags. If I see some that I know I won’t like, I won’t click those stories, but I’ll also usually give the ai-[…] tags a try. I’ll close it out if it opens with a long sight/smell/taste/touch/audio description of walking down a hallway, but I’ll usually give stuff a try. That’s my use case. It just sounds like some others are much more adamant and make use of those blocking features than I. I do wonder if a large fraction of readers block such tags, or if it’s at a <1% level.

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blocking content just because of their preconception about AI gen.

There are many reasons why a user may wish to avoid AI generated content. There are questions about the ethics about how the models were trained (plagiarism concerns), the energy usage, as well as more philosophical questions about what constitutes art.

This is all before you get to people’s lived experience with AI content and quality issues. Part of today in my professional life was seeing the damage because someone decided to vibe-code something important.

Painting this all as “preconceptions about AI gen” appears needlessly reductive and combative, as though users aren’t informed.

BUT… as with everything, there is not just black and white. Simply burying one’s head in the ground to avoid getting in touch with anything AI-generated is not the solution.

You’re literally saying things aren’t black and white, but then appearing to judge people who don’t want to engage with it?

There is no secure way to tell whether AI has been used at all.

This is a legitimate argument, and I do understand points made by @Mafisto and I am sympathetic to the moderators and reviewers.

But then I learned that some of the stories I really liked and made me horny as hell were, after all, created with some AI assistance. And that made me wonder. Who am I fooling here?

If you get off to AI stuff, that’s your call. But it also misses the larger point many of the writers have made in this thread about how frustrating it can be to have work that you spent months on placed next to another work, labeled identically, that someone made in a few hours based on a prompt engine.

You seem to be exclusively coming from the position of “if AI is good enough to get me off, it should be allowed without labels, because what’s the point", and that seems unsympathetic to the writers and to many of the users of the site.

Given the context of the challenges of moderating the old tag system, I understand why these changes are being made, and I respect that this is necessary for managing moderator/reviewer load, and because the previous system was unenforceable. I get that and I appreciate the context that’s been provided.

But this response still made me deeply concerned.

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You want to change the world, you want AI to disappear.

And I understand that. If I were younger and would have my whole professional life before me, I’d be deeply concerned about my own future, too. Especially if I’m a creative person (which I am, as I see coding as a creative process, too).

My message is:

These sites are not the battleground to fight this battle on. The battle won’t be won or lost here.

Whether humankind will live through these changes depend on many things, not the least of which is whether it will even be feasible that AI is used by the general public - it might turn out to be way too expensive. And then we’re back on only companies and rich people being able to use it - giving them another advantage along with so many other they already have.

If you want to engage in this fight, be my guest. Again, I’m with you, and I’m just as concerned as you are.

But fight it somewhere else, not on a site about smut erotica.

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I respect anyone that has a moral reason for disliking anything AI but you are falling into the point that is being made again , that authors believe that they have put more effort in than someone who used AI. That’s not fact that’s an opinion yet it gets treated as a fact and is used as a stick to beat those who use AI with .

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BTW, I bet you have, too. Don’t fool yourself. And don’t think you’re better than anyone else because you believe you only “get off” to stories written by humans. Humans also plagiarize, they also create trash, amazing work and everything in between. And that doesn’t change if they use AI as a tool.

Again, it’s not just black and white. Nothing is.

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Yeah it’s funny that nobody replied to the comment that I saw a story or two that had all the top 10 rated badges had a AI assist tag . I can guess the reply if there was one “ oh all those people have low standards and just wanna get off to something”

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TLDR: I’m ambivalent about AI use but the tone this conversation has taken is deeply off putting.

I’m not gonna lie, reading through this thread has put a serious damper on my enthusiasm for this site. Frankly it’s not even the ai rules themselves or the philosophical discussions around ai use, but the way site officials in this thread have conducted themselves. Many of these comments are needlessly inflammatory and reductive to the comments that are measured and thought out. A debate is one thing, but the way both writers and readers are being spoken about is incredibly disappointing as a long time reader and sponsor (as well as writer for a shorter time) Frankly even the rules as written are needlessly inflammatory, framing the current debate that is happening all across society as “anti-ai activism” comes across like a conservative misusing the term woke. It’s thought terminating and nuance flattening. The rules don’t need such a disclaimer. They just need to be defined and enforced. I genuinely wonder if this thread would be half as long if not.

