It's interesting that OpenAI models suddenly started increasing how often they add arrows to links shortly after this behavior peaked at a lower level in Anthropic models. It would be amusing if this were because they trained a reward model on human ratings where UIs made by the latest Opus were preferred and coincidentally arrows were slightly more common, leading the reward model to treat them as an implicit indicator of quality, and henceforth rewarding that for every later model in a self-reinforcing loop. Similar to the em-dash overuse cascade.
In my experience there's already a commonly used icon for external links [1] but it's not this north-east arrow, it's the arrow-out-of-the-square icon.
I don't know why it happens, but it reminds me of this feeling I have when the ai doesn't really know what it's doing: does one thing, then another one differently and when confronted: "Ah you're right, I just was just guessing, now I can do the correct thing".
Yes, that icon is more familiar to me also. It's also frustrating that some design guidance is now to make hyperlinks otherwise undecorated, such that even site-internal links need an icon. Please give us back underlined text with colors to distinguish visited versus unvisited.
That icon, at least as I've used it and seen it used, isn't necessarily to denote an external link; it's to indicate a link with a _blank target that opens a new tab. It's a hieroglyph for "open in new window".
I've used something similar for links that force a new tab. That seems like a more sane way to use it. (Personally I think forcing a new tab is annoying and user-hostile, but users keep asking me for it...)
Human generated stuff suffered just as much: "if you are a tech startup your domain MUST be .io or you are not going to be taken seriously"
Case in point: author HN user name is "arshxyz", the profile page shows https://github.com/arshxyz which is 404, but https://github.com/arshzip works and matches submission domain - author forgot to update his profile to the new fashion. An example of the fashionable ".xyz" becoming uncool and being replaced with new coolness ".zip"
This is a good observation. Now I'm curious how much fashion will be based on what models skew toward rather than what memes people latch onto? Also, velocity of change, as in how fast will fashion shift on a dime?
A physical paperclip collects things that aren't otherwise connected. For example, I receive a printed paper several pages long all stapled together, and I want to add a small note before passing along or returning, then I'd probably use a paperclip to attach my small note to the document. I don't think a paperclip icon in any way communicates "this will be a new window/tab when clicked."
It's interesting that OpenAI models suddenly started increasing how often they add arrows to links shortly after this behavior peaked at a lower level in Anthropic models. It would be amusing if this were because they trained a reward model on human ratings where UIs made by the latest Opus were preferred and coincidentally arrows were slightly more common, leading the reward model to treat them as an implicit indicator of quality, and henceforth rewarding that for every later model in a self-reinforcing loop. Similar to the em-dash overuse cascade.
In my experience there's already a commonly used icon for external links [1] but it's not this north-east arrow, it's the arrow-out-of-the-square icon.
I don't know why it happens, but it reminds me of this feeling I have when the ai doesn't really know what it's doing: does one thing, then another one differently and when confronted: "Ah you're right, I just was just guessing, now I can do the correct thing".
[1] https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/107823/is-there-a-com...
Yes, that icon is more familiar to me also. It's also frustrating that some design guidance is now to make hyperlinks otherwise undecorated, such that even site-internal links need an icon. Please give us back underlined text with colors to distinguish visited versus unvisited.
That icon, at least as I've used it and seen it used, isn't necessarily to denote an external link; it's to indicate a link with a _blank target that opens a new tab. It's a hieroglyph for "open in new window".
The long-time most prominent use is on Wikipedia, where it indicates external links and does not open a new window.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:External_links#How_t...
Random historic example: https://web.archive.org/web/20150105003618/https://en.wikipe... (“HyperTIES system”)
Definitely interesting, even if for web UIs I suggest using icon libraries: much more understandable and are easily managed by agents.
I've used something similar for links that force a new tab. That seems like a more sane way to use it. (Personally I think forcing a new tab is annoying and user-hostile, but users keep asking me for it...)
Do they know about middle-click? Or are they on mobile?
> (Personally I think forcing a new tab is annoying and user-hostile, but users keep asking me for it...)
This is much preferable to links that force the current window to mutate.
It's called fashion.
Human generated stuff suffered just as much: "if you are a tech startup your domain MUST be .io or you are not going to be taken seriously"
Case in point: author HN user name is "arshxyz", the profile page shows https://github.com/arshxyz which is 404, but https://github.com/arshzip works and matches submission domain - author forgot to update his profile to the new fashion. An example of the fashionable ".xyz" becoming uncool and being replaced with new coolness ".zip"
This is a good observation. Now I'm curious how much fashion will be based on what models skew toward rather than what memes people latch onto? Also, velocity of change, as in how fast will fashion shift on a dime?
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personally have been placing a paperclip icon when clicking something opens a new tab / window. idk why, felt like the best from the icon set
if the link just navigates to another page, imo it doesnt need an icon at all (and should be reconsidered: why a new page?)
A physical paperclip collects things that aren't otherwise connected. For example, I receive a printed paper several pages long all stapled together, and I want to add a small note before passing along or returning, then I'd probably use a paperclip to attach my small note to the document. I don't think a paperclip icon in any way communicates "this will be a new window/tab when clicked."
not even "here is a completely new page clipped to this one"? :)
just double-checked, i've also used a chain icon a few times, thinking "chain link" -> link