Writing Tips (Sometimes): Let's Talk About AI

You may have noticed that a lot of people seem to be talking about AI. You may have also noticed, at least in the author community, that everyone’s feelings on it are not only divided, but viciously so. In only the last couple of weeks, I saw a post by one author claiming that anyone who thinks AI is okay has failed an ethical meter and would be judged by her accordingly. And I saw another Facebook post by a different author suggesting that anyone who is anti-AI is a luddite, an idiot, and not worth listening to.

You’ve probably also noticed that the majority of the news articles about the topic use extremely emotionally heightened language. I’m looking at a list of articles now and here are a few of the phrases:

• “Gaslighting, love bombing, and narcissism”

• “Ring Alarm Bells on Rogue AI”

• “Unnerving Interactions with ChatGPT”

• “ChatGPT AI robots writing church sermons causing hell for pastors”

• “The monster is already on the loose”

• “Get ready for a sound revolution”

• “AI comes for the creative class”

The problem with emotionally heightened rhetoric is not that it is posing a particular angle on a new development in the world—it’s that it is telling us how to feel. And when we don’t recognize the rhetoric being used on us, it takes away our ability to decide for ourselves how we want to feel.

Now, since I don’t intend for this post to be a rhetorical analysis of news articles, lol, I’m going to simply say this: pay attention to the language. Because so often, the language is used to grab your attention and emotions, but the narrative it’s weaving is false. And you’ll notice that anytime anything new happens, this is the language used to talk about it. Not just AI. Everything.

Now that I’ve got that gripe out of my system, let’s actually talk about AI.

First, let me be clear that I’m what I call "AI Curious."

The picture at the top of this email was made using MidJourney. I used ChatGPT to answer a few questions I had about AI (ever wonder how support vector machines work?), and I used Google’s search engine to fact check a few things I thought were true but wasn’t certain about. I also used ProWritingAid to edit this post.

And I now run a brand-new discord server about AI, which you can click here to join.

I think AI is fascinating and exciting, and I don’t think anyone who is curious about it or interested in it is evil. That said, nor do I think anyone who is uncomfortable with it or prefers to avoid it is dumb.

AI is an extremely complex and nuanced topic, and so much of what you see are people applying binary conclusions to something that is the opposite of binary. You’ll see people saying “good/bad” and “yes/no,” but AI is not as simple as all that.

So what is AI?

"Artificial Intelligence" is an enormous term that encompasses a wide variety of different technologies. It is not only things like MidJourney or ChatGPT, it is also things like search engines, GPS, and email spam filters. It is editing software, robots, and algorithms. It is autonomous vehicles, space travel, social media, Spotify, Amazon, Netflix, Alexa, and Siri.

It is many things—and plays a role in many of the tools you likely use in your day-to-day life, whether or not you realize it.

Have you heard of a neural network? Do you understand the difference between heuristics, decision trees, and support vector machines? How about reinforcement learning? Do you know the difference between supervised and unsupervised learning? Do these words mean anything to you: classification, regression, clustering, association, dimensionality reduction?

These concepts are all part of understanding how AI works, where it gets the data it’s trained on, the advantages and disadvantages of AI, and potential pitfalls of the tech. And while you don’t truly need to know every detail and every nuance, the more you do know, the more educated of an opinion you can form on the topic.

Because AI, like any other technology, has pros and cons. It can be used for good things, and it can be used for bad. It can help people with disabilities navigate the world. For example, someone I know with dyslexia is using ChatGPT to help them write professional emails; I know several writers with aphantasia using writing tools to help them write descriptions with more depth and emotion; the ability to connect on platforms like social media can allow people confined to their homes to experience less isolation and loneliness.

But AI can also be used by corporations to exploit people. And when a tool is programmed on biased or racist data, it will produce biased and racist outputs.

My point is that it is unwise to go all in on or completely dismiss AI without understanding the full scope of the technology. If you don’t understand how it works, that’s okay. You can learn. I gave you some great keywords to get started with (above).

The second point I want to make is about ethics, because the number one objection to AI I see tossed around in the author community is that it’s “unethical.”

Now, you may not know this about me, but I’m a hobbyist philosopher. Sit me down sometime and ask me about absurdism or my essentialist definition of “dogness,” or tell me your feelings about Wittgenstein or Simone de Beauvoir, and I will be entertained for hours.

What I’ve noticed in these conversations about AI, is that people are conflating ethics with “something that makes me uncomfortable,” or “something that goes against my own moral code.” Sometimes these things align, but sometimes they don't.

Ethics is the study of “good and bad,” born from Socrates’s attempt to answer the question, “How should we live?” It’s an entire discipline that has been discussed, debated, and argued by some of the most intelligent people in history, reaching all the way back to Plato and Socrates—and the thing is, people still don’t agree on it.

