Model Collapse — AI Glossary

Model collapse is a phenomenon where AI models progressively degrade when trained on data generated by other AI models rather than human-created content. Each generation of training loses more diversity and nuance from the original data distribution — rare but important information vanishes first, and the model eventually produces repetitive or nonsensical outputs. Published in Nature in 2024, this effect has raised serious concerns as AI-generated content becomes an increasing share of internet data used for training.