The Anti-"LLM Grift" Playbook

Any time I see something get a ton of attention, I know instantly that it is either entertainment or bullshit (or both).

I know this with absolute confidence because it's exceedingly hard to convince people of something that is true, but you can get hundreds of millions of people to believe a lie in a split second.

Let's start with the title: "Something Big Is Happening"

• Generic and slippery: Nothing but pure anxiety or anticipation to latch onto, sucks the suckers right in real quick;
• Importance by proxy: If it's "big", it must be important. Not true in a generally useful way, but true enough to get attention, and impossible to easily contradict;
• Urgency by proxy: If it's "happening", it could be dangerous and I better pay attention immediately. This isn't something to bookmark and read later with a clear mind and careful focus.
• It "shares" itself: Give the preceding, this is something to gulp down immediately and share right now in a feeble attempt to take some action that recovers some sense of agency in the face of the fearful helplessness that those words just triggered.

This viral post ticks a lot of the boxes on the generic grift playbook that I wrote about in The LLM Grift Playbook.

If there is a generic grift playbook, then certainly there must be some generically useful principles and actions to defend against these tactics.

One very general option is to read a decent book on all the built-in and learned human exploits and foibles, for example: The Art of Thinking Clearly, or Thinking Fast and Slow, or Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions.

But I'm sure that sounds hard and since we humans have that lovely, inescapable "shortcut" wiring, there's realistically a vanishingly small chance you, dear reader, will do any such thing, no matter the benefit to you.

Instead, I'll just lay out five core questions and a few follow-ups that you can ask yourself for each of the elements of the generic grift playbook.

To recap: There is a pretty general grift playbook out there:

1. The Setup – Identify a lonely, greedy, or desperate target.
2. The Play – Present opportunity.
3. The Convincer – Provide staged proof.
4. The Put-Up Job – Extract money.
5. The Blow-Off – Disappear.

If that's the poison, here's a partial antidote:

1. What emotional vulnerability in me is being activated by this thing I'm hearing or reading?
   1. Have I eaten anything recently? Am I hungry right now? Have I gone for a walk today?
   2. How have I been feeling the past couple days?
   3. When was the last time that I had a good laugh or cry?
   4. Can I name three people who I feel care about me?
2. What would be the tangible benefit to me of this thing in actual dollars in the next week, month, or year?
   1. Have I tried something like this before and been disappointed? Is this claim one of, "This time it will be different"?
   2. How will I get the money that this is promising me? Or how will I measure something like "time saved" or "improved quality" or "better opportunities"?
   3. What will I see or observe if this is working as described? How will that contrast concretely with what I experience now without it?
3. What is the nature of the evidence supporting the claim?
   1. Is it a testimonial, a recording of a demo, a reference to an "academic paper"?
   2. Can I easily reproduce the result with my own actions?
   3. Can I vary the inputs according to something I know and observe the results myself?
   4. What do contrarians, naysayers, disbelievers, or skeptics say about these claims?
   5. Can I easily talk to directly to actual people who have used this?
4. How much in actual dollars am I being asked to pay up front, and how does that compare to other things I pay for?
   1. Am I only being asked to "try it" (i.e. spend my time on it)? What is my effective hourly rate (your weekly pay divided by your average hours worked per week)? How much is my time worth that I'm being asked to commit to this?
   2. What could I do instead with the money I'm being asked to spend?
   3. What do I do right now with the amount of money or time that I'm being asked to spend on this?
5. What are the consequences to this person or group if it turns out that this is a scam?
   1. Would potential consequences depend an winning a "he said, she said" dispute?
   2. What if this person or group goes out of business? What would be my recourse if this turns out to be false?
   3. Nothing works 100% of the time, so what happens now when it doesn't work as advertised? Can I speak personally to someone who did not have a good experience with this?

This isn't bullet-proof, and I'm sure it could be refined a lot, but it is pretty effective. Most important is to try to see something from as many angles as you possibly can. You have to do this, don't let them do it for you, because, oh my...

Beware, the good grifter's game is good, and there's not just one round. If you've ever had the distinct pleasure of watching an infomercial, or the more recent web staple, the Video Sales Letter (VSL), you know that a good grifter has lined up the objections like pins in a bowling alley and fully intends to knock them all down.

I don't know "viral post dude" but I can be pretty confident that if you ask him, he'll claim he was "just sharing his thoughts" and "cares a lot about this" and "is just trying to be helpful" and "wow, you're so mean" or something along those lines.

Eh, maybe, but more likely, bullshit.

It comes at you constantly from every corner of modern life.