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Föderation EN Fr 11.04.2025 23:55:16 I've been writing using em dashes since the 1990s. The reason AI uses em dashes is because it was trained on my writing, and that of countless other humans like me. Medien: 1 |
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Föderation EN Fr 11.04.2025 23:56:50 @kagan This is an absolutely brilliant illustration of the core issue |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:36:46 @codinghorror Thank you! 😊 |
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Föderation EN Fr 11.04.2025 23:58:16 @kagan Good point. It's worth reminding ourselves that it writes that way--that bland, boring-ass, soulless way--because it's emulating the kind of the writing that is thickest on the ground in its corpus, and that corpus came from all of us. Garbage in --> garbage out. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:08:27 @kagan @raganwald so, you're the culprit behind those cursed m-dashes? |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:12:24 |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:16:53 @raganwald @kagan did you learn this in school? When did this nonsense start? 😡 |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:34:33 @deborahh @raganwald Not sure if you're serious or not, but just in case… The OED has a reference to the em dash by that name as early as 1836: https://www.oed.com/dictionary/em-dash_n?tl=true One expert notes that it's existed "Since the days of metal type" and claims its use declined after the invention of the typewriter: https://literaryashland.org/?p=11371 And Wikipedia has examples of similar varieties of dashes, albeit with different names, by 1733: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dash#History This isn't "nonsense", and it's certainly not new. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:36:41 @kagan @raganwald huh. Thanks. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:40:47 Normal dashes are for making horizontal lines and bullet lists in markdown formatting. Oh, and for joining words too I guess. Em dashes on the other hand—so versatile! 😍 |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:44:07 > why were normal dashes insufficient? What need did m-dash fill? Here's a decent quick guide to the difference between hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes: https://www.thesaurus.com/e/grammar/types-of-dashes/ |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:21:10 @kagan @raganwald aha. So, it seems I can continue to ignore m-dashes: 'it typically takes the place of certain other punctuation marks: namely commas, parentheses, colons, and semicolons." … since I am a big fan of using commas, parentheses, colons, and semicolons. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:30:01 @kagan The only people who don't regularly use em dashes are people who use Windows, because it's the only common operating system that makes it practically impossible to type them. (It's ALT+0151, *if* you have a full keyboard.) And the sad thing is, Windows has been the most popular OS for over 35 years, now, so most people never learned how to properly use typography on a computer. I suggest "The Mac is Not a Typewriter" (1995), by Robin Williams, for people who didn't get the memo. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 00:30:18 @kagan I've been using em dashes for years. Then I got curious when to use em dashes versus en dashes versus hyphens. Merriam-Webster to the rescue! https://www.merriam-webster.com/grammar/em-dash-en-dash-how-to-use |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:21:46 @kagan Thank you. That some folks—so called professionals, no less—have equated the presence of em dashes to AI-generated writing underscores the poor state of literacy today. While people have abused this punctuation mark before AI came into the scene, anyone has access to plenty of resources online on how to use it correctly. |
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Föderation · Sa 12.04.2025 01:28:32 @kagan@wandering.shop My books were used by Meta to train their AI. Despite a copyright declaration explicitly forbidding it. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:34:24 @kagan @lisamelton BIG fan of the em dash! |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:43:27 @kagan Someone Swedish started writing to me (in English) about ten days ago using em dashes. I immediately asked if they were using genAI, because it's very rare for Swedes (or indeed anyone in Europe) to use unspaced dashes. They insist not, but still every message is florid, repetitive - and jammed full of em dashes. I smell an AI rat. |
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Föderation EN Sa 12.04.2025 01:46:45 @Janeishly Ask them to swear? (Not really joking.) |