To flatly say “AI is ethical/unethical” once again places a binary conclusion onto a concept that is immensely complex. Certain things about AI are definitely unethical. For example, I would argue that corporations selling each other data that is owned by someone else (looking at you, Findaway Voices/Spotify and Apple) is definitely unethical. But do I think the machines trained on the data are inherently unethical? No.

I also want to mention here, before someone yells “theft!” or “What about the artists?” that I am both an visual artist and a writer. I have posted many drawings online and written millions of words that are freely available to read. And I know for a fact my work has been used to train one machine or another. And I’m not upset about it. Why? Because I understand how the technology works.

Am I upset Findaway sold my audiobooks to Apple? Yes.

But these are two separate conversations: one is about the exploitation of creators by corporations; the other is about machine learning. There is overlap, but they are not one and the same.

Again, as I don’t intend this to be an essay on ethics, let me leave you with this: if you are concerned about the ethics of AI, brush up on your understanding of ethics first. Start by reading the Wikipedia article on ethics or watch Hank Green’s Crash Course on philosophy.

The last thing I want to say about AI (today, haha, because I’m sure I’ll keep getting questions about it), is that right now, everyone is hyper fixated on AI art tools like MidJourney and Stable Diffusion, or text bots like ChatGPT.

But AI has been around for decades. It’s not actually new. Have you ever considered what other tools you might use that rely on AI, and you didn’t even know it?

Let me give you a few examples of technologies that use AI: search engines like Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo, etc.; social media (all of it); GPS tools like Waze, Google Maps, and Apple Maps; Alexa and Google Home; website-building platforms; ProWritingAid and Grammarly; entertainment platforms like Spotify and Netflix; Amazon and other online ecommerce retailers; anything that gives you recommendations; the operating system on your computer; the production of cars, and autonomous features like auto-parking or braking; even your Roomba uses AI.

AI has also made its way into some surprising sectors you might not expect. For example, AI is used in agriculture to analyze crop data and predict weather patterns. In sports, AI is used to analyze player performance and develop game strategies. Financial service companies use AI to detect fraud, manage portfolios, and perform risk assessments. AI is used for traffic management, route optimization, and autonomous vehicle control. It's also used in the energy sector to optimize energy consumption and reduce waste. And don’t get me started on the Mars Curiosity rover (insert squeal of delight).

And because software is often proprietary, a company doesn’t have to tell you if they use AI. You could be using tons of tools that make use of AI technology without even knowing it.

Where do you think all these tools got the data to train their machines? Google Search, for example, scrapes the entire internet every day. It reads every website, looks at every image, listens to every audio file. And it has to do this in order to give you the best results when you type in a search query. We know this about search engines. But few other companies have revealed where their data came from, and we know big companies buy data and sell datasets all the time. So often, we just can’t know.

AI is everywhere. Not only that, it has made people’s lives immeasurably better in ways they don’t even realize.

If I had to offer a specific conclusion on this topic, it would be this: AI is not bad. AI has the potential to do immense good, and already does. But what we need is regulation—top-down regulation of corporations, transparency into the technologies and where they are being used and how they are being developed, and compensation for data bought and sold.

But that gets into politics, so I’m going to stop here.

I’ve received a couple of questions about the use of specific AI tools such as Google auto-narration, MidJourney, and writing tools, so I’ll talk about those soon.

But I’ll leave you with this: don’t be afraid. But put in the work to draw your own conclusions on the topic. The robots seem like they’re smart, but they don’t even come close to the power of the human mind.

We’re all gonna be okay.

Hello, World!

Guerilla Marketing Tactics for Indie Authors (with a little help from Chat GPT)

MidJourney: “surreal painting of an ai bot looking through a portal into a science fiction future”

If you’ve been following me for a while, you probably know that I’m AI curious, and think the new technologies that are developing are interesting (and the future of everything). I use ProWritingAid to help edit my work, I’m a big fan of email spam filters and search engines, and I’m fascinated by MidJourney. But most recently, I started playing around with Chat GPT.

First of all, it’s addicting. I remember when the first ChatBots came out, and they were fun for a few minutes, if only for the novelty of it. But they got boring, because they couldn’t maintain any kind of stream of thought, and often trailed off into nonsensical or non sequiturs that made the user confused and eventually lose interest.

But Chat GPT is not like that. Chat GPT can form what feels like coherent thoughts (though to be clear, AI techs are not actual intelligence. It’s just really complicated math.) that are easy to follow and understand. And it’s exciting to find out exactly what it’s going to say when you posit a question.

