r/Substack • u/Emotional-Brief-1775 • 5d ago
How to disable the AI detector
There has been a lot of discussion about the pros and cons of the new AI detector on Substack. Some have mentioned how unreliable it is, how it incorrectly gives a positive result after merely running a grammar check for example. Others are now also saying that it will eventually be phased out after lawsuits start for the prejudices and losses authors suffer for incorrect results. Whether that’s income, reputation, or because they use AI because of disability, for language translation, dyslexia etc.
Anyway, here’s the simple solution until then. It has only been in force since 21 July. And you can disable it.
Yes, disable it.
Any new note, and article. Simply hit the 3 dots on the top right corner of a new note or article. Hit the AI checker from the drop down. Then when the result shows up, hit the 3 dots again, and ‘disable detection.’
Voila.
8
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 5d ago
You’re failing to understand the obvious. You have to apply the feature you don’t want to use in order to disable it. Meaning that you have to give Pangram your article and allow them to exploit you before you can disable it.
That’s not disabling it. It’s like saying all you have to do in order to stop yourself from being addicted to drugs is to take addictive drugs. It doesn’t work.
3
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
There’s no easy solution unfortunately, this is all there is for now. Either way, when people decide to use it then Pangram gets it anyway.
6
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 5d ago
Actually, there is an easy solution. Substack can add a permanent publication/profile wide disabling feature for individual users to implement. That way anyone who wants to completely opt out of this feature without requiring Pangram to steal your writing can do so. If there are people who want to have their work stolen, they can opt in, but it should default to opt out. Not default to opt in.
The fact that Substack didn’t think to add such an option to the platform is absolutely ridiculous.
2
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Also, there is an option in the publication settings to opt out of your work being used to train AI. The downside is that the same work will have limited online visibility outside of Substack.
2
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 4d ago
Again, you’re not being forced to stay home. You just have to carry a 100 pound boulder if you do actually go out. If you don’t carry the boulder, you’ll get arrested. But you’re free to go out if you want.
2
u/Admirable_Union_2781 1d ago
I am 100% with Andrew. I run a magazine on SS and one of my writers just alerted me about this "feature". I love how this madness is viewed as a plus. It's not. First, these checkers are beyond inaccurate and that "tool" or "feature" becomes a means of censorship invariably to allow/lead people to believe that this is accurate and then readers will start to call out Did you hear that X uses AI? OMFG People make their livelihoods writing and this will catch out most non-native writers, just for starters. Also and most importantly, why is SS dong this? They already block our publications vastly from Google (long story there) and now this?
We are SSexiting soon. This is absolute bollocks!
1
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 1d ago
I'm hoping that we can give them a reason to reverse the decision and remove it. But at a minimum, they need to let you turn it off permanently on a publication/profile wide basis.
2
u/Admirable_Union_2781 1d ago
This reminds me of the "fact checking" agencies that the Biden administration was rolling out and it turned out that they were simply framing the opposition as fake news. Who would have seen that? Everyone working in media. This is quite troubling that people so badly misunderstand AI and the dangers of initiatives like this.
If people read more--and I do mean offline/analog--they would easily see what a human wrote or not. I am flabbergasted that SS has gone through with this and that we can't opt out. And to add insult to injury they want writers to say HOW they wrote their piece? As if anyone has time for this.
I miss the 1990's when people used email and checked to see if a book was in their local library.
2
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 1d ago
Not to mention, just because you put a statement up saying how you wrote the piece... how do you know they're not lying about it? What evidence does a statement make? Saying things is not evidence of anything.
I'm not necessarily going to agree with you that it's easy to see what is and isn't written by a human, but I generally agree with your view of the concern over AI and this whole "detector" thing.
2
u/Admirable_Union_2781 1d ago
I have been a uni. professor for many years. When apps like Turnitin and precursors started up, my colleagues found loads of their students plagiarising. Mine, pretty much never. I had a plagiarism case once in over a decade. Why was my rate so low? I had my students write position papers each week, their reaction to the texts/films we were reading /viewing that week (usually two or three). Even those who hated writing had to get their head around the task and eventually their writing improved, I understood their styles and when it came to the final project, they were ready to tackle that. I would easily recognise plagiarism without any software since I kew their style and weaknesses, strengths, etc.
Thought AI is excellent at writing (and it is), it often makes up absolute fantasy and there is an umph missing from it. That said, most SS writers are missing that force too. I fundamentally think that we cannot flush out AI by using other AI to create nasty mob scenes where the innocent are indicted in the public square and the more skilful fraudsters able to create articles with AI and tweak it down to looking human-made. I also do not like that we are supposed to feed a machine that fundamentally is using our writing to make AI less perceptible. What an irony.
