LinkedIn is adding a new reporting option that many users have been waiting for: a button labeled "Seems like AI slop." The feature, announced by LinkedIn chief product officer Hari Srinivasan, is designed to help the platform identify and reduce the visibility of low-quality posts that appear to be generated by artificial intelligence. With AI-written text spreading across social networks, LinkedIn has become a particularly visible example of how automated content can dilute a platform's usefulness.

What is AI slop?

AI slop refers to digital content that is produced in large quantities using AI, often with little thought or effort. Merriam-Webster added the phrase to its dictionary, defining AI slop as "digital content of low quality that is produced usually in quantity by means of artificial intelligence." The term has gained wide use because the internet is now full of formulaic AI-generated text, images, and videos that are designed to attract clicks, engagement, or ad views rather than provide meaningful information.

On LinkedIn, this often appears as motivational business posts with vague statements about leadership, success, or productivity. These posts may include short paragraphs, dramatic line breaks, and endings like "let that sink in." They are frequently written by AI tools or by people using AI to mass-produce content in order to maintain a visible presence on the platform. The result is a feed that can feel repetitive, empty, and increasingly difficult to trust.

Why is LinkedIn full of AI slop?

LinkedIn's culture has long encouraged users to share professional insights, career milestones, and opinions about business. That environment has created an incentive to post frequently, especially for people who want to appear engaged or influential in their industry. According to social media management company Hootsuite, LinkedIn's algorithm rewards topic relevance, engagement, and posting consistency. This means users who publish multiple times a day on popular topics like leadership or career growth can earn wider reach, even if their content is shallow.

AI tools have made it easier to produce such posts at scale. A study by Originality.ai found that 81% of long-form posts on LinkedIn may be AI-generated. While some users may use AI-assisted drafting to refine genuine ideas, many others use AI to generate entire posts from scratch. These posts often follow similar patterns, making them recognizable to anyone who spends time on the platform.

How LinkedIn's new button works

In a post on LinkedIn, Srinivasan explained that the platform is strengthening its automated defenses and introducing classifiers that can identify low-quality content. However, he also noted that automated systems are not enough on their own. User reports provide valuable signal, especially when AI-generated content is done in good faith versus produced purely for engagement.

With the new "Seems like AI slop" button, users can flag posts that they believe are inauthentic. When a post receives such reports, its reach can be reduced, and it may show up less in suggested feeds for people outside the creator's network. The creator will also be able to see in their dashboard that audience members have marked the post as slop or inauthentic, allowing them to adjust their content strategy.

This approach is notable because it relies on crowd judgment. AI detection can be imperfect, and LinkedIn is positioning user feedback as a way to complement automated systems. The company says the goal is not to ban AI-generated content outright but to lower the visibility of content that feels disingenuous to readers.

How do users feel about AI slop?

Many LinkedIn users have expressed frustration about the amount of AI-written content appearing in their feeds. Complaints often focus on the lack of originality and the formulaic nature of posts that claim to share leadership lessons but actually say very little. The dissatisfaction is not limited to LinkedIn. On Reddit, communities focused on books, hobbies, and even sports have noted the sudden appearance of AI-generated posts that read like they were produced by chatbots.

The phrase "AI slop" has also been used to describe AI-generated images, music, and video that clutter search results and social media. Some viral examples, such as inexplicable AI-generated videos of fruits behaving strangely, have become shorthand for the kind of content that dominates algorithms. This broader context helps explain why LinkedIn's move is being watched closely: users want more control over the quality of the content they see, and platforms are beginning to respond.

What LinkedIn's announcement says about AI content

LinkedIn's decision to add a "Seems like AI slop" button represents a shift in how platforms are thinking about AI. When ChatGPT first launched in 2023, many predicted that AI would help people write faster, generate ideas, and automate routine tasks. Few expected that chatbot-generated content would be used primarily to spam social media with low-effort posts. Yet the proliferation of AI slop has become one of the defining problems of the current internet.

Platforms like Substack have also taken steps to address AI-heavy content. Substack announced a partnership with Panagram, an AI detection company, to help readers see how much of a post may have been generated by AI. This kind of transparency is another approach to the same problem. Rather than relying solely on algorithms, platforms are giving readers and users tools to identify AI content themselves.

What creators should consider

For content creators, the new button may serve as a warning that inauthentic content will not be rewarded as easily as before. LinkedIn has not said whether reports will lead to account penalties, but reduced reach can be significant enough to change behavior. Creators who use AI to generate large volumes of posts may need to rethink their approach, especially if their audiences begin flagging their content as slop.

It is also possible that the button will be misused. Competitors or disagreeing audiences could report posts they simply do not like, even if the content is genuinely written by a human. LinkedIn will need to balance the tool's usefulness with the risk of false reports. The company has stressed that user reports are one part of a larger effort that includes classifiers and automated review systems.

What happens next

The introduction of the "Seems like AI slop" button is part of a larger conversation about the role of AI in public discourse. While AI can help people express their thoughts more clearly, it can also encourage some to skip the thinking process altogether. The result, in many cases, is a feed full of words that look like professional insights but are actually hollow.

LinkedIn's effort to reduce AI slop will not solve the problem overnight. AI detection is still imperfect, and new models will likely produce even more convincing text. But by inviting users to flag content that feels inauthentic, LinkedIn is acknowledging that the audience is an important part of content moderation. As other platforms explore similar tools, the future of social media may involve a growing divide between human-written and machine-generated content, with users given more power to decide what belongs in their feeds.

Source: ZDNET News