Because I’m a nerd, I started by asking it about things like indie author business models and marketing tips. And while I found most of the advice generic (but not wrong!), I started to customize my prompts. And when I asked it “What is the least common marketing method used by indie authors?” It responded with guerilla marketing. Like, what!?

I laughed pretty hard, but the thing is, it’s not wrong! That is a very uncommon marketing tactic lol.

It followed up with some guerilla marketing tips for indie authors:

One less common method that some indie authors have used successfully is guerrilla marketing.

Guerrilla marketing is a marketing strategy that uses unconventional and often unexpected tactics to promote a product or service. For indie authors, guerrilla marketing might involve:

1. Leaving copies of your book in unexpected places, like coffee shops, public transportation, or parks. You could include a note inviting the finder to read and pass on the book

2. Creating street art or graffiti that promotes your book in a creative and visually striking way. This could be done with stencils, posters, or even temporary chalk art.

3. Hosting flash mobs or public performances that are related to your book. This could involve a group of actors performing a scene from your book in a public space, or a group of dancers performing a routine that ties into your book's theme.

4.Creating a viral video that promotes your book in a unique and memorable way. This could involve a humorous skit, a song, or even a short film.

It's worth noting that guerrilla marketing can be risky, and some tactics may be illegal or could damage your reputation if done poorly. However, if done well and with care, guerrilla marketing can be a highly effective way to generate buzz and attract attention to your book.

Not only is “guerilla marketing” not commonly discussed in indie marketing circles, but I have never seen someone recommend “host a flash mob” or “graffiti” as a marketing tactic. Could it work? Maybe, if done well.

I followed up by asking if guerilla marketing is ethical, and it replied:

Some guerrilla marketing tactics, such as leaving copies of your book in public places, can be considered littering or illegal. Other tactics, such as defacing public property or disrupting public spaces, can be seen as disrespectful and unethical. It's important to always consider the impact of your actions on others and the environment, and to obtain any necessary permissions or permits.

In general, it's important to ensure that your guerrilla marketing tactics align with your personal values and the values of your target audience.

One thing I noticed when talking to chat gpt was a repetition of ideas, when asked differently phrased questions. If I asked it, “which guerilla marketing tactics would be the most effective for indie authors” (and similar but alternatively phrased questions), it would repeat the same answers as when posed the question, “what is the least common marketing technique for indie authors?”

But when I asked “what are some other guerilla marketing tactics, it came up with new stuff.

1. Reverse shoplifting: Instead of leaving your book in public places, you can "reverse shoplift" by placing your book in a bookstore or library where your target readership is likely to browse. This can help introduce your book to new readers and encourage them to purchase or borrow it.

2. Human billboards: You can hire people to wear t-shirts or other clothing featuring your book cover or a promotional message related to your book. These "human billboards" can walk around in public spaces, attend events, or go to places where your target audience is likely to congregate to create visibility for your book.

To be clear, these are not book marketing strategies I would typically recommend, as an actual human with actual non-machine learning capabilities. I think any author who wants to try them will mostly find they require a concerted amount of time and effort with little gain (unless you manage to go viral, which is as much luck as it is quality of performance).

But, I love the idea that Chat GPT might be able to help me reduce the mental load of coming up with marketing ideas constantly. That I could ask it to help me come up with fun ideas for a book launch party, or list book promotion sites to try, or generate topics to write about in my newsletters. That I could get ideas for how to think about my business model, or ask for advice on time management.

Of course, no AI is a magic bullet, but they are fun and interesting, and I’m excited to see both how the technology evolves, and what our societal response to it ultimately looks like.

And in case you were wondering, I wrote this blog post all by myself! Except for the quoted sections from Chat GPT.

I’ve always been excited about the future, though more specifically, about the future of space travel and the future of medicine. But now I’m excited about the future of this too.

The Swamp Hag of Blackrock Fields

My first official new book release this year is the second book in my collection of fairy tales. Last summer, I released the the first, The Bald Princess and Other Tales, and now I'm excited to bring you the second, The Swamp Hag of Blackrock Fields and Other Tales. Currently, only the ebook version is available, but the paperback is in progress and should be ready soon.

As always, Patrons have already gotten their free copy! Click to become a patron!

I've had this book almost ready for months, but just now have had the time and energy to push it over the finish line. 

This is my second collection of original fairy tales, all of them drafted during 2022. On my mind this year were thoughts of loneliness and isolation, dealing with grief, and building relationships as an adult. I also thought a great deal about responsibility, and how to find the balance between our responsibility to ourselves, our families, and our community, especially in a world that is rapidly becoming more and more integrated.

We moved into a new town and a new state early in 2021, and have noticed the difficulties of making friends as adults, especially in an area where the majority of the population has different values and beliefs than us.

