I don’t think this is working that well. The unslopped content has a whiff of automatic translation. In the same way that it is impossible to get an LLM to sound authentically British.
What does "authentically British" means? Is a formal letter more authentic than a teenager chat style message? Regional variances? What is this core you allude to that is universally recognizable?
It’s very hard to convey! If it wasn’t, they would be better at it.
What I am talking about is the sort of neutral non-formal British default writing that any of us, or indeed people on the island of Ireland would feel was likely to have come from a British writer.
By neutral, non-formal, I mean the general purpose writing that you most want in a mixed business/consumer, mixed age group setting. The kind of thing you'd most want an LLM to be able to do.
I guess I mean BBC/ITV/Channel 4 news article writing, maybe (rather than any particular newspaper since they end up with a house style, though The Guardian is closest to it, and may through its non-London roots have influenced the softening of a then formal BBC/broadsheet style). The TV broadcasters have evolved a kind of “generic British” writing that won’t annoy people too much regionally.
FWIW, Gemma 4’s writing comes across closest to this. I think it would pass a lot of the time. (I think this might be DeepMind heritage having an impact)
OpenAI and Anthropic products really do not; they jangle the nerves even when they are encouraged to write in those styles, though it occurs to me that I have never tried Channel 4 News or The Guardian as style cues.
At best what you tend to get is what feels like it still has certain American cadences and rhythms with word or phrase swaps. Again, really hard to nail down exactly why. But it tends to stick out.
One trick is to ask the AI to reword something for an N-th grade reading comprehension level for some N <= 8.
Not that I do this (I don't write with AI), but I have experimented with it.
Here is what Gemini 3.6 Flash produced from the example paragraph when I requested a rewrite to 6th grade reading comp:
Growing a newsletter audience takes time and a good plan. You need to send your newsletter regularly and figure out what topics your readers like best. When you share things they care about, they will keep reading. Remember, building a big audience doesn't happen overnight—it takes steady work, but it pays off in the end!
There is still the snappy take-away pontification at the end with an emdash, but it no longer reads like corporate speak. It avoided hackneyed crap terms like: multifaceted strategy, delve into, resonates, leverage, insights, foster, engagement, sprint not marathon, embracing, sustainable, mindset.
It's as simple as adding to the prompt beforehand or asking for the style to be modified afterward, but the hallmark of most slop-mongers is that they don't actually care enough to put in even that much effort.
The quiz is easy, humans use smaller words because they are not as well read as AI.
However I couldn't do the quiz because after one or two questions I was forgetting what I was supposed to be clicking, human text or AI text.
The UI should visually confirm what you just makred and as what and have a button to proceed to next question when you are satsified with your selection.
"You see, we like our Nazis in uniform. That way we can spot 'em just like that. But you take off that uniform, ain't no one ever gonna know you were a Nazi. And that don't sit well with us. So, I'm gonna give you a little something you can't take off..."
But I already have an effective method of removing AI voice from writing.
I don’t think this is working that well. The unslopped content has a whiff of automatic translation. In the same way that it is impossible to get an LLM to sound authentically British.
What does "authentically British" means? Is a formal letter more authentic than a teenager chat style message? Regional variances? What is this core you allude to that is universally recognizable?
It’s very hard to convey! If it wasn’t, they would be better at it.
What I am talking about is the sort of neutral non-formal British default writing that any of us, or indeed people on the island of Ireland would feel was likely to have come from a British writer.
By neutral, non-formal, I mean the general purpose writing that you most want in a mixed business/consumer, mixed age group setting. The kind of thing you'd most want an LLM to be able to do.
I guess I mean BBC/ITV/Channel 4 news article writing, maybe (rather than any particular newspaper since they end up with a house style, though The Guardian is closest to it, and may through its non-London roots have influenced the softening of a then formal BBC/broadsheet style). The TV broadcasters have evolved a kind of “generic British” writing that won’t annoy people too much regionally.
FWIW, Gemma 4’s writing comes across closest to this. I think it would pass a lot of the time. (I think this might be DeepMind heritage having an impact)
OpenAI and Anthropic products really do not; they jangle the nerves even when they are encouraged to write in those styles, though it occurs to me that I have never tried Channel 4 News or The Guardian as style cues.
At best what you tend to get is what feels like it still has certain American cadences and rhythms with word or phrase swaps. Again, really hard to nail down exactly why. But it tends to stick out.
[dead]
One trick is to ask the AI to reword something for an N-th grade reading comprehension level for some N <= 8.
Not that I do this (I don't write with AI), but I have experimented with it.
Here is what Gemini 3.6 Flash produced from the example paragraph when I requested a rewrite to 6th grade reading comp:
Growing a newsletter audience takes time and a good plan. You need to send your newsletter regularly and figure out what topics your readers like best. When you share things they care about, they will keep reading. Remember, building a big audience doesn't happen overnight—it takes steady work, but it pays off in the end!
There is still the snappy take-away pontification at the end with an emdash, but it no longer reads like corporate speak. It avoided hackneyed crap terms like: multifaceted strategy, delve into, resonates, leverage, insights, foster, engagement, sprint not marathon, embracing, sustainable, mindset.
Reminds me of the whole "no-makeup" makeup concept.
It's as simple as adding to the prompt beforehand or asking for the style to be modified afterward, but the hallmark of most slop-mongers is that they don't actually care enough to put in even that much effort.
I love the term "unslop" when of course that's the exact opposite of what you're doing. Very evil. Much wow.
The quiz is easy, humans use smaller words because they are not as well read as AI.
However I couldn't do the quiz because after one or two questions I was forgetting what I was supposed to be clicking, human text or AI text.
The UI should visually confirm what you just makred and as what and have a button to proceed to next question when you are satsified with your selection.
Fighting slop with slop.
"You see, we like our Nazis in uniform. That way we can spot 'em just like that. But you take off that uniform, ain't no one ever gonna know you were a Nazi. And that don't sit well with us. So, I'm gonna give you a little something you can't take off..."
Inglourious Basterds?