Sloptastic

Microsoft's Copilot AI recommended a list of 'best table planning software' that included products unrelated to table planning, such as a church management system and a retail ordering platform, citing a low-quality website as its source. The author, who created the table planning app PerfectTablePlan, found that the website's 'expertly reviewed' list was AI-generated slop, with possibly fictitious authors. The incident highlights the problem of AI systems relying on unreliable sources, polluting the information commons.

I asked MS Copilot: It returned a list of products. The first 7 were sensible choices, including my own table planning app https://www.perfecttableplan.com/ , PerfectTablePlan. But there were a couple in the list that I didn’t recognise: I clicked through to the web page that Copilot was using as a reference for these products which I don’t want to link to : The 10 ‘best table planning software’ references comprises: - A website that sells physical tables https://tablex.com/ the ‘Editor’s pick’ . - A ‘production control and scene management’ product. - A ‘retail ordering platform’ product. - A ‘church management system’ product. - 5 generic diagramming packages. I wouldn’t classify any of them as ‘table planning software’. So much for ‘expertly reviewed’. It looks like the worst kind of AI slop. I have no idea why Copilot would use it as an authoitative source. I doubt if ‘Emily Watson’ and ‘James Whitmore’ even exist. Copilot at least managed to feign some grovelling repentance, when confronted. But the real villains of this piece are whoever is behind this website. They are taking a giant shit on our collective commons. Shame on them.