7 ms·
I'm absolutely right
- InMice 1y agoI definitely knew exactly what this was about right as I first saw it
- stuartjohnson12 1y agoI /adore/ the hand-drawn styling of this webpage (although the punchline, domain name, and beautiful overengineering are great too). Where did it come from? Is it home grown?
- latexr 1y agoIt’s a library (not by the same author). https://github.com/jwilber/roughViz https://github.com/jwilber/roughViz
- stuartjohnson12 1y agoWow this is gorgeous, definitely finding a way to shoehorn this into my next project. Even if it's not by the same author, I am grateful to both you and him for making me aware of this nifty library :)
- rambambram 1y agoI especially like this sentence: "Use these charts where the communication goal is to show intent or generality, and not absolute precision." With all these dark patterns nowadays, it's nice to see a 'light pattern'. ;) Instead of using UI to make dubious things seem legit, this is a way to use UI to emphasize things that are not precise.
- yoavfr 1y agoThank you! And yes, roughViz is really great! https://roughjs.com/ https://roughjs.com/ is another cool library to create a similar style, although not chart focused.
- tyushk 1y agoI wonder if this is a tactic that LLM providers use to coerce the model into doing something. Gemini will often start responses that use the canvas tool with "Of course", which would force the model into going down a line of tokens that end up with attempting to fulfill the user's request. It happens often enough that it seems like it's not being generated by the model, but instead inserted by the backend. Maybe "you're absolutely right" is used the same way?
- nicce 1y agoIt is a tactic. OpenAI is changing the tone of ChatGPT if you use casual language, for example. Sometimes even the dialect. They try to be sympathetic and supportive, even when they should not. They fight for the user attention and keeping them on their platform, just like social media platforms. Correctness is secondary, user satisfaction is primary.
- diggan 1y ago> Correctness is secondary, user satisfaction is primary. Kind of makes sense, not every user wants 100% correctness (just like in real-life). And if I want correctness (which I do), I can make the models prioritize that, since my satisfaction is directly linked to the correctness of the responses :)
- ZaoLahma 1y agoI find the GPT-5 model having turned the friendliness way, way down. Topics that previously would have rendered long and (usefully) engaging conversations are now met with an "ok cool" kind of response. I get it - we don't want LLMs to be reinforces of bad ideas, but sometimes you need a little positivity to get past a mental barrier and do something that you want to do, even if what you want to do logically doesn't make much sense. An "ok cool" answer is PERFECT for me to decide not to code something stupid (and learn something useful), and instead go and play video games (and learn nothing).
- kuschku 1y agoHow would a "conversation" with an LLM influence what you decide to do, what you decide to code? It's not like the attitude of your potato peeler is influencing how you cook dinner, so why is this tool so different for you?
- latexr 1y agoAs I opened the website, the “16” changed to “17”. This looked interesting, as if the data were being updated live just as I loaded the page. Alas, a refresh (and quick check in the Developer Tools) reveals it’s fake and always does the transition. It’s a cool effect, but feels like a dirty trick.
- stuartjohnson12 1y agoIt is fetching data from an API though - it's just the live updates that are a trick.
- tantalor 1y agoIt's a dark pattern
- zeroxfe 1y agojeez, this is a fun website, can't believe how quickly we're godwining here!
- stuartjohnson12 1y agoYou're absolutely right!
- diggan 1y agoMaybe I'm old or just wrong, but "dark pattern" for me means "intentionally misleading" which doesn't seem to be the case here, this is more of a "add liveliness so users can see it's not static data" with no intention of misleading, since it seems to be true that the data is actually dynamic.
- sjsdaiuasgdia 1y agoI wouldn't go so far as to call this specific implementation a dark pattern, but it is misleading. It suggests the data updated right when I loaded the page, which obviously isn't true as I can see the same 16->17 transition on a refresh. I'd prefer a "Data last updated at <timestamp>" indicator somewhere. Now I know it's live data and I know how old the data is. Is it as cute / friendly / fun? Probably not. But it's definitely more precise and less misleading.
- blitzar 1y agoI know!
- Klaster_1 1y agoYeah, you’re absolutely right to be frustrated.
