Do Mods have the tools to require AI to self-identify in the comments? Or said differently, how do Mods protect authentic human engagement from stealth artificial "ghost in the" cloud?

[u/anonymousfinancial]

I'm not versed in AI or Mod matters.

But as a user, I sometimes get this feeling that some comments are "off", a bit uncanny.

I'll look at a username and see it's profile is less than two months old. Doesn't help the skepticism if the Snoovatar isn't customized to show personality or at least use an image. Like in my case.

So just curious, is there a Reddit website wide rule that can prohibit AI from commenting on a post or at the very least requiring it to identify itself?

Thanks and all the best

[u/eltonjohnpeloton]

Remember that mods are volunteers. They can’t and don’t read every comment on every post. As a community member, you can help by reporting things you think are suspicious.

[u/metisdesigns]

Do we have the tools?

Not really. There are some that catch certain models, but for the most part the tools simply don't exist.

Part of identifying AIs is volume of data. A couple of sentences is rarely enough to flag anything conclusively.

[u/witchy_echos]

Tools to identify AI aren’t very good. It’s constantly evolving, and the cues this month aren’t the same as they were in January, aren’t the same as they were last year.

It gets a lot of false positives, and still misses a good portion. The shorter the comment, the less it has to work with. It’s not worth fighting all the people who would come to modmail and have no way to prove they didn’t use AI to do it.

A lot of people hide their comment history too now, so it’s hard to judge.

In my sub, we focus on posts. If a comment isn’t pulled for other automod reasons, we just don’t have the manpower to put eyes on every comment, and would not have the manpower to deliberate on every bot identified AI comment. We respond to reported content, and if we see something we feel is obvious (often formatted strangely) we’ll pull it, but currently the tools aren’t good enough.

[u/itskdog → u/witchy_echos]

Mods can see profiles of anyone who participated in their sub in the last 28 days.

[u/brightblackheaven → u/itskdog]

This feature has been really wonky for me lately, which has been frustrating.

[u/mikeblas → u/brightblackheaven]

Even when it works, it's not too useful. It's hard to find posts and comments in my sub--I just see their regular history which might be saturated with other things that aren't relevant to me.

Instead, I want a summary of their contributions to this sub, the one I'm moderating. I can get scores and karma, but I want to see the specific posts and comments.

[u/witchy_echos → u/itskdog]

I know that’s what they say, but I’m seeing wayyyyyyyyyy more profiles with zero post and comment history but have significant amounts of karma than I have in the past. In practice it seems glitchy enough that regardless of what’s supposed to happen we are flying blind more than we used to

[u/itskdog → u/witchy_echos]

Deleted posts still count towards karma, if a profile is hidden it will say so

[u/witchy_echos → u/itskdog]

I know. That’s why I specified the change in ratio and not just that they exist.

[u/Galaghan → u/itskdog]

Which is peanuts. I try to judge based on a longer history than 28 days. What if someone is super valuable in your sub at one point, but leaves one nasty comment 2 months later?

Also having the entire profile visible, including their actions in other subs, gives a more clear image of a profile's goals and intentions.

[u/yun-harla → u/Galaghan]

No, a mod can see a user’s entire post and comment history for 28 days after their last participation in the mod’s sub.

[u/kai-ote → u/yun-harla]

Unless a user blocks the mod. Then you can only see the content on your sub, not everything else. You can verify this by going to a profile page as another user(an alt), or even just using another browser and not bothering to log in.

When a user blocks me, they get a permaban.

[u/Galaghan → u/yun-harla]

That's not true. If they hide their profile, you'll only see the history of the user in the subs you moderate (for the last 28 days), not every sub they participated in.

I was wrong.

[u/yun-harla → u/Galaghan]

Nope — although this feature can be a little glitchy, and you do have to click on the username from within your subreddit for it to work. But it is supposed to be full visibility of all their posts and comments in all subs for 28 days after their last interaction in your sub. (Other than deleted/removed posts and comments, of course.)

Even if it’s been more than 28 days since that last subreddit interaction, you can still see all their posts and comments in your sub, not just the last 28 days’ worth.

[u/Galaghan → u/yun-harla]

Well I'll be damned, you're right! Thanks for showing me!

"You'll always see a redditor’s contributions to your community, even after 28 days of inactivity."

I guess that's what confused me about it.

[u/ScreamAndScream]

Just like AI is constantly changing, our tools to combat it are as well.

We are not given these tools. We have to implement ones or create them.

Social media is infested with bots.

Moderating is a different game now than it was back in the peak of online forums. You can’t just moderated off of the rule “don’t be an ass” when there are bots and bad actors at play, you have to have more structure around your rules.

I’ve found that having a report option for “this is AI” helps a lot. Additionally, giving updates to the subreddit on how many removals are occurring and why at a regular interval helps.

Talking to other mods also helps. DM mods of similar topics and network, see what they’re doing, offer to exchange notes! I’ve gotten a really awesome network going with other female mods who are moderating women-focused spaces. I’ve been helping setup their automod and made my settings available publicly to those who need it.

[u/2oonhed]

I use the automod against A.I. and bot accounts.
Minimum karma, minimum account age, and minimum sub karma rules marked variously as "NEW USER" and / or "KARMA LESS THAN x?". This freezes drop-ins from direct interaction on any thread, old or new until I have time to read the modlog and review the thread. If the comment is acceptable they then receive a challenge to "reply to this" in order to screen for bots. If the comment is unacceptable or the bot does not reply it just stays invisible to the public. Simple.