I recently came across a new term describe a specific type of online content:
"AI slopaganda."
But what exactly does this catchy, slightly derogatory phrase mean, and when did it first appear?
Essentially, "AI slopaganda" refers to the dissemination of low-quality, often inaccurate, and mass-produced content generated by artificial intelligence, specifically large language models.
The "slop" part highlights the lack of human refinement, originality, or factual rigor, while "propaganda" (or "paganda" as a portmanteau) points to its potential for spreading misinformation, biased narratives, or simply overwhelming the internet with vacuous text.
Examples include blog posts that sound plausible but offer no real insight, or news articles that are technically correct in grammar but factually questionable, all churned out at an unprecedented scale.
While the exact origin is difficult to pinpoint with absolute certainty, the phrase "AI slopaganda" seems to have gained traction in online communities and tech discussions around late 2022 to early 2023. This period coincides with the widespread public availability and rapid improvement of generative AI tools like ChatGPT, which made it possible for anyone to produce vast amounts of text with minimal effort. As these tools became more accessible, so too did concerns about the potential for their misuse in creating a deluge of mediocre or misleading content, leading to the coining of terms like "AI slopaganda" to describe this phenomenon.
Sources:
Observations from online tech discussions and social media trends (e.g., Reddit, Twitter, specialized AI forums) during late 2022 and early 2023.
Discussions and articles from tech journalists and AI ethics researchers concerning the implications of widespread generative AI usage.
The text above this line and the picture above was produced by entering this query into Google's Gemini "Please write a short 200 word or so blog post on what the phrase AI slopaganda means, add an appropriate non copyright photo/picture, list the sources for the post and in the post explore when the phrase was first used" I then did some minimal editing of the text.