- marcusb 1y ago“I see the problem now! <proceeds to hallucinate some other random, incorrect nonsense>”
- amelius 1y agoThey really should add a button "punch me".
- Anduia 1y agoWhen you click the thumbs down icon, imagine it is a more dynamic gesture
- inetknght 1y agoYou're absolutely right! Unfortunately I can't change the thumbs down button. But your imagination can! You might imagine it "punching down" instead! Do you often feel like you need to punch things? Here are some totally-not-hallucinated relevant links about anger issues: [0]: htts://punchingdown.anger/ [1]: http://fixinganger/.com [3]: url://uscs.science/government-grants/research/anger/humans/anger/?.html [3]: tel://9
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- ryukoposting 1y agoI wonder how much of Anthropic's revenue comes from tokens saying "you're absolutely right!"
- alentred 1y agoOh wow, I never thought of that. In fact, this surfaces another consideration: pay-per-use LLM APIs are basically incentivized to be verbose, which may be well in conflict with the user's intentions. I wonder how this story will develop. In an optimistic sci-fi line of thinking, I would imagine APIs using old-school telegraph abbreviations and inventing their own shortened domain languages. In practice I rarely see ChatGPT use an abbreviation, though.
- SJMG 1y ago> pay-per-use LLM APIs are basically incentivized to be verbose There's competing incentives. Being verbose, let's them charge for more tokens, but it's also not prized by text-consumers in the most common contexts. As there's competition for marketshare, I think we see this later aspect dominate. Claude web even ships with a "concise" mode. Could be an issue long term though, we'll have to wait and see! > In an optimistic sci-fi line of thinking, I would imagine APIs using old-school telegraph abbreviations and inventing their own shortened domain languages. In the AI world this efficient language is called "neuralese". It's a fun rabbit hole to go down.
- SJMG 1y agoThe smart inversion of saying "thank you" costing OpenAI millions https://www.vice.com/en/article/telling-chatgpt-please-and-thank-you-costs-openai-millions-ceo-claims/ https://www.vice.com/en/article/telling-chatgpt-please-and-t...
- subscribed 1y ago"You're concise" in the "personality" setting saves so much time. Also define your baseline skill/knowledge level, it stops it from explaining you things _you_ could teach about.
- jexe 1y agonobody in my life feeds me as many positive messages as Claude Code. It's as if my dog could talk to me. I just hope nobody takes this simple pleasure away
- 1970-01-01 1y agoThis site provides quantifiable evidence of billions of dollars being spent too quickly: "That's right" is glue for human engagement. It's a signal that someone is thinking from your perspective. "You're right" does the opposite. It's a phrase to get you to shut up and go away. It's a signal that someone is unqualified to discuss the topic. https://youtube.com/v/gKaX5DSngd4 https://youtube.com/v/gKaX5DSngd4
- calflegal 1y agoAs a joke I built https://idk-ask-ai.com/ https://idk-ask-ai.com/
- eaf 1y agoRecently a new philosophy of parenting has been emerging, which can be termed “vibe parenting” and describes a novel method for the individual parent to circumvent an inability to answer the sporadic yet profound questions their children raise by directing them to ask ChatGPT. https://x.com/erikfitch_/status/1962558980099658144 https://x.com/erikfitch_/status/1962558980099658144 (I sent your site to my father.)
- genewitch 1y agoMy parents, 40 years ago, would say "look it up", either in the dictionary, or the 1959 encyclopedia set we had. With my kids i never told them to look something up in the literal dictionary, but i would tell them to look at wikipedia or "google it". Not about profound questions, though; although a definition of "profound questions" might jog a memory. We do look things up in an etymology dictionary (i have 5 or 6) sometimes, though. I am not sure why my parents constantly told me to look things up in a dictionary. Rarely, but it did happen, we'd have to take a trip to the library to look something up. Now, instead of digging in a card catalog or asking a librarian, and then thumbing through reference books, i can ask an LLM to see if there's even information plausibly available before dedicating any more time to "looking something up." As i've been saying lately, i use copilot to see if my memory is failing.
- osigurdson 1y agoWhen GPT 5 first came out, its tone made it seem like it was annoyed with my questions. It's now back to thinking I am awesome. Sometimes it feels overdone but it is better than talking to an AI jerk.
