Tech caution
I always approach new tech cautiously. It took me years to get a smartphone. I don’t have VR, or a hand-held gaming system, or any smart devices in my home. It takes money to be on the bleeding edge of tech, which is one reason. The other reason is that I like to see where it’s going. I like for someone else to work out the kinks and blaze the trail a little bit before I hitch up my wagon and start plodding Westward.
Whether you like it or not, AI is here. While I object to the use of AI to replace designers and coders (at least, without compensation), I find that creative people can leverage AI in ways that enhance what they can already do. And, being a proponent of the idea that all people have not only a drive but a right to be creative, I’ve altered my stance on the current AI boom.
In that vein, I have made cautious approach to the use of LLMs for clarifying my writing, for example. AI suggests keywords for SEO, and sometimes cleans up the structure or rewords the shaky parts. As I have noted, SEO-izing my posts just seems to draw spam and I’ve yet to see any real engagement from it, but while the tool is not a driver of my work, it is a tool. Just like no modern production woodshop would build furniture with only 19th Century technology, there is no reason to ignore a useful tool if it’s available.
Clarity, not creation
I don’t like AI’s writing output, although I have used it for my link post intros. All of my actual blog posts are really mine, sometimes just improved by using an AI to analyze. Do you want to know the really funny thing? A lot of experts say you can tell AI writing by the em-dashes. But I actually liked using em-dashes. They’re a way to include a pause in your writing that’s not as strong as a semi-colon. Now I need to avoid them, lest my writing be seen as AI generated. Or using old-fashioned words like “lest.” Curse my interest in 20th Century fiction and all of its grammatically correct authors!
Lately I try to think of AI tools like any other piece of technology. I don’t hesitate to use a calculator. Or a computer, for that matter. There was a time when both of those things would have been considered a cheat.
I find AI useful for when I’m groping for that word or expression that’s at the tip of my tongue. It’s also helpful to find sources of quotes (or the correct quote in its context). AI is less helpful to use to make something out of whole cloth. It’s really just a statistical predictive model. It’s no more intelligent than the calculator that can multiply numbers faster than I can write them. All it can do for writing output is to take all of its training data, and link up key words to try to match its output to the user’s prompt. My brain already does that, albeit somewhat more slowly.
Unpredictable outcomes, familiar patterns
There is much talk about an AI bubble. The energy use (or overuse), the effect of AI on the climate, the morals of those who are bringing it to fruition. Creatives either rail against its use, or quietly put it to work. I think, like most things, that AI will do its disruption and then integrate itself into our daily lives. No one could have predicted that the World Wide Web of the 90s would become integral to how the world operates. In the 90s I only dreamed of someday having my own dot-com address. Now I have several. I dipped my toe in the water of blogging on a few platforms in the early days, thinking it a bit silly to just post random thoughts for anyone to read. But now I see the value of it for myself, even if it benefits no one else.
Just like no one in the 90s truly predicted the current commercial, civic, and social impacts of the internet, so too the emergence of AI will possibly also follow an unpredictable path. There is much talk of AI-driven robots in the home. But what about AI governance of business or civic institutions? Could its statistical probability expertise solve problems that currently stymie the world’s political actors? AI is impacting creatives but it could much more effectively replace middle managers. AI helps with scientific analysis, but what if we fired AI into space to explore the universe as our proxies?
So, this is not a rant against AI. Maybe only a little bit. It’s more of my view of the situation from way deep in the forest. Maybe I can only see trees. In a year, this post might seem ridiculously outdated. It might also be prescient.
Either way, it’s here to stay. Assuming we don’t scour ourselves off the face of the planet.