Stop Slop

Why it's ranked here

Its value comes from unusually specific guidance rather than a broad request to sound human. The phrase tables, structural diagnoses, replacement advice, and transformations make the rules usable. Its rigid prohibitions also limit the range of prose it can handle without human judgment.

What's good

The guidance explains why patterns fail and often supplies a better approach. It asks writers to name actors, replace vague importance claims with concrete consequences, vary sentence lengths, and remove rhetorical scaffolding. Before-and-after samples make several edits easy to understand and repeat.

Tradeoffs

Several rules overreach. Banning every adverb, every passive construction, every sentence beginning with a question word, and every three-item list can remove useful language. One revised example even contains an em dash despite the explicit prohibition. The scoring rubric also depends on subjective judgments without calibration guidance.

How to use it well

Use it as a second-pass checklist for essays, product writing, and other prose that has grown formulaic. Treat its bans as prompts for inspection, then keep exceptions that serve meaning or voice. It does not provide grammar checking, factual verification, citation support, or automated editing software.

Observed

License

MIT

Primary format

Markdown instruction and reference documents

Install surface

Folder-based skill, project knowledge upload, copied custom instructions, or system-prompt content

Interfaces

Prompt and skill content; no CLI, library, MCP server, or standalone API implementation shown

Model support

Described for Claude or any LLM that can follow supplied instructions

Repository structure

Core skill document plus phrase, structure, and example references

Testing

No test directory or test files appear in the provided repository tree