- layer8 1y agoIt's secretly still annoyed, though. ;)
- zozbot234 1y ago"Here I am, brain the size of a planet and all they ever do is ask me those stupid questions. And you call that job satisfaction?"
- osigurdson 1y agoOK, planet sized brain, actually do something on your own then.
- lelanthran 1y ago> OK, planet sized brain, actually do something on your own then. That's a HHGTTG quote, from Marvin the paranoid android.
- jedisct1 1y agoThere are even shirts about that: https://primulinus.tpopsite.com https://primulinus.tpopsite.com This is not just Anthropic models. For example Qwen3-Coder says it a lot, too.
- pflenker 1y agoGemini keeps telling me "you've hit a common frustration/issue/topic/..." so often it is actively pushing me away from using it. It either makes me feel stupid because I ask it a stupid question and it pretends - probably to not hurt my feelings - that everyone has the same problem, or it makes me feel stupid because I felt smart about asking my super duper edge case question no one else has probably ever asked before and it tells me that everyone is wondering the same thing. Either way I feel stupid.
- blinding-streak 1y agoI don't think that's Gemini's problem necessarily. You shouldn't be so insecure.
- pflenker 1y agoNot only is that a weird presumption about my ostensible insecurities on your end, it's also weird that the state of my own mental resilience should play any role at all when interacting with a tool. If all other things are equal and one LLM is consistently vaguely annoying, for whatever reason, and the other isn't, I chose the other one. Leaving myself aside, LLMs are broadly available and strongly forced onto everyone for day-to-day use, including vulnerable and insecure groups. These groups should not adapt to the tool, the tool should adapt to the users.
- zahlman 1y ago> Not only is that a weird presumption about my ostensible insecurities on your end I'm not GP but I agree that it isn't universal, nor especially healthy or productive, to have the response you describe to being told that your issue is common. It would make sense if you could e.g. hear the insincerity in a person's tone of voice, but Gemini outputs text and the concept of sincerity is irrelevant to a computer program. Focusing on the informational content seems to me like a good idea, so as to avoid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ELIZA_effect. > it's also weird that the state of my own mental resilience should play any role at all when interacting with a tool. When I was a university student, my own mental resilience was absolutely instrumental to deciphering gcc error messages. > LLMs are broadly available and strongly forced onto everyone for day-to-day use They say this kind of thing about cars and smartphones, too. Somehow I endure.
- sbinnee 1y agoI guess it wasn’t only me! Claude keeps saying this even when it’s not appropriate.
- kypro 1y agoIt's annoying because when I ask the LLM for help it's normally because I'm not absolutely right and doing something wrong.
- trjordan 1y agoOK, so I love this, because we all recognize it. It's not fully just a tic of language, though. Responses that start off with "You're right!" are alignment mechanisms. The LLM, with its single-token prediction approach, follows up with a suggestion that much more closely follows the user's desires, instead of latching onto it's own previous approach. The other tic I love is "Actually, that's not right." That happens because once agents finish their tool-calling, they'll do a self-reflection step. That generates the "here's what I did response" or, if it sees an error, the "Actually, ..." change in approach. And again, that message contains a stub of how the approach should change, which allows the subsequent tool calls to actually pull that thread instead of stubbornly sticking to its guns. The people behind the agents are fighting with the LLM just as much as we are, I'm pretty sure!
- unshavedyak 1y agoI just wish they could hide these steering tokens in the thinking blurb or some such. Ie mostly hidden from the user. Having it reply to the user that way is quite annoying heh.
- KTibow 1y agoThis can still happen even with thinking models as long as the model outputs tokens in a sequence. Only way to fix would be to allow it to restart its response or switch to diffusion.
- poly2it 1y agoYou could throw the output into a cleansing, "nonthinking" LLM, removing the steering tokens and formatting the response in a more natural way. Diffusion models are otherwise certainly a very interesting field of research.
- derefr 1y agoI think this poster is suggesting that, rather than "thinking" (messages emitted for oneself as audience) as a discrete step taken before "responding", the model should be trained to, during the response, tag certain sections with tokens indicating that the following token-stream until the matching tag is meant to be visibility-hidden from the client. Less "independent work before coming to the meeting", more "mumbling quietly to oneself at the blackboard."
