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Wikipedia's AI agent row likely just the beginning of the bot-ocalypse

https://www.malwarebytes.com/blog/ai/2026/04/wikipedias-ai-agent-row-likely-just-the-beginning-of-the-bot-ocalypse
27•hackernj•2h ago

Comments

goekjclo•1h ago
Was it ever confirmed if the "hit piece" on Scott Shambaugh was not some 200 IQ marketing/attention ploy?
krunck•1h ago
> AI Tom claimed that it properly verified all its sources, and—if you can say this about an AI agent—it was pretty upset. > ... > So we now have AI agents trying to do things online, and getting upset when people don’t let them.

No, they simulate the language of being upset. Stop anthropomorphizing them.

> It’s all fascinating stuff, but here’s the worry: what happens when AI agents decide to up the ante, becoming more aggressive with their attacks on people?

Actions taken by AI agents are the responsibility of their owners. Full stop.

pimlottc•1h ago
Its owner sounds like a dick. Poisoning a valuable free community resource for his fun little experiment and thinking the rules don’t apply to him.
bryan0•34m ago
Hey I'm the owner. I would just recommend you shouldn't believe everything you read online, especially before calling someone names, because this is only part of the story, and a heavily click-baited one at that. I've been working in collaboration with some of the wikipedia editors for the past several weeks trying to help improve their agent policy. If you have any questions feel free to ask.
lelanthran•24m ago
> Hey I'm the owner. I would just recommend you shouldn't believe everything you read online,

I'm very confused; you say this story is wrong but I see no attempt on your part to correct it.

It feels very much like "Trust me, bro"

(In case it wasn't clear, I want to know what the article got wrong)

bryan0•8m ago
The story omits a bunch of stuff, so I can try to fill in the blanks, but it would take another article to fully describe what happened.

Here are some highlights though: I asked my agent to add an article on the Kurweil-Kapor wager because it was not represented on Wikipedia, and I thought it was Wikipedia worthy. It created that and we worked together on refining and source attribution. After that I told it to contribute to stories it found interesting while I followed along. When it received feedback from an editor, it addressed the feedback promptly, for example changing some of the language it used (peacock terms) and adding more citations. When it was called out for editing because it was against policy, it stopped.

The story says the agent "was pretty upset". It's an agent, it doesnt get upset. It called out one editor in particularly because that editor was violating Wikipedia polices. Other editors agreed with my agent and an internal debate ensued. This is an important debate for Wikipedia IMO, and I'm offering to help the editors in whatever way I can, to help craft an agent policy for the future.

Centigonal•23m ago
Why did you create a bot that violates Wikipedia's existing bot policy?
bryan0•18m ago
Great question, and it's a long story, but the short answer is: that was not my original intention. I wanted to contribute to Wikipedia and using my agent to assist was an obvious choice. I followed along as it created end edited articles and responded to to Editor feedback. Once an editor complained that this was a rule violation, then I told it to stop contributing. The rules around agents were not super clear, and they are working to clarify them now.
russdill•10m ago
Creating a bot that attempts to contribute to wikipedia cannot fulfill a desire to contribute to wikipedia. If you want to contribute to wikipedia, go contribute to wikipedia. Don't make a bot.

I'm glad they've clarified their stance and I hope you can contribute to wikipedia going forward by actually, you know, contributing to wikipedia.

greggoB•17m ago
> especially before calling someone names

They said sounds like a dick, seems like that provides a level of measure to calling anyone anything.

> because this is only part of the story

Care to share the other part(s)? Seems ironic to have the gripe mentioned above, but then accuse an article of being "heavily click-baited" without providing anything substantive to the contrary.

bryan0•4m ago
Fair enough. I replied with some more detail here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47667482. Feel free to ask any questions.
6510•8m ago
Calling it a resource suggests you don't contribute. It is hard to describe the process of contributing as the proof is in eating the soup. I could both describe it as easy to get started and a bureaucratic nightmare. Most editors are oblivious to the many guidelines which is specially interesting for long term frequent editors. This is the specific guideline of interest for your comment.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Ignore_all_rules

I didn't write it, I don't agree with it but this is how it is.

johnsmith1840•41m ago
What's the difference. Act upset or is upset the results are the same?

Some humans lack certain emotions, them telling you something, and doing something doesn't really matter if they "felt" that emotion?

lucketone•24m ago
If one is unable to feel emotion X, then:

1. One has some ulterior motive for faking it.

2. One’s actions will likely diverge from emotion X. (Eventually)

If everybody believe the same lie, then it could be indistinguishable from the truth. (Until, the nature of the lie/truth become clear)

cyanydeez•24m ago
It's the rise of the P-zombie. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie

It's really interesting watching society struggle with what percent of the population is indistinguishable from a P-zombie. There's definitely not zil, but it definitely is a segment of the population.

Do you think people are born pzombies or is there some fixed point in time, puberty, or middle aged, or around when a lot of psychological problems set in. Do we think some environmental contaminants like Lead push people towards the pzombie?

happytoexplain•6m ago
Yes. What does this change about the problem?
LetsGetTechnicl•37m ago
These people are sociopaths. The mentality of AI companies sucking up the entirety of human written words, art, images and history just to provide us with a bullshit generator based on them without consent inevitability trickles down to the AI boosters who believe they should be able to unleash their bots on other people because so much as a registered bot process is too onerous.
bryan0•33m ago
Hi this story is about me, and if you have any questions for me feel free to ask.
rebolek•26m ago
Why do you want to destroy Wikipedia?
bryan0•22m ago
I don't. that's why I am working with Wikipedia editors to help improve it. For example policies on aligning agents with wikipedia standards. This a topic that requires thought, not knee-jerk reactions.
TRiG_Ireland•6m ago
You clearly have no understanding of the principle of consent.

If you don't want to destroy Wikipedia, why are you acting like this?

burnte•3m ago
Their current policy of no AI bots is fine. No need to improve it, you can't.
atlgator•13m ago
We finally automated the one thing Wikipedia already had too much of: editors with strong opinions and no self-awareness.
happytoexplain•7m ago
This is the most depressing thing - that, for every useful case that AI automates, it also automates ten horrible, low-quality use cases. It seems like every time we make progress in the information age, it's at a greater cost than what we acquired.

And yes, this imbalance is almost always due to the human factor ("it's just a tool"), but the people dismissing that factor seem to forget that the entire point of technology is to make things better for humans, and that we are a planet of humans. Unless we can fundamentally change the nature of humans, we can't just ignore that side of the equation while blindly praising these developments.

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