Robots penning literary masterpieces
As AI threatens to replace human writers, will the future of literature be written by machines?
Image created by AI based on my prompts.
In the past, there was plagiarism. Today, if you copy someone, you will be caught immediately. But what if it’s written by Artificial Intelligence (AI)? Will it be detected by plagiarism checkers and search engines? Will such AI-generated content be penalised by companies like Google? Will writers lose their jobs? Will quantity override quality? Will the history of humankind be written by machines from now on? Let’s find out…
All the questions above are relevant and topical concerns.
ChatGPT is one of the best examples of this new trend. Kids are using the tech to write their home works and research papers. The technology isn’t quite there yet, so they have to do 25-50% of the work, such as factual checks, citations, format, and content styling. Yet, ChatGPT is still the handiest Jeeves they can ever find. What’s more, it’s free. For now. A paid version is in the offing. Adults are using it to write resumes, sales landing pages, LinkedIn profiles, blog posts, and social media messages.
Is this the end of the writer as we know it?
Yes, it is the end of the writer “as we know it”.
Welcome to the AI-assisted writer or the AI prompt writer.
Only a person who understands the right prompts to use for customised answers can succeed in today’s world. And this requires common sense and experience. And both are costly propositions. Only a few possess common sense, and even fewer use it.
So what gives?
AI has truly transformed the way we process information. However, it can only be an assisting tool for writers. AI can never replace humans. Because the content it is currently spewing out is based on all the human content that came before it. The moment writers stop writing original content, what will AI produce? Garbage? Regurgitated history? Outdated content?
So, this is how I see AI being used to our advantage:
AI is great to set the agenda: Just ask AI how to frame your content strategy for a company by giving all the specifics you need (you need to be a good prompt writer). The better your prompts, the more customised will be the AI’s output. You can either make it as an average writer or a great writer, depending on your input. Similarly, AI can help you get over writer’s block by suggesting ideas and concepts to help you move forward.
Forget about grammar and proofreading: AI does a great job of it, most of the time. There are some idiosyncrasies, but it’s largely fine. So you don’t have to be a wordsmith to be good at writing. AI will take care of that by not only finding the right synonym for you, but also a better way to construct that sentence.
Writing style: By training the AI to mirror your unique writing style and thought patterns, you can infuse your work with the essence of your own personality. This is only possible for those who possess the talent of a true writer. You will gain a distinct advantage over those who believe that AI can replace human writers entirely. Your writing will possess the distinction between mere pulp fiction and a literary masterpiece.
Technical help: AI can help you get that video embedded right, so your video doesn’t spill out of the web page when viewed on mobile devices. All you need is the right prompt to get the code you need to insert into your WordPress website.
Illustrations: You don’t need to draw maps, sketches, or graphs anymore. The AI will do it for you. This will greatly reduce your time doing mundane tasks, so you can focus on the most important.
Automate research: You can get the basic draft of any subject under the sun. However, fact-checking, current citations, and hyperlinking can only be done manually.
And much more: I will let ChatGPT answer this one:
Enhancing storytelling and character development
Improving the accuracy of translations
Helping to generate personalised content
Writing news articles and summaries
Generating headlines and captions
Supporting authors with disabilities
Enhancing automation for repetitive tasks
Generating summaries and abstracts of long documents
Providing real-time feedback and suggestions for improvement
Helping with formatting and typesetting
Creating personalised marketing content
Generating responses to customer inquiries
Helping with SEO optimisation for online content
Identifying patterns in data to inform writing
Automating the generation of legal or financial documents
Enhancing personalisation in emails and other communication
Final thoughts
Sure, you can write more now because you have AI by your side. However, AI is still in its nascent stage. If you just have the AI write your content, you might have to retract the content like CNET did recently. This is a shining example of human ingenuity surpassing the capabilities of AI generated output. But in the next 5-10 years, AI can get super efficient in a lot more areas of human endeavour. However, AI will never be able to override humans. Without the guidance and direction of a master, the AI's output will be limited and without purpose. As ChatGPT admits: “While AI can support humans in many ways, it still lacks the ability to have an independent thought or creative idea without being prompted by humans. It is important to note that AI is a tool and not a replacement for human intelligence.”
There you have it. Humans and AI have spoken. Humans will continue to lead as AI-assisted writers. AI can be compared to a spell checker, as an indispensable and automated tool to improve the quality of writing and research. And importantly, overcome writer’s block.
P.S.: I asked ChatGPT to rewrite the human-written text above. From 900 words, it condensed the article to 300 words and got a Hemingway readability score of 10 (which means: it’s highly dense and not-so-reader friendly). However, my article got a grade of 5. Which means, it’s way better than AI. There you go, I have proved that humans will always tower over machines. Continue to write, dear writer. And readers will continue to read good writing.