Bonum Certa Men Certa

Slopwatch: Brian Fagioli, Brittany Day, and Other Plagiarists Who Rip Off Real Writers and Target Themes Around "Linux"

posted by Roy Schestowitz on May 23, 2025

Is SEO and fake productivity/traffic the new "bro"?

We're now at the end of another fine week. Let's examine the LLM slop situation, with less focus (at least today) on image slop...

Today we demoted some sites in our lists (OPML), seeing they had gravitated towards spam, slop, or both. We gave a new example a few hours ago.

Linking to slopfarms or sites that only SOMETIMES use LLM slop is risky. Why? Several reasons: 1) It might accidentally reward actual slop. 2) It might contains serious errors (that's what slop does). 3) Even if the cited article is original, traffic is given to sites which elsewhere within them promote a) slop b) falsehoods. The broth is spoilt. Spill it out. Get rid of the whole lot.

Serial Sloppers like Brian Fagioli will never get off the wagon. They're drunk on slop. It's an addiction of sorts. Companies such as Microsoft are providing plagiarism tools, but it isn't a sound business model, nor is this going to work in the long run, either for the provider or for the user. An associate cited this new post ("There are not good big tech companies left") wanting to "note the mistake in the penultimate paragraph -- simply using the software continues the problems because doing so block the use of better software, cf the reasoning behind the "we'll get them sort of addicted" quote from 1998..."

Microsoft wants to get people 'addicted' to low-quality junk and falsehoods. For that, nobody should forgive Microsoft. It also engages in mass-plagiarism - something of unprecedented proportions. It only calls this "AI" to mislead people and distract them from what it's really all about, as Liam Proven has proven. To quote him: "AI" is not "AI". The liars and the shills redefined what people used to mean by "AI" as "AGI", artificial _general_ intelligence, so they could market their stupid plagiarism bots as AI."

"AGI is not real. It doesn't exist. It will probably never exist. Hell, at the rate humanity is going, we won't be able to build new computers any more by 2050 and the survivors at the poles will be nostalgic for electricity."

"AI is a scam. It's a hoax. It's fake news. There is no AI, and what is being sold as AI is such an incredibly poor fake that it is profoundly disheartening that so many people are so stupid to be deceived into thinking it is AI."

Here's what Fagioli had to offer some hours ago:

Arch Linux-based SteamOS 3.7.8 update brings Plasma 6, better battery controls, and Legion Go S support

Of course it was fake garbage, likely sponging off various people who did write about this:

Valve has officially pushed SteamOS 3.7.8 to the Stable channel

And with many real pages about significant Mozilla news, Fagioli also prompted chatbots for some words diarrhoea.

Mozilla is shutting down Pocket

Yes, diarrhoea.

Mozilla, which acquired Pocket in 2017, says it’s closing the platform due to changes in how people browse and consume content. The company wants to focus its resources on tools that better align with modern online habits. Despite shutting Pocket down, Mozilla will continue offering curated content through other channels like Firefox’s New Tab experience and a newly branded email newsletter.

Brittany Day, another Serial Slopper, also did her share of diarrhoea:

Tails 6.15.1 Fixes Critical Tor Browser Flaws

Notice how bland a headline (just spam for SEO):

Understanding Security Threats In Open-Source Software Supply Chains

As usual, diarrhoea of words. These people have no knowledge, no skills, no integrity. They just flood the Web with machine-generated garbage, based on much better work of actual people who understand what they write about and actually fact-check.

Then, joining the slopfarms which inspired and got cited by real news sites (because Google News promotes slopfarms at the expense of original work by actual humans), Brittany Day had this:

Understanding Malicious .desktop Files: A Persistent Threat to Linux Systems

If only she wrote it.

We saw a couple of slopfarms citing or basing themselves on this blog post, obviously distorting the original message and not even linking to it.

