I’m not concerned about AI outcompeting competent writers or impacting my career directly. I am deeply concerned about AI swamping submission systems and destroying the ability of editors and readers to find the next generation of writers.
AI is very much a danger to the long term health of the field not because of competition for quality readable fiction but because of its ability to create dreck in previously unimaginable quantities and drown submission systems and indie publishing in shit.
@KellyMcC
"Swamping submission systems" hits the nail dead-on. The threat of #AI / #ChatGPT systems to the writing /creative pipeline/lifecycle isn't (so much) that it "kills the crops" as that, unchecked, it has potential to "kill the soil", the cultivation of new writers/creatives.
If social media taught us anything, we need to up our systems thinking game, AND FAST, because we so rarely think about secondary effects much less stave them off.
@PixelJones @KellyMcC I may be late to this, but isn't this one of those things where we are (or perhaps should) all be going, "always, always, check primary sources. Whether it's Wiki, or Chat-whatevs, or anything.
"What are your sources for that?" should almost always be question #1.
@bytebro @KellyMcC Right. "Check your sources" is always good advice but there's a huge chasm of effort between reading/scanning for information and formally _vetting_ it.
Before #ChatGPT (broadly speaking) you could look at a coherent, literate-sounding article & assume no human would go to the effort to produce coherent rubbish. You'd tacitly trust it & only vet it further if needed.
Now, vetting _all_ content _first_ is an added cognitive burden.
Kelly McCullough
PixelJones
Bytebro 🇬🇧 🇺🇦 🇬🇱