An old Apple blog and its former authors have become the latest victims of AI-generated spam articles. TUAW ("The Unofficial Apple Weblog"), closed by AOL in 2015, was acquired by a new owner last year who started publishing articles under the byline of former writers, none of whom had worked there for over a decade. The new owner seems to be running other AI spam websites as well, seemingly trying to hide the truth.
Christina Warren, who has long worked in tech news and later joined Microsoft, then GitHub as a developer advocate, shared screenshots of the ongoing situation on Tuesday.
In these images, you can see that Warren appears to have been writing new articles since July of this year - despite not having worked for TUAW since 2009.
Another screenshot shows Warren's name listed among other former TUAW writers, including Brett Terpstra, Chris Rawson, and Chris Ullrich.
According to 404Media, all listed authors have been replaced with AI-generated images, and many have told 404 that they have no connection to the new website. AppleInsider confirmed that the name of its writer William Gallagher has also been incorrectly appended to the content of TUAW's new owner.
Highlight:
🧟♂️ The new owner of TUAW seems to be using generative AI to roughly recreate the works of its former authors.
🧟♂️ The website owner seems to be trying to hide what they are doing.
🧟♂️ The names of Christina Warren and others have been removed from the new TUAW website, and they are relieved that they no longer feel the need to involve lawyers.