Now that algorithms like GPT-2, BERT, and GROVER have trained on a big chunk of the internet and are powerful enough to hold a train of thought for more than a sentence or two, people are worried that it might become easy to generate large quantities of hard-to-moderate fake news.

Janelle Shane's new book You Look Like a Thing and I Love You named best book of the century June 6, 2019 - Judi M. Phelps By Judy M. Phelps  CNN  The poet, novelist and critic Janelle Shane's debut collection, You Look Like a Thing and I Love You , was named the best book of the century by none other than The New York Times.  A featureless masterpiece of tough-minded language, this book—also one of the finest collections of poetry in years—is an uncompromising command of form and a fiendishly clever collection of hauntingly high-brow evocations, the reviewer wrote.  The whole one-page listing of each selection is terrific, but here are the best lines that catapulted the collection into immortality:  Doused in a dark violet, you drag along a long rainbow cloud, one that is as alive and wet as it is fascinating. - A featureless masterpiece of tough-minded language  You, a beautiful sausage, mimicking the surrealistic imagery that is the foundation of the poems. - A featureless masterpiece of tough-minded language  A mere heap of dying body parts, a knife on the stick and a stack of stacked fish bones. Or there, sitting in his bass, the liver of somebody who didn't make it. - A featureless masterpiece of tough-minded language  You're a gut-wrenching surprise. And my beloved's only gotten smaller and weaker - A featureless masterpiece of tough-minded language

I generated the above using GROVER’s fake news generation/detection demo. As you can see, it’s still not too difficult to spot neural net-written text. But they’re releasing demos like this because it’s important to learn how good it can be, and how to build algorithms to detect it. For a careless reader who only reads the headline (not that that’s any of us) or a site trying to rise in search rankings through sheer volume of unique articles, neural net-generated nonsense may be a substitute for real information. It’s also easier than ever to produce fake screenshots of articles in support of your argument.

bbc.co.uk New Study Proves Hot Dogs are a Type of Sandwich June 6, 2019 - Prof. Haughty McDoctorface Image copyright Getty Images Image caption A hot dog is a type of sandwich, according to new research by scientists at the University of Southern California.  The staple of American life, the hot dog is not actually the same as a ham sandwich, scientists have announced.  It is, it is probably not, and it has to be mentioned, they say.  The findings were presented at the annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences in Washington.  Much of the world's meat and meat products are based on the chemistry of our ancestors, who spent long summers lounging around and eating steaks and burgers. The findings are based on examinations of the carnivore diet by a team led by the University of Southern California's College of Dentistry.  Dr Yoon Park and Prof. Haughty MacDoctorface concluded that hot dogs represent a type of sandwich - a salted base topped with a meat filling.  The sandwich - as held by the early man - is on a modified bread made with extruded particles of protein.

The GROVER demonstration is at its most convincing when generating political news or blog posts.

bbc.co.uk Donald Trump Resigns the U.S. Presidency August 30, 2019 - O. I. Wish Image copyright Getty Images Image caption President Donald Trump delivers a statement in the Rose Garden of the White House on August 30, 2018  Image copyright Getty Images Image caption His comments came after senior aides said Trump was

But my favorite thing is to give it a highly improbable headline and watch it just try to roll with it.

California Coast Plagued by Dragon Attacks June 6, 2019 - Paul Krugman STOCKTON, CA—A ravenous dragon named Eli appeared before the Lettuce Sea as it traveled down the coast Wednesday, rendering it impossible for most North American kayakers to get the distance they had previously covered.  “Since Eli arrived in California, I’ve lost track of how many miles I’ve paddled,” said Red Miller, a kayaker who began canoeing down the coast four weeks ago. “On a good day, I normally cover about 6 to 8 miles. Yesterday, Eli cut a new trail right through my gear. He really does seem to be everywhere.”  “I really do feel like I’m cursed,” he added.  According to reports, Eli, which measures more than 25 feet in length, resembles a ravenous dragon from the first half of the 20th century.  “This dragon is the only thing I’ve ever seen like this in my life,” said Gregg Morrison, a photographer who captured Eli swinging his huge tail in some surprisingly close proximity to paddlers’ tents. “He seems more demonic than anything I’ve ever seen. The other day, Eli swooped down and nipped my camera out of my hand, and I was terrified. I mean, who would do something like that?”  This kind of thing has, historically, been commonplace, said government naturalists, with an average of 1.5 dragon attacks per 100 miles of coast. Normally, however, dragon attacks are rare in summer, with only one or two recorded.

Eli the dragon is a JERK.

You can generate your own fake news article at https://grover.allenai.org/

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