An old Apple blog and its former author have become the latest victims of artificial intelligence-written sludge. TUAW (“Unofficial Apple Blog”) was shut down by AOL in 2015, but last year, a new owner acquired the domain and began publishing articles under the previous writer’s byline They haven’t worked there in more than a decade. And the new owner, who appears to also run other AI sludge sites, appears to be trying to hide.
Christina Warren, who left a long career in tech journalism to join Microsoft and later GitHub as a developer advocate, shared a screenshot of what happened on Tuesday. In the image, you can see that Warren has apparently been writing new posts as of July of this year, although she hasn’t yet laugh Since 2009, she has confirmed edge.
Another screenshot shows Warren’s name listed next to what appears to be an artificial intelligence-generated photo and generic resume, along with a list of other former TUAW writers, including Brett Terpstra; Chris Rawson and Chris Ullrich. All listed author photos have been replaced with AI-generated images, 404 media reports, many say 404 They are not involved in the new website. Apple Insider It was confirmed that TUAW’s new owners also inappropriately attached the name of its author, William Gallagher, to the content.
What’s more, the new TUAW appears to be using generative artificial intelligence to hastily reconstruct the work of its former writers.
TUAW is now apparently owned by Web Orange Limited, which purchased the site “without original content” from “Yahoo IP Holdings LLC” earlier this year, according to TUAW’s “About Us” page.
So instead of using “original content” it appears that the new TUAW is using artificial intelligence to plagiarize it – you can easily see this by comparing actual archived TUAW posts. enjet to the new website.
For example, see this extremely benign post about changes to the iOS keyboard Shift key in iOS 7.1. Here’s the first paragraph of Erica Sadun’s original article “The new Shift key icon in iOS 7.1 is awesome”:
Today, with the rollout of version 7.1, major complaints are coming from TUAW’s backstage channels. “Oh my God,” the tortured man yelled, “it’s the end of the world—Apple redesigned the Shift key icon!” Our own Dave Caolo even wrote about the change, saying “Overall it’s a Nice change but takes some getting used to.”
About the new TUAW? It has a different title, “iOS 7.1 update introduces cool new Shift key icon,” a new author, “Matthew Wilson,” and an introduction that reads as if the same words are run through a thesaurus:
With the release of version 7.1 today, the TUAW team is making a definite splash. “OMG,” they exclaimed, “the end is nigh — Apple has changed the Shift key icon!” Our colleague Dave Caolo commented on the update, noting: “It’s a positive tweak, but it takes some Time to adapt.”
Warren said she was familiar with the Zombie brand, but she was still shocked that a shady new site owner would steal a writer’s identity.
“I think the worst thing that could happen is MTV News The archive just disappeared, but I was faced with a paradox, what was worse than not having any archive at all was this bastard version, this weird zombie corpse that looked like what it was, but wasn’t,” she told edge.
“I was like, ‘Fuck you, really fuck you.’ You can quote me on that. — Christina Warren
TUAW’s new owners aren’t exactly trying to hide what they’ve done: “The new team at Web Orange Limited is dedicated to reviving its legacy, carefully rewriting the contents of the archived version on archive.org, ensuring TUAW’s richly preserved history, while updating to meet modern standards and relevance,” says the new TUAW’s “About Us” page. We reached out to Apollo Management Group, which acquired Yahoo’s assets in 2021, to get a better idea of what Web Orange is acquiring.
But the new TUAW apparently also believes that not all plagiarism is justified. Since Warren posted — she told us she also sent a “strongly worded email” threatening legal action — her author name on the new TUAW has been changed to “Mary Brown.” Likewise, Brett Terpstra is now “Paul Terpstra,” Chris Dawson is now “Kevin Hall,” and Chris Ulrich is “Matthew Wilson.” ”.
Web Orange Limited describes itself on its website as a Hong Kong-based “online advertising agency” that manages “some of the largest media sites on the Internet,” including loungeanother older Apple blog.
loungehas also resurfaced as a website that appears to have artificial intelligence sludge masquerading as the work of humans. We found that the profile pictures of its most famous “authors” were all stock images.
For example, the photo above of Lucy Bennett also appears on iPhone cases and as a model for online dating sites:
we discover lounge Writer Samantha Wiley — who also has a stock image as her profile picture — posted three posts in three minutes earlier today. Wiley’s author page shows many instances of Wiley publishing multiple articles in a very short period of time. This isn’t unusual if you’re a writer who’s been embargoed multiple times, but that doesn’t seem to be the case here. Bennett and Wiley also have X follow-only accounts lounge and does not contain any posts. (They also have similar X usernames: “editorlucyb” and “editorwiley”.)
Both men have Muck Rack profiles claiming they have worked for other publications, but we found no evidence that Wiley has written for other publications baltimore post or houston press Just like stated. We’re contacting Muck Rack for comment.
Another Web Orange site, Soup.io, has a “Jorgie Soto” whose stock profile photo appears in ads for VoIP services:
until today, loungeIts own about page identifies its owner, Web Orange Limited, as Haider Ali Khan, “a well-known Australian entrepreneur, investor, author and cyber security expert”. However, the page has now removed all references to Khan, and Khan’s personal website, which was running yesterday, now displays an error message. The site’s owner did not respond to our email. Khan’s name has also been removed from other Web Orange sites.
We have not explicitly linked Haider Ali Khan to “Web Orange Limited”, but there is a company registered in Hong Kong with that name. Khan’s personal website also states that he founded a website hosting company called Sudoly, which was later renamed OrangeHost and currently lists Haider Ali Kahn as CEO. According to OrangeHost’s Haider Ali Kahn’s LinkedIn page, he is currently in Dubai. But we confirmed that OrangeHost is a US company registered in Delaware.
Web Orange Limited also said it has partnered with companies such as Avast, Adobe, Cloudways, ExpressVPN and Hostinger, and we have contacted them for comment on how they work with the company.
Warren said she was concerned about her and her laugh Colleagues’ names no longer appear in new laugh website, she figured she no longer needed to hire a lawyer. “What really pisses me off is blaming new content online on these authors. That’s something I didn’t expect.
“Plagiarism… I don’t like it, but at the same time, you have to pick your battles,” she said.