To contribute to the discussion at hand: I feel the more information able to offered the better, especially since hard enforcement is impossible. If this truly is a negotiation between writers and readers then give us the language to negotiate with. Disclosure is always a good thing. objection to disclosure comes across as dishonesty. As this new technology develops, documenting the level of involvement will be important for archival purposes. Whether we like it or not, this being one of the only kink centered gay erotica sites in existence means it’s part of queer history as it’s being made, ESPECIALLY with internet censorship laws on the rise, meaning it’s far more important than just a place to get off. I’d appreciate if everyone, especially its stewards would treat it as such.

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A couple of points to consider:

  • I believe that most AI checkers use AI.
  • Microsoft Editor (the spell and grammar check on Microsoft word) I believe now is AI based; the same with Google Docs.
  • AI is being integrated with a lot of everyday tools for better or worse and becoming increasingly difficult to avoid. Even if you elect to not use LLMs for spell / grammar checks it is possible that your selected word processor might be using it already.

I only point this out to say that it getting increasingly more difficult to avoid and is only becoming more prevalent. It would not shock me that for the next generation of young authors going through school that their use of AI (as a tool) might seem normal and question why you wouldn’t use it.

For those who are old enough to remember, this is somewhat similar to debates around digital photography vs film photography. I grant that as a analogy there are greater differences than there are similarities, but the substance of the arguments do overlap. My only point in bringing this up is that with new technologies, there is always going to be a struggle between the integration of newer tools into crafts and their legitimate uses.

Since stories that are suspected of being AI generated are scrapped, I am happy. With regard to AI assisted - I think that this was too vague of a term as most stories are going to be AI assisted. Technically, if spell check or a grammar check was used it is AI assisted - this will only get worse as AI is further integrated into Microsoft Office and Google Docs. Even in my email for work, I get notifications asking if I want Gemini to check and possibly re-phrase email.

So for me the scenarios that we should consider is down to the following cases:

  1. Translations: I think this is one where there is little debate and argument. If a user uses an LLM to translate their work from another language into English then I don’t have an issue with this. I think a tag here would be appropriate. I would appreciate maybe a note that needs to be added that lets users know what the original language is. This will also be evident based on mistranslated idioms and expressions.
  2. AI Prose - Personally, for me, this would apply to a case where there is 35%-65% of the work is AI generated. Anything more than 65% I am leaning towards it being just AI generated and not original. Anything less, it is written by a human, but for whatever stylistic reason the author chose to use AI tools for assistance in writing a particular scene. This might be due to a change in prose style, lack of knowledge to actually write about a topic, or for stylistic purposes.

Overall, as a site and community we rely on the honor system. Will their be users who try to game the system to avoid the AI tag, probably yes. In the grand scheme of things, who cares. For me I write my stories, because I like the story and I want to share it. I write because it is something I genuinely enjoy doing.

So in terms of where we go from here. I think we try the new terms and see how it goes. If it works great, if after 3 or 4 months there is an increase of AI content or questionable material, then I suggest we revisit. This by necessity will be an ongoing discussion and not something that can be finalized as there are too many changes and tools coming out that will add nuance and complexity.

Lastly, just a gentle encouragement to everyone, always try to assume good will from members of the community. Writing in forums is not like writing in a story where we might take hours to figure out how to respond or craft dialogue. As is evident from the dialogue there are passions on both sides with regard to the usage of AI in writing stories and its ethics. However - from my reading of the responses everyone’s pretty much on the same side here, and we are only arguing about where we draw a line or how detailed the tags are. So I end with one of my favorite quotes, “Don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good.”

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I’m genuinely sorry that you see it that way, Chris.

I’ve seen that you cancelled your sponsorship the other day. Let me say that I truly appreciate you sponsoring us for so long, and there are no bad feelings on my part. You’ve indeed shown more engagement towards the site than the vast majority of users.

Now to the points you made.

You simply haven’t been part of all the discussions we, the admins, have had to go through in the last couple of months. With authors who were pissed that we outed them for using AI. With readers who want to blindly block anything that even remotely smells like AI.

Hell, even in this thread, you see some people who would even ban Grammarly from being used in stories!

These people want to force their opinion on us. “You have to block anything that has any AI in it, or give me the option to block it, or ELSE!”

