Oct. 14, 2026

I see many people online bemoaning the loss of the em dash or other stylistic tendencies such as, “It’s not X, it’s Y.”

• “I’m not giving up the em dash.”
• “I used em dashes before we had AI, and I still do.”
• “AI didn’t invent em dashes.”

^^These are all quotes I found online.

For me, one of the biggest (and most obnoxious) AI tells is the adverb quietly.

Never in my life did I read about so many things happening “quietly” until 2025. Now it’s the only way that anything seems to happen.

I recently griped about the following abomination, which a consulting firm subjected me to during a mindless presentation…

“Selling without a framework isn’t just inefficient; it’s quietly eroding your bottom line.”

Am I the only one who vomited in their mouth while reading that?

I could list other common tells, like the ubiquitous triplet lists, but they’ll only change over time as the language models evolve.

Besides, it doesn’t really matter…

The problem isn’t that AI uses these rhetorical flourishes; the problem is that it overuses them.

(Notice how I used the “It’s not X, it’s Y” pattern in the previous sentence, but it still doesn’t sound like AI? The secret technique: I wrote it myself!)

The AI models are trained on a lot of really high-quality writing, which is why they use these patterns that work great in moderation.

But then they over-index on these “good writing” techniques, to the point where you can’t take it anymore.

It’s like ice cream (or whatever food you love).

Ice cream is awesome—unless you’re eating it for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and snacks. Then it starts to become nauseating.

Why does AI not realize when too much is too much?

Because it has no taste. It’s like a kid telling the same joke over and over, not understanding why people stopped laughing after the second iteration.

Variety is the spice of life.

So long as you use them sparingly and tastefully, you can use any rhetorical devices you want.