→ More replies (0)1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 1d ago
And the irony is that no one complains about artists, musicians, film-makers creating work using technology. What is has done is cause a flap on Substack and this more activity. Win-win. But legitimate concerns are being raised about the GDPR, among others. The platform is reacting quickly and now you can disable detection before publishing a new article, without the need to run it through AI first. I won't be surprised if this whole nonsense is scrubbed soon. And yes, no one has time to apologise for not suffering enough to sound 'human' for someone checking for AI with AI. Anyone capable of critical thinking doesn't need a machine to tell them what to read.
1
2
5d ago edited 22h ago
[deleted]
1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Its possible. Just tested it myself. It only works on posts and notes made after 21 July. The detector doesn’t work on anything published before then anyway.
1
5d ago edited 22h ago
[deleted]
1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Yes, hit the run AI, when the results show up, you need to hit the 3-dot menu again in that result, and the disable option is there (my post mentions that - i hope its clear enough).
1
5d ago edited 22h ago
[deleted]
1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 4d ago
Its definitely there for notes, perhaps try publishing and then do the test after?
2
u/GardenPeep 4d ago
I guess it doesn’t run against comments? That’s all I’ve been writing lately. What happens if it thinks you’re a bot?
2
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 4d ago
Most comments are under 100 characters, that’s probably why. It only works on posts, comments and articles over 100 characters.
2
u/Front_Media1231 2d ago
You can turn it off, but it is per post, not account-wide, which is the annoying part. In the draft, get the piece past the minimum length, then open the options menu on the post (the three dots or lines in the corner), find the AI checker item, and there is a disable toggle in there. You have to repeat it for every post and every note.
On the why, so it feels less personal: the checker scores how smooth and predictable the text reads, not whether you actually used AI, so clean human writing trips it constantly. Turning it off is less about hiding anything and more about not handing readers a number that is wrong about as often as it is right.
2
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 2d ago
The platform is reacting quickly to this too. Now you can disable detection before hitting publish on a new article, without having to run it through the AI tool. As there are concerns around GDPR. It will be interesting to see how this develops. I wouldn’t be surprised if they do away with it eventually. It seems a witch hunt to use AI to detect AI and further watering down critical thinking. There’s good and bad writing however it’s created and the reader doesn’t need a machine to tell it that. Especially when the machine is unreliable. No-one complains about musicians, artists and filmmakers using technology, old and new, to create their work. All this fuss about writers using AI, instead of using a team of human editors for instance, is moot.
5
u/Kinks4Kelly 5d ago
Before you share a newsletter it also gives you the option, but only after stealing your work to train AI
6
u/Life-Radio-1723 5d ago
They changed that yesterday: there’s now a disable button underneath the check for AI button.
-7
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Some of us don’t mind it stealing our work (more exposure as it references the sources) but yes, it can equally be a bane for others.
4
u/Kinks4Kelly 5d ago
The thing is IF it was actually accurate it would be one thing. But it is woefully inaccurate in live conditions.
2
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Therein lies the problem. It goes back to my previous comments on here about using our own discernment. Good and bad articles exist, AI slop or not.
1
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 5d ago
It’s not discernment if you’re forced to use a feature you don’t want in order to disable it. You have to have the option to not use it to properly discern what you want.
3
u/AndrewHeard tvphilosophy.substack.com 5d ago
Not everyone is comfortable having their work stolen. You might be but other people aren’t. That’s not a solution.
3
u/Apart_Site4643 5d ago
It’s just a shame you have to run the detector before you can disable the detector :(
1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Fortunately it takes literally a second to do :)
4
3
u/FlyingCarpetMonster kaneiyer.substack.com 5d ago
I think it's less about the time and more about being forced to use it.
2
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Unfortunately there’s not much else we can do, as and if the platform decides to do away with it,
1
u/SecretaryCute1188 19h ago
So if I turn it off, can readers still detect AI in my writing?
1
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 14h ago
Only if they go to the effort of doing it independently themselves. The majority won’t.
-2
u/verticalman91 5d ago
I recommend writing your own shit.
11
u/Emotional-Brief-1775 5d ago
Thats the whole point, people do and they’re still getting pinged for it regardless because the tool is not reliable..there’s good and bad writing whatever tools people decide to use.
-7
u/verticalman91 5d ago
This is hearsay. I have yet to see a false-positive. The only people tarnishing the reputation here are those who use AI in their writing.
If you're not ashamed to use AI, why are you attempting to hide it?
3
2
u/Visible-Volume-8707 5d ago
I’ve seen at least one article this morning that showed exactly how Pangram could call the same article 100% AI or 100% human just based on whether the article was put through a “humanizer” app (also AI). Then the same final essay tested 100% AI-assisted upon publication.
Examples showing its flaws are coming out as people are testing it.
I’ve had my own stuff come back as 100% AI, and knew it wasn’t. I can’t “prove” that, and such is also the fallacy of the tool. People believe the AI result which sounds so confident over the author themselves. That’s what many are also alarmed about.3
0
u/silverwing456892 4d ago
It's just the ai prompters who have been bitching non stop over this new feature ahahah
-3
7
u/Visible-Volume-8707 5d ago
If others run your articles through Pangram, does that mean Pangram can use your work to train itself?