If you use the word “clanker” to talk about generative AI, I am immediately suspicious of you.

[griotspeak@soc.mod-12.com]

@danirabbit I almost subtooted with this distinction. I had to look up “clanker” and then I was like “oh, there is established fictional bigotry. I see” it wasn’t so difficult to see that you weren’t defending ‘robots’

[electron_wizard@fosstodon.org]

@danirabbit Sometimes I accidentally take the wrong turn and when I notice the error, I just stand there, confused on where I am and how I have gotten myself into this situation. This post gave me this feeling. Is this legit or some kind of form of satire? I am confusingly standing at the wrong spot at the wrong time. What?

[teoman@discuss.systems]

@lesbianhacker @danirabbit
For the same reason I swear at the living room table when I hit my toe on it. Also the same reason I say "This piece of shit is not working" when my pc crashes.

[cyberia@tilde.zone]

@danirabbit ok clanker

[courtcan@mastodon.social]

@danirabbit I never even heard the word "clanker" before. Do I dare look it up? 😬

[westerninfidels@mefi.social]

@danirabbit I sometimes play an online game that pits humans against sci-fi robots. And some of the human players with microphones take obvious relish in referring to the robot enemies as "clankers."

I don't get it. I don't understand the glee in speaking a slur, even if it's a made up slur about unfeeling, imaginary entities. Who looks at the state of the world and says "Golly, it sure would be great to have some new slurs in here?"

I sure won't argue that old-fashioned real-world racism isn't a big factor, but there are enough people joining in, with a wide enough variety of accents, that it's hard to accept that as a complete explanation. Is there a slur-loving caveman hiding in each of us?

[thoe@snac.9space.no]

@danirabbit@mastodon.online

I'm with you. The willingness to use demeaning terms speaks volumes about a person.

[thejacenallen@mastodon.social]

@danirabbit this is the most mastodon post ever. Lmao.

[yora@mastodon.gamedev.place]

@danirabbit Are you saying slop bots are people?

Because slop bots aren't people.

[danirabbit@mastodon.online]

@yora it’s super easy to read the whole thread

[riversnow@mastodon.social]

@danirabbit is this a reference to me calling out Armin on bluesky lol https://bsky.app/profile/mitsuhiko.at/post/3mgd5h7hy5c25

[danirabbit@mastodon.online]

I’ve now blocked people who have called me “clanker” in response to this thread, which really honestly proves my point. The type of person that wants this kind of language to exist and wants to use it is not a good person

[danirabbit@mastodon.online]

@riversnow I don’t know who you are or who that is. I don’t use bluesky

[castanea_jo@ni.hil.ist]

@danirabbit I can't recall exactly the details but I think this was an aspect of The Animatrix back in the day wrt how humans treated the machines and how poor a reflection that was for the humans given they were just replaying slavery - this isn't me saying LLMs are conscious, but as you say it has some shared shapes

[riversnow@mastodon.social]

@danirabbit I assumed we are referring to the issue with chardet, I called Armin out for using the word Clanker, he used the exact same phrase "LLMs aren't people", which is why I thought you referred to it

[jaye@theforkiverse.com]

@danirabbit I really appreciate your insights and thoughts. Feels very level-headed, which isn’t something you see too much these days.

[cap_ybarra@beige.party]

@danirabbit i would like for a robust taxonomy of words for people who are forcing llms into everything for their own personal profit & fun; i am hoping my frustration with these people and their rot of my world doesn't make me a bad person.

[danirabbit@mastodon.online]

@castanea_jo yes exactly. The point to me isn’t if the machines feel bad—they don’t because they can’t. The point is what it says about the people who want to behave like this

[danirabbit@mastodon.online]

@cap_ybarra “capitalist”, “fascist”, “white supremacist”, “anti-worker”. It’s pretty easy to point at the tech bros who aspire to be slave owners without making up new fake slurs

[joshg@mathstodon.xyz]

@danirabbit yeah. the Star Wars connection made me find it kind of funny early on, where the term had weird WWI inter-european slur vibes (like kraut, limey, whatever) which are a bit uncomfortable but less problematic from a power perspective (but still othering and dehumanizing so meh).

but, like, we have "slop". it's simple, it doesn't anthropromorphize the statistical extrapolation machines, and it doesn't remind people of bigotry.

makes me wonder if people still using "clanker" are just more 4chan types trying to poison the waters on purpose.