There's "wrack and ruin", which means destruction and is somewhat tautologous (it says the same thing twice), and there is "rack and ruin" which means stretching torture and subsequent uselessness, and then there is wrack and UAIN, where the latter is an acronym... and not a good thing.
For an absolutely delightful (and not at all pompous) peroration on the relative merits of "wrack" or "rack", see Steve Finan's article.
https://www.thecourier.co.uk/fp/columnists/837471/wrack-and-ruin-is-not-rack-and-ruin/
I agree with him about the difference between "discreet" and "discrete". No doubt since AI is unavoidable, fewer and fewer people will know the difference, and "discreet" will simply acquire a fourth meaning, or even up to eight additional meanings if one is mathematically inclined.
So what does UAIN stand for, and why is it bad?
Legal blogger and senior counsel Douglas J. Wood of Reed Smith LLP, writes briefly but powerfully about the unsung environmental harms caused by AI in promiscuous (third and fourth meaning) online advertising.
https://viewpoints.reedsmith.com/post/102iig0/unfettered-waste-when-will-it-stop#page=1
U is for Unreliable
A is for Artificial
I is for Intelligence-generated
N is for News-and-information-websites
Newsguard's Misinformation Monitor goes into much greater detail in a very long, comprehensive and damning article written by Jack Brewster, Zack Fishman, and Elisa Xu ... et alia. Apart from the waste of energy, the carbon footprint, the heat, the damage done by UAIN includes the proliferation of allegedly bogus and potentially harmful health advice, a lack of human editing, and a great deal of copyright infringement and piracy of reputable writers' articles.
https://www.newsguardtech.com/misinformation-monitor/june-2023/
Please note that there are several banners that split up this article, but keep scrolling until you reach the literal and metaphorical bottom line which is:
"NewsGuard considers a site to be Unreliable AI-Generated News if it meets all four of these criteria:
- There is clear evidence that a substantial portion of the site’s content is produced by AI.
- Equally important, there is strong evidence that the content is being published without significant human oversight. For example, numerous articles might contain error messages or other language specific to chatbot responses, indicating that the content was produced by AI tools without adequate editing. (It is likely that now or in the future many news sites will use AI tools but also deploy effective human oversight; they will not be considered UAIN websites.)
- The site is presented in a way that an average reader could assume that its content is produced by human writers or journalists, because the site has a layout, generic or benign name, or other content typical to news and information websites.
- The site does not clearly disclose that its content is produced by AI."
By the way, and nothing to do with wrack and UAINs, it is good internet security advice to change your passwords every 90 days!
All the best,
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