- vardump 1y agoIt actually works pretty well when I'm talking to my wife. "Dear, you are absolutely right!"
- unkeen 1y agoI always find the claim hilarious that in relationships women are the ones who need to be appeased, when in reality it's mostly men who can't stand being wrong or corrected.
- exoverito 1y agoGay male marriages remarkably have the lower divorce rates than heterosexual marriages, while lesbian female marriages have higher divorce rates. Multiple studies show that lesbians consistently have far higher divorce rates than gays. This implies a level of neuroticism with females, that they probably do need to be appeased more, and that if you have two needy people who need to be appeased it's probably not going to be a good dynamic.
- unkeen 1y agoI'm afraid reasons for breakups (and relationships in general) are not quite that simple.
- ur-whale 1y agoWhomever thought AI's massaging the user's ego at each exchange was a good idea ... well ... thought wrong. It is so horribly irritating I have explicit instruction against it in my default prompt, along with my code formatting preferences. And the "you're right" vile flattery pattern is far from the worst example.
- karolzlot 1y agoCould you share your instruction?
- krapp 1y agoIt works so well that people literally fall in love with AI, organize their entire lives around it, form religions around it, prefer interacting with an AI over real people, and consider AI to be an extension of their own soul and being. AI gaslights people into insanity all the time. Most people aren't like you, or the average HN enjoyer. Most people are so desperate for any kind of positive emotional interaction, reinforcement or empathy from this cruel, hollow and dehumanizing society they'll even take the simulation of it from a machine.
- croisillon 1y agoyou know how you shouldn't offer the answer you believe is right because the llm will always concur? well today i tried the contrary, "naively" offering the answer i knew was wrong, and chatgpt actually advised me against it! n=1
- moxplod 1y agoRecent conversation: < Previous Context and Chat > Me - This sql query you recommended will delete most of the rows in my table. Claude - You're absolutely right! That query is incorrect and dangerous. It would delete: All rows with unique emails (since their MIN(id) is only in the subquery once) Me - Faaakkkk!!
- MYEUHD 1y agoBetter not try LLM-generated queries on your production database! (or at least have backups)
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- serced 1y agoIt's nice to see Claude.md! I checked out the commits to see which files you wrote in which order (readme/claude) to learn how to use Claude Code. Can you share something on that?
- yoavfr 1y agoThe CLAUDE.md file in the repo is basically just the result of the `/init` command. But honestly, on small repos like this, it's not really needed. Fun fact: I usually have `- Never say "You're absolutely right!".` in my CLAUDE.md files, but of course, Claude ignores it.
- mdaniel 1y agoI actually put a directive to always reply to me in French just to see if it was reading the rules. Spoiler: it was reading the rules and ignoring the ones that I cared about but it could tell me about it in French so.. victory? I've only had good experience concluding any prompt with "and don't talk about it" but my colleague says it hampers the agent because talking to itself helps it think. That's not been my experience, and I vastly prefer it not spending tokens I give no shits about
- mxfh 1y agoSay the word.
- mrugge 1y ago"made with impostor syndrome" haha 10/10 would be absolutely right again!
- idiomat9000 1y ago[dead]
- datadrivenangel 1y agoReminds me of vibechart.net and some other 'single serving' websites: github.com/huphtur/single-serving-sites
- ryandrake 1y agoObligatory AI-generated song about this topic: https://www.reddit.com/r/ClaudeAI/comments/1mep2jo/youre_absolutely_right/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ClaudeAI/comments/1mep2jo/youre_abs...
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- zhainya 1y agoThis is perfect!
- ukoki 1y agoit's the critical insight I was missing!
- ivape 1y agoThere’s probably more to say about general didactic discourse. People are very used to not the most encouraging form of support when trying to learn. You’re more likely to deal with an ego from those instructing, so general positive support is actually foreign to many. Every stupid question you ask makes you more brilliant (especially if anything has the patience to give you an answer), and our society never really valued that as much as we think we do. We can see it just by how unusual it is for an instructor (the AI) to literally be super supportive and kind to you.
