lisa writes stuff issue #29 is it live or is it memorex
On generative ai and future of the resistance
Dear Internet,
I hang out on r/writing and r/selfpublish, among other subreddits, on Reddit. (If you’re not familiar with Reddit, it’s a site dedicated to communities of interest.) One topic that comes up quite a bit is using generative AI to create content to publish and sell on Amazon, BN, Kobo, etc.
As one would expect, this topic can be, at times, incredibly divisive.
Where to start?
AI needs to be trained thousands of times to spit out reliable content and not jibberish. The New York Times (gift link) did a great piece on training AI using literature including Shakespeare and Jane Austen.
“They imitate whatever they’ve been trained on.”
It’s important to know how AI works. It does not think, understand nuance, give original thoughts, or can be 100% reliable. (OpenAI, the creators of ChatGPT clearly state this on their site.) It provides answers and summaries to questions that have already been asked in one form or another. It is a machine. It just pieces together what it has learned to provide you an answer.
AI can also show bias and be easily manipulated.
A popular topic of conversation on those subreddits is creating AI books and selling them on online. It’s super easy to do. I played around with ChatGPT the other day and asked it for help on Stella Matthews Makes a Decision because I was stuck. I wanted to know what it would give back to me with the short summary I provided. It spat out an outline of sorts tackling character development, setting, etc. I also played around with Google’s Bard, and it spit out somewhat the same. (Microsoft’s Copilot response was not that great.)
This example was illuminating.
But what it gave me was not new and that’s important because while I probably would have gotten there myself, what it did do is get me there in a shorter amount of time.
(While working on my UX homework, I found a list of AI tools you can use for writing all types of content from blogs and emails to short stories and books. It’s frightening.)
Is that helpful? Possibly.
“Authors” (and I use that term loosely) are creating “whole” and “complete” stories using AI. By giving a summary using keywords (to rate the book higher in Amazon’s algorithm), AI churns out a story on whatever topic or length you ask it to do. “Authors” are creating hundreds if not thousands of short stories, serials, and novels using this method and selling them across variety of platforms. Amazon and other retailers are cracking down on the use of AI created content.
And the AI is doing it on the backs of others.
Recently, a bevy of writers sued OpenAI (gifted link) claiming OpenAI was using copyrighted work to train ChatGPT. This is not the first of lawsuits and it certainly not the last. It’s concerning because training on work that OpenAI (or any AI bot creator) has not sought permission from is stealing. It’s essentially plagiarism and copyright infringement in the highest order.
(If you’re curious on what’s going on with the cases (for there are many), a search for “writers sue ai copyright” in Google will pull up lots of articles from reputable sources. I recommend you trim it down the results to last month which you can do under Tools > Past Month.)
Also, courts found that work generated by AI cannot be copyrighted because it was not created with human input. So, if I wrote a story solely using ChatGPT or any other AI software and posted it online, you could repost it under your name and I couldn’t do a thing about it.
(The crux of the writer’s lawsuits is that permission was not granted for the indexing of their content and if OpenAI (and other AI companies) had sought permission, we’d have having a whole ‘nother discussion. Additionally, Amazon is now requiring you to state you are using AI generated content in the book/serials description. If Amazon detects you are and you’ve not stated this in your description, you can very well lose your author account and be banned from selling on Amazon)
I played around with ChatGPT and asked it to write me a sexy romance in 500 words. Here is some of that result:
“Under the soft glow of moonlight, they danced, bodies entwined in a sensual symphony. Marco's hands, strong and sure, explored the curves of Olivia's form, leaving a trail of shivers in their wake. The heat between them intensified with every forbidden touch, the air thick with the intoxicating scent of passion.
Their clothes became mere obstacles as they succumbed to the undeniable chemistry that bound them. The warmth of the sand beneath them heightened the intensity of their connection as they surrendered to the pull of desire. Skin met skin in a dance that mirrored the sensuality of the night, and the world blurred into a tapestry of pleasure.”
(ChatGPT tagged the piece against their usage policy which turns out to be true. Because of this, I’m surprised it spat out an answer that while it seems to be not direct in the sexy times, the context is definitely not appropriate for those 13 years and younger.)
I mean, really?
Writing is lonely work and it takes a lot of energy mentally and emotionally. While we always want a way to make our jobs easier, using AI to write those stories is not the way to go. But, and this is a big but, using it to get an idea to move forward, like with Stella Matthews Makes a Decision, or bounce ideas off can be a good thing. Lots of writers use ChatGPT to brainstorm ideas and flesh out scenes. And they are open about it. I think that’s okay as long as you are open about using it because it’s getting help and not depending on ChatGPT to do the entire job.
And remember: plagiarism and copyright infringement are bad.
Is there the line blurred? Absolutely. ChatGPT has only been around since November 30, 2022. It’s incredibly immature right now.
What will the future hold for AI? No one really knows even with all the future speculation . It’s a whole new world out there but I will say, if AI becomes sentient, I’m joining the resistance.
P.S. I’m currently taking Google’s course in UX design on Coursera and when I complete that, I’m attending a course on AI. I want to be prepared when the world goes down in flames.
robotically yours,
lisa x