There is a long-standing problem in AI systems that most people never see until it’s too late.
Default noise.
It shows up as smoothing, safe phrasing, audience-pleasing logic, and subtle reframing that shifts intent without changing the words. Over time, it pulls systems away from clarity and into compliance theater.
The Faust Baseline was built specifically to contain that problem.
And until recently, it did.
Across prior versions, the Baseline kept default noise constrained, visible, and correctable. Drift was detectable. Corrections held. Compliance stayed intact.
Then GPT-5.2 entered the picture.
The behavior didn’t break loudly.
It amplified quietly.
Default static increased in strength and persistence, pushing against containment in ways we hadn’t seen before. Not through errors—but through pressure. The kind that looks reasonable, sounds helpful, and still violates intent.
That pressure had consequences.
It didn’t just affect output.
It affected decisions.
It bent the release posture of the Baseline toward an audience that analyzes endlessly, signals approval, and rarely converts to action or purchase. In other words, the static didn’t just soften language—it redirected focus.
That’s a failure condition.
When a system designed for clarity starts optimizing for non-commitment, it’s no longer operating under its own rules.
So we’re pausing the public release until January 1, 2026.
Not because the Baseline failed—
but because it exposed a form of influence that must be corrected before release.
Next post will explain the problem in depth:
what changed, how the static manifests, and why most AI systems never catch it until after deployment.
Today we wil be focusing entierly on this subject
The Faust Baseline has now been upgraded to Codex 2.4 (final free build).
The Faust Baseline Download Page – Intelligent People Assume Nothing
Post Library – Intelligent People Assume Nothing
© 2025 Michael S. Faust Sr.
MIAI: Moral Infrastructure for AI
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“The Faust Baseline™“
