this post was submitted on 29 Jun 2023
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Amazon Kindle Unlimited’s bestseller list, especially for young adult romance, was recently flooded with AI-created books. Many of these books were nonsense and were apparently being used for click farming.

  • Of the top 100 books, only 19 seemed legitimate, with the others being AI-generated.

Examples of AI-Generated Titles: Among the nonsensical titles were "When the three attacks," "Apricot bar code architecture," "The journey to becoming enlightened is arduous," and "Department of Vinh Du Stands in Front of His Parents’ Tombstone."

  • A book titled "wait you love me," featuring a seagull image on its cover, was 90th on the bestseller list, with two reviews labeling it a "fake AI book."
  • Other peculiar titles included "The God Tu mutters," "Ma La Er snorted scornfully," and "Jessica's Attention."

Continued Presence of AI-Generated Books: Despite their removal from the bestseller list, these AI-generated books are still available for purchase on Amazon.

  • Users can search for and even read samples of these books.
  • For instance, the book "Apricot bar code architecture" starts with a nonsensical sentence about black lace pajamas.
  • As of the time of the report, an Amazon spokesperson had not responded to requests for comment.

Source (Vice)

PS: I run a ML-powered news aggregator that summarizes with an AI the best tech news from 50+ media (TheVerge, TechCrunch…). If you liked this analysis, you’ll love the content you’ll receive from this tool!

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[–] ulu_mulu 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

So, not only did they publish AI-generated nonsense but they were also able to bot it all the way up to bestsellers? Doesn't Amazon have measures against that kind of fakes?

[–] SaucyGoodness 3 points 1 year ago

It's shrödinger's authoritarian Amazon most of the time.

Self-pub authors are terrified of the great hand of Amazon, meanwhile shit like this happens.

It seems like they do have quite an extensive review process, it just takes a long time. Resulting in legitimate authors being punished and bot farmers thriving, I guess.

[–] SheeEttin 3 points 1 year ago

Maybe, but if the bot sales are actually paid, they still get their cut, so why do they care?