The Web will become a rotten mess until and unless we all call out and discourage the prime culprits. █

Other Recent Techrights' Posts

The World Needs Activists With Social Skills and Perseverance
An everyday activist makes life better for everybody, everywhere (not for personal gain or even credit)
 
The Register MS: About 60 Mentions of "AI" in One Day Are Paid-for Spam (Sponsored Hype, Composed by the Companies Covered)
The Register MS is a dying site
Links 22/10/2026: MElon (Elon Musk) Election Interference and Perl/Raku Foundation by the Numbers
Links for the day
Techrights Audience Grew as a Function of the Intensity of Attacks on Its Existence
We try to publish fewer stories but better (not necessarily long but at least important) stories
TechRepublic is Becoming a Slopfarm
It seems like TechRepublic became LLM slop (maybe all of it, maybe only some of it for now)
Techrights is Not About GNU/Linux, Tux Machines Is
When we say "GNU/Linux" we emphasise the GNU
Intercontinental Brigading - Part XII - Lawfare to Cover Up Microsoft's Restricted Boot Calamity (Microsoft as Authority Over Linux), Garrett Wants to Talk About Penises Instead
When lawsuits become a political weapon
Without Microsoft's Monopoly (and Monopoly Rents) the Inevitable Microsoft Mass Layoffs Carry on Endlessly
Microsoft Windows is not retaining the dominance it once had
IBM's Debt Grew About $2 Billion in 3 Months
The silent layoffs still seem to impact Red Hat
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, October 22, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, October 22, 2026
Gemini Links 22/10/2026: Solar MiniBBS, Building Major Tom, and Zig
Links for the day
Links 22/10/2026: Busan’s Celebrity Shark in Canal Again
Links for the day
Links 22/10/2026: "Software Developers Have Been Promoted Into Incompetence"
Links for the day
Intercontinental Brigading - Part XI - Losing Over a Million Pounds (Borrowed Money) to Try to Silence Critics of Restricted Boot With Microsoft-Controlled "Certificates"
Garrett is also very jealous of Daniel Pocock
Links 22/10/2026: eBay to Lay Off a Tenth of Staff (Again), Node.js and PHP Security Crises, Climate News
Links for the day
Red Hat Layoffs Still Going on This Week (Whilst IBM's Debt Grows in Spite of Mass Layoffs)
IBM is bluffing/cheating the shareholders again
IBM's Debt Continues to Increase While the Company Rapidly Shrinks
This is what a dying company looks like
Linux Kernel Needs Diversity and Diversity of Good Code, Not LLM Slop
Linux (and Linus) are kicking a can down the road
Microsoft Shrinks Every Year
Microsoft will try to spin or twist this as "efficiency"
Gemini Links 22/10/2026: Holiday Inn and Emacs
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 21, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 21, 2026
Techrights Was Right About a Fake Security Model Built Around Lies or Built Upon Trust in "Certificates" and "Authorities" (like Microsoft)
We have begun to amass some media reports and blog posts from technical sites
Windows Monopoly is No Longer Sustainable (the Case of Oceania)
This is why Microsoft layoffs are happening all the time
Some Downtime Possible Shortly (Router Work)
We don't use PHP in the site anymore
Mass Layoffs at Microsoft This Week and/or Next Week
Cannot pull a bunny out of some hat
With Its Future on the Line, EPO Management (Dictatorship) Resorts to Further Escalations to Fake 'Production' and Curtail Industrial Actions
It's clear that with a yearlong campaign of industrial actions - including strikes - Campinos cannot save face anymore
Gemini Links 21/10/2026: Summer Day in Tokyo (30c in Late October) and Whole Food for the Whole World
Links for the day
Links 21/10/2026: "Zelensky Took the Gloves Off This Time With Convicted Felon" and "Cellebrite iPhone Radio Zero-Day"
Links for the day
Reuters is Becoming Slop, Not a News Agency (Treat Reports From Reuters Sceptically)
In their own words
Disclosure/s Crisis at The Register MS (Promoting a Ponzi Scheme for Money)
So now they sell several schemes/scams at the same time, not limited to the slop
Links 21/10/2026: "The Tragic Death of the Republican Party" and "No War But Data Center War"
Links for the day
Internet Relay Chat Still Growing
The numbers go up, not down [...] Don't believe the doomers
Intercontinental Brigading - Part X - American Back Doors Inside Our Computers, With Transatlantic Swatting Against Critics Thrown 'Into the Mix'
"If your Windows PC's Secure Boot certificates are out of date, your system is vulnerable to malware like rootkits."
Gemini Links 21/10/2026: A Walk Through Amsterdam and Pythagorean Theorem
Links for the day
More Mass Layoffs at Microsoft Weeks From Now, Then Again Months From Now
Microsoft's crisis is not limited to XBox
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 20, 2026
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 20, 2026