anti-slop

name	anti-slop
description	Detect and remove generic, unjustified, inflated, or unfinished work across code, UI, prose, research, and agent behavior. Use when creating or reviewing substantial output, when a result feels templated, or before declaring a user-facing task complete.

Anti-Slop

Purpose

Raise specificity and usefulness by removing choices that are present because they are common defaults rather than because they serve the task.

Inputs

• The user's actual outcome and audience.
• Repository conventions, domain constraints, and existing content.
• The draft implementation or output.
• Verification evidence already collected.

Scope Boundary

Use this as a cross-cutting critique pass. It does not replace a domain review or implementation workflow; pair it with the skill that owns the code, UI, research, or writing task.

Process

1. Restate the output's job in one concrete sentence.
2. Identify elements that do not help that job: abstractions, decoration, claims, sections, dependencies, or process steps.
3. Check for generic substitutions where project-specific evidence exists.
4. Check for hidden incompleteness: placeholder content, untested paths, missing states, vague citations, or completion claims based on one command.
5. Remove unnecessary elements before adding compensating explanation.
6. Replace remaining generic choices with domain-specific ones supported by the brief or repository.
7. Apply the relabeling test to UI and prose: if the structure survives unchanged when the subject is swapped, it is probably generic.
8. Re-run the checks that prove the user-visible contract.

Constraints

• Do not equate minimalism with quality; necessary complexity should remain.
• Do not erase an established brand or project convention merely because it is common.
• Do not turn this skill into a universal checklist that blocks trivial work.
• Do not criticize subjective taste as an objective defect without evidence.

Verification

• Every prominent element has a task-specific reason.
• UI and prose contain subject-specific structure, not merely subject-specific nouns.
• No placeholders, invented claims, unexplained metrics, or decorative filler remain.
• The result covers relevant failure and edge states.
• Completion claims name the evidence that supports them.
• Removing an element would now reduce usefulness, clarity, or correctness.

Failure Modes

• Cosmetic cleanup that leaves an incorrect workflow untouched.
• Adding a new framework or design system to make output look intentional.
• Replacing one visual cliche with another.
• Polishing a generic template until it looks expensive without making it specific.
• Rewriting concise factual prose into a longer style guide performance.
• Declaring work clean because search found no TODO markers.

Examples

UI: remove nested decorative cards, keep the operational grouping, and add the missing loading/error states.

Code: delete a pass-through abstraction and reuse the repository's existing helper.

Research: replace a universal ranking with separate measured dimensions and stated assumptions.

Sources

See ../../sources/anti-slop.sources.md.