I was pleasantly surprised to find a glossary immediately following, which tells me it wasn't the tone of the post, but the shorthand terminology that was unfamiliar to me that was my issue.
I think writing in "Ben's voice" is great. There are just going to be times when your audience needs a bit more context around your terminology, that's all.
The moment I change the way I talk and say instead of "That's bullshit, let's move away from it" to "That could be a challenging and rewarding experience", and I can already see the advantage.
I rather like to talk the way I want, but I see it as challenging and not that rewarding as people seem to get more sensitive. That made me wonder if the way GPT-style chatbots communicate with humans would make humans expect the same way of communication from other humans.
For example, "in which case the world goes all Huxley really fast." "Huxley" apparently means something to you. Would it mean anything at all to someone who hasn't read any Aldous Huxley? As someone who _has_, I still had to think about it -- a lot. I assumed you're referring to a work of his literature rather than something he actually believed, as Huxley's beliefs about the world certainly had a place for the contrarian and the original.
Further, I assume you are referring to his most well-known work, _Brave New World_, rather than (for example) _Island_, so you're not saying that people would be eating a lot of psychedelic mushrooms and living together in tolerant peace and love.
I don't at all think you need to sound like GPT to be a successful communicator, but you will be more successful the more you consider your audience and avoid constructions that they're unlikely to be able to understand without research.
What you are alluding to is quite similar to the that “instagram face” that everyone pursues and self filters for except its more about your communication and thoughts. Also the argument that you need to reach a wider audience i dint think isn't necessary unless you want the wider audience to comment and engage.
The internet is the great homogenizer soon(ish) we will be uniform.
And the above is substantially what I said, and undoubtedly would find a better reception with a larger audience.
I'm troubled though, because I already sanitize what I write and say by passing it through a GPT-style "alignment" filter in almost every interaction precisely because I know my authentic self is brash/abrasive/neuro-atypical/etc. and it's more advantageous to talk like ChatGPT than to talk like Ben. Hacker News is one of a few places real or digital where I just talk like Ben.
Maybe I'm an outlier in how different I am and it'll just be me that is sad to start talking like GPT, and maybe the net change in society will just be a little drift towards brighter and more diplomatic.
But either way it's kind of a drag: either passing me and people like me through a filter is net positive, which would suck but I guess I'd get on board, or it actually edits out contrarian originality in toto, in which case the world goes all Huxley really fast.
Door #3 where we net people out on accomplishment and optics with a strong tilt towards accomplishment doesn't seem to be on the menu.