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Posted by CliffStoll 3 days ago

Rumors of my death are slightly exaggerated

AI hallucinations are getting ambitious.

A couple people recently emailed, asking whether the Klein bottle business was still operating after my death.

“Huh?” I thought. “I ain’t dead yet.”

After some digging, I discovered the source: an AI-generated review of The Cuckoo’s Egg circulating on Facebook. Alongside the usual synthetic praise and fabricated details, it confidently announced that I had died in May 2024.

Apparently AI has now advanced to the point where it can kill people off before they notice.

Mark Twain once wrote, “Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” I never expected to field-test the quote personally.

source: https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=989939243570691&id=100076638743004

Cheers, -Cliff

1616 points | 248 commentspage 9
eastern-sun 18 hours ago|
Glad to see you
adastra22 22 hours ago||
Loved your book, btw!
taneq 20 hours ago||
I’m very glad to hear it! Hopefully getting killed by AI doesn’t cause you too much paperwork. ;)
jlarocco 23 hours ago||
This is the second time I've heard of where a slightly well known person has been killed off by AI.

The other was a reporter covering the Denver Broncos: https://www.denverpost.com/2026/01/15/broncos-reporter-ai-fa...

fragmede 1 day ago||
Reported it as false information on Facebook.
h0p3 1 day ago||
XD. Always a pleasure to you see on these here innanets, sir. `/salute`. Family and I were talkin' about you the other night during Family Gathering. What's your plans for what you got left on this rock?
CliffStoll 1 day ago|
Thanks! I've submitted a paper to Black Hat / DefCon; I don't know if it'll be accepted. If so, I'll have fun doing a talk there.

I'm volunteering around the Bay Area (up at the Steam Trains at Tilden Park on Sunday afternoons), show up to the intro-classes at Berkeley Folk Dancing, and speak to schools and professional groups.

And, of course, I'm still operating this Klein bottle business. I have only one employee (who is a lazy, good for nothing sloth). Management is very thin and incompetent: there's only one boss (who is an oppressive taskmaster always trying to get me to do more work than I want to).

throwaway5752 1 day ago||
I picked up a klein bottle at your house and it was a bucket list moment and one of my best memories. I'm glad AI was wrong, and I am also glad it nudged me to tell you this.
CliffStoll 1 day ago|
Thank you -- one of the joys of running this zero-volume business is meeting visitors to the Bay Area. Every few days, someone stops by. Much fun! Cheers, -Cliff
alex1138 1 day ago||
Christopher Hitchens (by now, of course, most certainly dead. In fact 15 years this year) had this in Hitch-22, he discusses mortality. They'd (the newspapers) made a mixup and depicted him as "the late Christopher Hichens" ("something that one day will inarguably be true") before furiously apologizing to him, and he goes over some other people through history who have read their own obituaries
jeffrallen 1 day ago||
An eternal golden braid running from Twain to Stoll, from pen and ink to AI hallucinations.

Who would have thought? :)

CliffStoll 1 day ago|
Not me, Jeff! Smiles, -Cliff
Jaauthor 1 day ago|
So grateful you're okay - this week's been rough enough without hearing of another hero's demise.
CliffStoll 1 day ago|
I'm grateful to be OK as well. Close call there...
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