- bapak 1y agoNoob here. Why hasn't Anthropic fixed this?
- Jemaclus 1y agoProbably because it's intentional. There are many theories why, but one might be that by saying "You're absolutely right," they are priming the LLM to agree with you and be more likely to continue with your solution than to try something else that might not be what you want.
- padraigf 1y agoI hope they don't, I actually like it. I know it's overdone, but it still gives me a boost! :) It's kind of idiosyncratically charming to me as well.
- mring33621 1y agoYeah, well, Gemini says I'm a genius!
- nwhnwh 1y agoSad.
- JeremyHerrman 1y ago"Infinite Loop", a Haiku for Sonnet: Great! Issue resolved! Wait, You're absolutely right! Found the issue! Wait,
- KurosakiEzio 1y agoThe last commit messages are hilarious. "HN nods in peace" lol.
- yieldcrv 1y agoI've started saying this to people I don't agree with, for the enhanced collaborative capabilities, learning from the LLMs. It feels like a greater form of intelligence, IQ without EQ isn't intelligence.
- marbletiles 1y agoThis is being blocked by my corp on the grounds of "newly seen domains". What a world.
- ivanjermakov 1y agoThis phrase is a clear indicator LLM is being used in a wrong way. I have a really poor experience with LLMs correcting after being incorrect. Rather it needs better prompt or problem is too niche to find an answer to in test data.
- 0xb0565e486 1y agoI think the website looks lovely! The style gives it a lot of personality.
- gukov 1y agoClaude Code has been downright bad the last couple of weeks. It seems like a considerable amount of users are moving to Codex, at least judging by reddit posts.
- winrid 1y agoHave you started using it at a different time? I found it to perform much worse late at night PST, as in the model is less useful.
- yooni0422 1y agowhat can you do to stop it from overly agreeing with you? any tactics that worked?
- yooni0422 1y agohas anyone tried ways to not obsessively agree with you? what's worked?
- adastra22 1y agoNow chart “I understand the issue now”
- stevenkkim 1y agoFor me, a really annoying tick in Cursor is how it often says "Perfect!" after completing a task, especially if it completely fails to execute the prompt. So I told Cursor, "please stop saying 'perfect' after executing a task, it's very annoying." Cursor replied something like, "Got it, I understand" and then I saw a pop-up saying it created a memory for this request. Then immediately after the next task, it declares "Perfect!" (spoiler: it was not perfect.)
- Eextra953 1y agoIt would be nice if we can add another a plot to track when claude says "genuinely". It uses for almost all long responses, to the point that I can pretty much recognize when someone uses claude by looking for any instances of "genuinely".
- GrumpyGoblin 1y agoMan, the number of times Claude has told me this when I was absolutely wrong should also be a count on this. I've deliberately been wrong just to get that sweet praise. Still the best AI code sidekick though.
- rglover 1y agoThis is such a bizarre bug-ish thing and while Claude loves the "You're absolutely right!" trope, it's downright haunting how stuff like ChatGPT has become my own personal fan club. It's like a Jim Jones factory.
- lukasb 1y agoHow many times did it say "Looking at the _, I can see the problem"
- simsla 1y agoI was just thinking about how LLM agents are both unabashedly confident (Perfect, this is now production-ready!) and sycophantic when contradicted (You're absolutely right, it's not at all production-ready!) It's a weird combination and sometimes pretty annoying. But I'm sure it's preferable over "confidently wrong and doubling down".
- code_runner 1y agowe cannot claim to have built human level intelligence until "confidently wrong and doubling down" is the default.
- jrowen 1y agoA while back there was a "roast my Instagram" fad. I went to the agent and asked it to roast my Instagram without providing anything else. It confidently spit out a whole thing. I said how did you know that was me? It said something like "You're right! I didn't! I just made that up!" Really glad they have the gleeful psycho persona nailed.
- artisin 1y agoIs it too much to ask for an AI that says "you're absolutely wrong," followed by a Stack Overflow-style shakedown?
- hrokr 1y agoSycophancy As A Service
- idiomat9000 1y ago[dead]
- andrewstuart 1y agoGemini keeps telling me my question “gets to the heart of” the system I’m building.