I’m not making this up. It’s a reality. There’s a war going on, and the people don’t care whether the collateral damage is destroying everything left and right in their path. I am frustrated about that.

Authors are mad at us because they don’t want to be outed as AI users. They claim that our detection is flawed.

Readers are mad at us because we didn’t flag a story that, in their eyes, is clearly AI.

In the end, WE - the admins - are in the middle of this fight. And WE are the ones suffering.

And I’m not going to stand for that. Fight somewhere ELSE, people. Not here. This is NOT your battleground.

And this is why I wrote that disclaimer that you find so offensive.

Frankly, connecting me with any anti-woke propaganda is hurting a lot. You have no idea how many fights I’ve been fighting against the anti-woke crowd, who are screaming at anything that has anything that they consider “woke” in it.

So I’m not going to take this accusation lightly.

We have to be careful not to allow people to drive a wedge into OUR community as well. It’s too precious to be destroyed by outside destructive forces, especially if we’re only affected tangentially (like in the whole AI topic).

Corin.

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I’m not taking a side in a war. I’m observing how this conversation has been conducted from a public facing front. You’re right. I’m not privy to those conversations with authors, you are. I don’t have that context. I just have what is officially being posted. Which is my point. I’m not accusing you as being anti-woke, I’ve been here long enough to know you’re not. My point is about communication and public perception. Without the context you’re privy to that’s how that rule comes across. Within only the context of this discussion thread (and I’ve read through the entire thing) many of your replies come across as inflammatory or misdirected anger. are you the only doing that? Of course not- but you’re the site owner. Of course you have WAY more info than any of us. Please remember that the opposite is true, we have less info than you, so we’re not gonna know where this heat is coming from. I say this someone with a background in fundraising, where public perception is everything. Finally like it or not, much like the AI is a genie out of a bottle, so is the debate about its future. The “war” is here and was always going to be here by the very nature of the site being a place of creative endeavors.

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Indeed. That is practically word by word what I’ve been saying many times over :slight_smile:

Anyway, I’m sorry that my way of communicating has offended you and that you think it’s unprofessional.

It’s telling that this was the very reason that Soren left the team. He thought that I’m too blunt and that he can’t stand my way of confronting people.

So, yeah, there’s probably a lot of truth in that. I’m not a trained company shill who covers the most drastic and offensive actions in sugar coating and makes it sound like they have only the best interests of everyone in mind, when in fact they couldn’t care less about their customers and employees.

I don’t know if you remember that discussion about underage characters on the site. Where people wanted to tell me, that it would be pedophilia to have a character at the age of 17 in a story on the site. My reaction was and is still just as blunt towards those claims. I won’t hold back, that’s me.

So yeah, if you think that makes me less of a likeable person, that’s what I have to live with. But I’m not going to hide behind a front and a communication officer that sugar coats anything I’m saying.

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Again, I’m not trying to make this personal, or ask you to act like a shill. I don’t think less of you, I understand where you’re coming from. Maybe it’s because I have background in non-profit fundraising that I have this perspective but the readers, writers, the people in this thread, they ARE the customers (to use your word). Or more accurately, they are your constituents in a nonprofit endeavor (this archive of stories). Look I may be a fairly passive participant in this site due to my own issues but I care for this community deeply. Neither of us wants the wedge to be here so all I’m asking is to not hammer it in any further. I respect your active participation in the discussion but perhaps you might need take a step back from the active part, observe how the conversation goes, and make your decisions as site master from there. No sugarcoating needed. Like I said, you don’t need to provide justifications for how you run your site. If we’re going with one AI prose tag we’re going with one AI prose tag. If people are upset let them be upset. If people being abusive to you i.e. calling you a pedo, ban them from the site because that breaks the rules. There is no need to be in this thread exposing private sponsorship information, egging people on to leave the site, and being reductive to people like @anonusr who was making fairly even handed points as wanting AI to dissapear.

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I agree with most of what you’ve said.

Still, some people feel entitled to tell us what we have to do to make the site as convenient for them as possible.

Even though I usually try to accommodate people’s wishes if I can - as can be seen by the endless number of features I added over time, which were requested by someone - there are some things where I need to draw a line, usually, where policy is involved.

