Can you spot the AI?
Eight rounds. Each has two short texts: one by a famous writer, one by an AI imitating them. Pick the machine, learn its tells, and see how you compare with other readers.
Warning: the AI has been practising. I got fooled twice, and I'm a professional.
8 tells of AI writing
No single sign proves anything, and AI keeps improving, but together these patterns give it away surprisingly often.
Too tidy
AI loves balance: neat pairs, triplets and "not X, but Y". Human writing is lumpier.
Safe words
Watch for "bittersweet", "tapestry", "journey", "delve" and "testament". AI reaches for the comfortable word.
It explains the lesson
AI often ends by spelling out the moral. Great writers trust you to get it.
Familiar formulas
"X beats Y", "the only way to…", "here's the thing". Catchy, but you've heard the shape before.
No odd details
Humans include oddly specific, slightly unnecessary details, like the "fat spruce timberland". AI stays general.
Perfectly on-theme
Every sentence serves the topic. Real writers wander, contradict themselves and take risks.
Polished punchlines
AI over-explains the joke or adds a second punchline. Real wit is usually shorter.
Too smooth to snag
If nothing makes you pause, frown or re-read, be a little suspicious.
A small skill with big benefits
As AI writes more of what we read, from reviews and emails to news and scam messages, a healthy eye for machine-made text is genuinely useful. It's one of the concerns in our AI Forecast. And for the record: AI writing isn't bad. We use it every day. It's just good to know what you're reading.
About the texts: all human passages are public-domain works by Emily Dickinson, Jack London, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, William Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, Benjamin Franklin and Mark Twain. The AI passages were written by an AI assistant especially for this game, imitating each style. Reader statistics are anonymous.
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