I recently wrote a feature article about artificial intelligence (AI) and how businesses can use it to their advantage. The inherent trouble with this type of hot topic, however, is that there’s breaking news every day, basically rendering the content obsolete by the time you send it to your editor. In the process of researching the article, I even went straight to the source with questions. (For the record, the AI answers were no more illuminating than anything I found on Google.)
Even the smartest tech people on the planet are actively debating where it’s all headed. Out of pure curiosity, I had started playing around with ChatGPT when the first version came out in late 2022. In the few short months since then, it’s gotten a lot slicker. And I’ve also seen a lot more freelancers debating whether AI is an existential threat to our livelihoods.
In the short term, I believe AI will serve the same purpose for text as free clipart and stock images do for graphics: It’s a way for clients who don’t care much about quality to fill up their websites, blogs, brochures, etc. with words. And it will look and sound like it: GIGO.
Nonetheless, that still represents new competition for freelancers at the low-end, low-paying end of the market, much like the advent of content mills more than a decade ago. In a way, though, it’s even worse: Cheap clients will choose a free AI option over a low-cost human one.
For freelance professionals with higher-end clients, the threat is not as immediate. AI bots are far from writing as persuasively or creatively as a skilled human, and intelligent clients know that. Even so, the various AI platforms will get more sophisticated — and like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction, they will not be ignored. As creatives, we’ll need to figure out where they fit in our toolbox. What does that entail?
- Investigating and experimenting with AI on your own time. The more you learn about AI, the less you’ll fear it. It functions quite differently from search engines, since you can ask long, complicated questions (a.k.a., superprompts) that generate more useful outputs. Plus, educating yourself will also prepare you when a client asks what you know about AI!
- Leveraging AI to streamline processes. This could include tasks such as generating marketing ideas, brainstorming concepts, or tweaking the SEO of a blog post.
- Being wary about anything you generate on AI. Because of the databases and programming, AI information is often incomplete, dated, biased, or all three. Come into the process with as much or more skepticism as you would using a search engine.
My final thought on this: Never present AI-generated content as your own, even if you heavily edit it. Which brings me back to the magazine article I mentioned at the top of this post. When I submitted it, my editor told me that they’re now running an AI check on all stories — and I predict that’s an inevitable best practice in the publishing industry.
Jake Poinier made the leap into freelance writing and editing in 1999 after a decade of positions in the publishing industry, giving him key insights from both sides of the desk. As the founder and owner of Boomvang Creative Group, he has worked with a diverse array of Fortune 500 and small businesses, consumer and trade magazines, and independent authors. Jake is committed to helping freelancers improve their businesses and shares his knowledge and experiences frequently as a speaker at industry conferences, through webinars, and on his blog.
Hi Jake,
Thanks for the response. I understand that the hub-bub is about content written by AI. My point was that’s not what most people say when they decry AI. They just say AI is bad. Writers shouldn’t use AI, using AI to mean something specific (AI-generated content), but not saying that. It’s like saying cars are bad when what you really mean is a specific make or model.
This brings me to my next point…if you hire a ghostwriter to write your content, you don’t disclose that. One might argue that AI is a type of ghost writer. If you re-write and run through another AI that checks for plagiarism and AI generated content, how’s that different from paying for a ghost writer? (BTW…I do understand that you were talking about freelancing here, which is different since people are hiring a freelance writer specifically their writing talent).
BTW…I’m not advocating one way or another. I’m simply trying to point out that there are situations in which AI isn’t just writing and often is used like an assistant or extra writer. Personally, my efforts to experiment with it haven’t been great short of helping develop outlines. I’m a terrible prompter 🙂
This is a great comment, Leslie–thank you for pushing the topic further. In your examples of using AI tools for editing or for dictation/transcribing (which I’m doing today with otter.ai), that’s clearly not something anyone should feel obligated to disclose.
The tricky part indeed is in the definition, specifically what it means for something to be AI-generated. And really, that’s what I’m cautioning about. At the risk of oversimplifying: If I give ChatGPT a prompt to write a 900-word article about sightseeing in Rome and submit it to an editor with some minor tweaks. To me, that’s effectively plagiarism–and depending on how sophisticated the publication is, I might get caught. What if I heavily rewrite it (or use Prowriting to), to the point that it sounds like an original work? That’s a personal call.
I didn’t address it above, but it will also be interesting to see how the copyright battles play out in the coming years.
Again, thanks for commenting–I’m hoping others will weigh in with their thoughts.
AI is certainly a big topic. In this piece, you say not to use AI content as your own even if editing the content into your own voice. But what if AI is the editor (e.g. Grammerly or Prowriting Aid)? What if I use Prowriting Aid and ask it to rephrase a sentence I don’t like? What about dictation (which is how I write)? That’s AI. Do using those mean I have to fess up that I used AI or not use the piece at all?
I know that sounds nit-picky and not what most mean when they say not to use AI-generated content. However, I believe that we, as writers, need to be more specific about what we mean in terms of AI for writers and AI generated content. All I see is “AI is bad” or “I’ll never use AI” when in fact, most writers already use some form of AI if they’re using spellcheck, predictive text in search, Siri or Alexa, GPS, etc.