Remember when your inbox was flooded with emails about miracle weight loss pills and Nigerian princes? We called that “spam.” Now we’re facing a new digital nuisance—the internet is drowning in AI-generated garbage, and we’ve finally got a name for it: “slop.”
Where Did This Term Come From?
The word “slop” started making the rounds in tech circles in mid-2024. Programmers and Reddit users were the first to adopt it, frustrated by the flood of mediocre AI content appearing everywhere online.
By June 2024, even The New York Times was talking about it. Their article “First Came ‘Spam.’ Now, With A.I., We’ve Got ‘Slop'” brought the term into everyday conversation. British developer Simon Willison had already been discussing it on his blog, noting he’d seen it popping up on forums like Hacker News and even 4chan.
So What Exactly Is “AI Slop”?
Think of slop as the digital equivalent of fast food—mass-produced, unsatisfying, and lacking any real substance. It’s that travel blog that reads like it was written by someone who’s never left their basement. Or those product reviews that somehow say everything and nothing at the same time.
The term caught on because we desperately needed a way to describe this new phenomenon. Just as “spam” gave us a shorthand for unwanted emails, “slop” lets us quickly identify AI-generated junk.
Why Should I Care?
Because it’s everywhere! Since ChatGPT and similar tools went mainstream in 2023, the internet has been flooded with AI-written content. Your Facebook feed, Medium articles, even some news sites—they’re all increasingly filled with this stuff.
And unlike human-written content, AI slop has a distinct flavor. It’s often oddly repetitive, weirdly phrased, or filled with confident-sounding but completely made-up facts.
The Good Side of Having a Name for This Stuff
We Can Talk About It
Having a simple term makes conversation easier. Instead of saying “that weird, generic-sounding article that was probably written by an AI,” you can just say “that’s slop.” Done!
This isn’t just convenient—it’s powerful. The term “spam” transformed how we handle unwanted email. “Slop” could do the same for AI content.
It’s Pushing Platforms to Act
Once something has a name, it becomes harder to ignore. Medium’s CEO has publicly addressed how they’re trying to reduce AI-generated posts on their platform. They recognize that slop threatens both human creativity and reader trust.
Several platforms are now developing “slop filters”; think of them as the next generation of spam blockers.
It’s Expanding Our Vocabulary
As AI becomes more integrated into our lives, we need new words to describe what it does. “Slop” is just the beginning. It’s short, evocative, and instantly understandable—exactly what good terminology should be.
It Helps Regular People Spot the Fakes
When the Financial Times named “slop” its Word of the Year for 2024, it wasn’t just being trendy. It was highlighting something many people were struggling to identify. Now, even your tech-averse uncle has a word for that strange product description he read online.
The Downsides of Crying “Slop!”
It’s a Pretty Broad Brush
Not all AI content is created equal, but “slop” lumps it all together. There’s a big difference between a slightly awkward AI-written email and a deliberately deceptive deepfake video—but both might get labeled as “slop.”
This oversimplification could make it harder to develop nuanced responses to different AI challenges.
It Could Slow Down Innovation
AI research isn’t always pretty. Sometimes breakthroughs come from systems that produce weird, seemingly meaningless outputs along the way. If we’re too quick to dismiss these as “slop,” we might miss out on important discoveries.
Facebook researchers found that AI systems experimenting with non-standard language sometimes performed better than those strictly mimicking humans. Not all “strange” AI output is worthless!
It Feeds into Panic
While “slop” is useful shorthand, headlines about “zombie internet content” and “AI invasion” don’t help anyone. Some media coverage has gone overboard, creating unnecessary fear around AI.
This sensationalism distracts from legitimate concerns and makes reasonable discussion harder.
It Could Lead to Over-Filtering
Platforms desperate to eliminate “slop” might implement heavy-handed filters that catch too much in their net. This could accidentally suppress innovative AI content or even some human-written work, making online spaces more sterile and boring.
What Can We Do About All This Slop?
Get More Specific
Instead of a simple slop/not-slop binary, we could use more detailed categories:
- “Junk Slop”: Complete nonsense or copy-pasted garbage
- “Muddy Slop”: Content that seems coherent but contains factual errors
- “Edge Slop”: Experimental AI content that might be useful for research
This approach would help platforms make better moderation decisions.
Create Shared Terminology
Tech communities could develop collaborative glossaries defining terms like “slop,” “hallucination,” and other AI behaviors. This would build consensus on what these words actually mean.
Label AI Content Clearly
Adding simple metadata—what model was used, what training data it had, and how confident it was—would help users make informed judgments.
Imagine if your browser could show a little icon next to AI-generated content, letting you decide whether to engage with it or not.
Learn the Warning Signs
Just as we’ve learned to spot email scams, we can train ourselves to recognize slop. Watch for:
- Repetitive phrasing
- Vague, generic statements
- Facts that seem off but are stated confidently
- Content that reads like it was written to fill space rather than communicate
Make Quality Pay
If we create financial incentives for quality – better ad rates for human-written or high-quality AI content, penalties for publishing slop – the economics would shift. Why create slop if it doesn’t pay?
The Future of Human-AI Communication
This is just the beginning of a new vocabulary we’re building to describe our relationship with AI. “Slop” marks an important milestone—the moment we began collectively naming what we’re experiencing.
With clearer language, better tools, and thoughtful approaches, we can manage the downsides of AI content without missing out on the genuine benefits. After all, not everything an AI creates is slop—just like not every unexpected email is spam.
The real power lies with us—as users, creators, and platform operators—to shape how we want to engage with AI-generated content. If we get this right, “slop” will become a historical footnote rather than the future of the internet.
