Is that GPT5? Reddit users are freaking out about losing 4o and AFAICT it's because 5 doesn't stroke their ego as hard as 4o. I feel there are roughly two classes of heavy LLM users - one who use it like a tool, and the other like a therapist. The latter may be a bigger money maker for many LLM companies so I worry GPT5 will be seen as a mistake to them, despite being better for research/agent work.
No, that was 4o. Agreed about factual prompts showing less sycophancy in general. Less-factual prompts give it much more of an opening to produce flattery, of course, and since these models tend to deliver bad news in the time-honored "shit sandwich" I can't help but wonder if some people also get in the habit of consuming only the "slice of bread" to amplify the effect even further. Scary stuff!