I make the rules. No one has the right to tell me that my rules are wrong or that I have to change them. This kind of entitlement doesn’t sit well with me. It’s a free service; the team and I put a lot of energy into this service. That doesn’t give anyone the right to tell us where we’re wrong and how to offer this service.

So yes, if someone is coming along telling me what I have to do to accommodate their view of the world, I might respond more aggressively than seems warranted. Especially if they also add some threat to this, “do it my way, or I won’t publish here anymore!” (that was someone else, not @anonusr).

So no, the users of the site are not my customers. They are people whom I invite to enjoy what I provide here. I like to hear their opinion, and I want to try to make it a good place for them. But that’s it. They don’t have ANY right to tell me what I can and cannot do in my own living room.

So, Chris, again, I’m not fighting with you. I hear you. And I understand where you’re coming from. But you have to realize that I need to make clear where I stand. Please understand that, even if you think my way of dealing with this isn’t the way you’d do it.

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Hi Everyone,

It seems that the conversation is beginning to veer off topic and we should strive to be focused on the discussion of the rules about AI and tags to be used. For the purpose of this thread and to help the community as a whole - I think we should try to remain focused on this.

While secondary conversations are related - I think it will be a distraction to the actual purpose of the thread and not helpful in this particular thread.

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The tag name was formerly AI assisted that got changed has changed again by the way to “Contains AI patterns” now incase anymore missed the notice :smiling_face:

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I can be naturally snarky too, but I just want to clarify that it should never be interpreted as dismissiveness of people or their arguments. The thing I detest the most in the world is “contempt”, I’ve never felt it (or at least not very often), and I just get angry when I see it. So please don’t take my snarkiness as dismissiveness.

I’ve been very present in this thread, mostly because I wanted to help people understand the rules and provide as much clarity as I could, although only Corin knows if I presented them correctly. I think what Chris picked up in the rules as extra is actually a sort of manifesto, a way to frame the reasons behind the changes, which are not very extensive from a day to day management point of view. They’re more of a shift in philosophy.

There’s a lot of frustration all around. I know a lot about how AI works, and I see what it does well, and how it can in certain cases be harnessed to do good things. But I’m also terrified by it and its impact on our world. I don’t know into what it will force us to evolve. So I understand all the feelings expressed about it by the authors here.

Just go easy on the demands made on people who do stuff for free. Yes, you have the right to not want to interact with AI at all, but you don’t have the right to force other people to make that convenient for you. You can believe all you want that authors should be forced to disclose how they make the stories they offer for free, but if they don’t want to, they don’t. And when you then turn to the management here and say “Make them do it!”, it puts undue pressure on us and it’s not really our role, or it’s not a role we want to play. So that just means that if you want not to interact with AI at all, you’ll have to find ways to do it that does not require forcing authors to do what they don’t wanna do, or admins to police what they don’t want to police. You’ll have to convince the authors to tell you, and if that doesn’t work, then accept that you might just not be able to achieve your objectives fully, but you can still do your best.

We achieved a lot in the past by convincing and informing. They might seem much less efficient than imposing and “educating”, but imposing often leads to backlash, and then we all lose.

And you have all the rights in the world to have any opinion about authors who use AI, and assume all you want that it automatically means they’re cheaters, they’re lazy, they don’t put any effort in their work, there’s nothing human in what they write, but it’s a sort of contempt. You don’t know their process at all, you just assume, and you might not think the efforts they put into it are actually efforts at sacrosanct “writing”, but they’re spending time doing something that the machine doesn’t do automatically. Dismissing them is a form of othering, of making second class citizens. We are banning the ones who just wrote smut in fifteen minutes with a few prompts on a GPT, those who put no effort in what they generate, so the site will never be swamped by those.

The real problem will come when it’s not people submitting the stories they had in their heads and used AI to help them tell them. It’s when AI bots will start submitting full AI stories by themselves with no human in the process. Reserve your anxiety for then. :slight_smile:

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That was perfect thank you :folded_hands: and I apologise if any of my replies to people came across as confrontational .

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I just realized I may have been subconsciously influenced by the AI debate when I wrote my latest story, with Dr. Hale rejecting technological aids for hypnosis. I swear it was not intended at all. :sweat_smile:

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Hehe I went the other way ,was so AI obsessed I was hearing AI voices in my Halloween entry :face_with_spiral_eyes::face_with_spiral_eyes::face_with_spiral_eyes::joy::joy::joy:

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