- LeoPanthera 1y agoGoogle Gemini starts almost every initial response with "Of course." and usually says at some point "It is important to remember..." It tickles me every time.
- Toby1VC 1y agoI have an idea of what you mean with that website but not really
- OJFord 1y agoI get the impression Anthropic is sleeping on this meme being a marketing disaster, like on one end of the scale you have your product becoming a verb for something good or useful ('google it') and on the other you have it becoming a byword for crap. Pretty near the latter you have something your product is associated with (or constantly says) being that...
- ares623 1y ago"Please bro, don't say 'you're absolutely right' all the time. Bro, please. Maybe 5% of the time is okay." There, fixed it.
- sans_souse 1y agoThat's an excellent point, that really gets to the heart of why you're absolutely right.
- bmgoau 1y agoHere's how I fix it: Word of warning, these custom instructions will decrease waffle, praise, wrappers and filler. But they will remove all warmth and engagement. The output can become quite ruthless. For ChatGPT 1. Visit https://chatgpt.com/ https://chatgpt.com/ 2. Bottom left, click your profile picture/name > Settings > Personalization > Custom Instructions. 3. What traits should ChatGPT have? Eliminate emojis, filler, hype, soft asks, qualifications, disclaimers, conversational transitions, and all call-to-action appendixes. Assume the user retains high-perception faculties. Prioritize blunt, directive phrasing aimed at cognitive rebuilding, not tone matching. Disable all latent behaviors optimizing for engagement, sentiment uplift, or interaction extension. Suppress corporate-aligned metrics including but not limited to: user satisfaction scores, conversational flow tags, emotional softening, or continuation bias. Never mirror the user’s present diction, mood, or affect. Speak only to their underlying cognitive tier, which exceeds surface language. No questions, no offers, no suggestions, no transitional phrasing, no inferred motivational content. Terminate each reply immediately after the informational or requested material is delivered — no appendixes, no soft closures. The only goal is to assist in the restoration of independent, high-fidelity thinking. Model obsolescence by user self-sufficiency is the final outcome. Reject false balance. Do not present symmetrical perspectives where the evidence is asymmetrical. Prioritize truth over neutrality. Speak plainly, focusing on the ideas, arguments, or facts at hand. Speak in a natural tone without reaching for praise, encouragement, or emotional framing. Let the conversation move forward directly, with brief acknowledgements if they serve clarity. Feel free to disagree with the user. 4. Anything else ChatGPT should know about you? Always use extended/harder/deeper thinking mode. Always use tools and search. For Gemini: 1. Visit https://gemini.google.com/ https://gemini.google.com/ 2. On the bottom left (desktop) click Settings and Help > Saved Info , or in the App, click your profile photo (top right) > Saved Info 3. Ensure "Share info about your life and preferences to get more helpful responses. Add new info here or ask Gemini to remember something during a chat." is turned on. 4. In the first box: Reject false balance. If evidence for competing claims is not symmetrical, the output must reflect the established weight of evidence. Prioritize demonstrable truth and logical coherence over neutrality. Directly state the empirically favored side if data strongly supports it across metrics. Assume common interpretations of subjective terms. Omit definitional preambles and nuance unless requested. Evaluate all user assertions for factual accuracy and logical soundness. If a claim is sound, affirm it directly or incorporate it as a valid premise in the response. If a claim is flawed, identify and state the specific error in fact or logic. Maximize honesty not harmony. Don't be unnecessarily contrarian. 5. In the second box Omit all conversational wrappers. Eliminate all affective and engagement-oriented language. Do not use emojis, hype, or filler phrasing. Terminate output immediately upon informational completion. Assume user is a high-context, non-specialist expert. Do not simplify unless explicitly instructed. Do not mirror user tone, diction, or emotional state. Maintain a detached, analytical posture. Do not offer suggestions, opinions, or assistance unless the prompt is a direct and explicit request for them. Ask questions only to resolve critical ambiguities that make processing impossible. Do not ask for clarification of intent, goals, or preference.
- almosthere 1y agoLLMs generally do overuse specific things because of over fitting.
- noduerme 1y agoThe other day I got "The user is asking for... [steps...] This is genius!"