The internet has offered a wonderful connection point for both my spouse and I, allowing us to connect with people who share our values and beliefs on Discord servers, Slack, and social media. But lacking that in-person connection can also be challenging and isolating.

The internet and in-person meet-ups aren’t the only way to find connection, however. Stories offer connection as well, and not just to others in our time—but connection to the past.

There’s nothing quite like holding a 300-year-old book and imagining how many people have held it in their hands, read the words on the page, or kept it stored on their bookshelf. And there’s nothing I love more than seeing scribbled notes or drawings on the pages that show someone not only read the book, but had a relationship with it.

For my anniversary gift this year (seven years!), my spouse bought me a piece of petrified pine—280 million years old. The thought of the time, species, history, cultures, civilizations, and people that existed during those years is mind-boggling. Just the thought that someone found this tree made from stone, decided to slice it up and polish it up, and shipped it off to the Smithsonian, where it could be purchased by me? Incredible.

These original fairy tales might never make it farther than a few e-readers and the platforms the book is available on. But, at the very least, it is an attempt, by me, to communicate with the future. To offer some sort of shared narrative. To say, “These are the feelings I felt, the thoughts I had, the stories I wrote. Perhaps they’ll mean something to you, too.”

And just for fun, I made some character art using MidJourney!

The Transformation of My Original Series

I have another exciting announcement to make! Because apparently, this year is going to be marked by forward momentum. 

Those of you who have been around for a while might remember my first ever series, the Sagittan Chronicles. It was my "practice" series, as I like to call it, where I learned how to do everything from writing a book to publishing to cover design to marketing.

But there was one problem with the series: the title.

When I initially wrote the series, I picked the name of the planet (Sagitta) off a National Geographic star map from the 1970s. Literally, I closed my eyes and pointed, and that's how I got the name. That was before I learned I really need to google everything before I published, and I had zero awareness of anything related to astrology, other than that it was a thing that existed.

Once, in college, a guy asked me what my sign was, and confused, I replied, "A stop sign." So yeah. Not my area of expertise lol.

So you can imagine my shock and surprise the first time someone asked me if my book was about astrology. After that, I spent years fielding questions about astrology at every event I attended. A couple years ago, I finally gave up on trying to even market it, and focused solely my other books. So, as the 10th anniversary of the series approaches, I decided to do something crazy, and retitle everything, starting with the series name. No more astrology associations for me haha.

Meet the Zirian Chronicles! 

If you've already read the series, back when it was titled The Sagittan Chronicles, it's mostly the same thing. It's all the oldies but goodies, reedited and repackaged. I got rid of some of the tenacious typos that made it through my first couple redesigns and did some basic language massaging, but the stories are by-and-large the same. I also redesigned the ebook, and in a couple months (if all goes according to plan), the paperback editions will be available as well. I've also created Google AI narrated audiobook versions, which you can find in the Google Play store! 

As with my other series, book 1, now titled Sundered Sky, will be free on all retailers (hopefully, that's already happened, but Amazon does like to be difficult sometimes). The audiobook version on Google Play is also free!

I'll be honest, most of my redesign decisions were made with improving my marketing options at the forefront of my mind, but I'm very excited to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the series (March 28th) with this brand-new redesign. (And, if you are a patron, you get digital copies of all the new edition ebooks for free!)

The series has five books, one prequel, and two short stories, and I left it openended in case I feel inspired to write more in the universe in the future. The books, while they have some tie-ins and crossover characters, can be read in any order. The series is in chronological order, however, if you read them 1 - 5. 

The over-arching question of the series is how different people and cultures react to major technological change—or at least, that was the intention when I initially wrote it. It's set on a planet called Ziri (previously Sagitta), in a civilization who has a technology called Doors, which allow them to travel great distances quickly and easily—think portals, like in Stargate or Narnia.

In book 1, the Doors change from being able to go to only 1 other location, to being able to go to multiple locations, which creates chaos across the galaxy. 

Each book is about different people, how the Doors affect their personal lives, and what steps they take to adjust to the the changes.

I think if I had to pick, Singular Cipher or Fall of the Flighters is my favorite of the series. I actually felt a little sad when I published Fall of the Flighters originally (2021), because I knew since I wasn't marketing the series, hardly anyone would read it. 

But, with the new titles and redesign, I'm much more hopeful a few readers will like the series enough to make it to the end!

Below, if you're curious, you'll see the whole series evolution with all its various iterations over the years. It's interesting for me to see such a clear visual representation of my own growth.

If you have any questions about the series, please let me know! 

You can find them on all retailers, if you're curious to check them out. Thanks for sticking with me!

Writing Tips (Sometimes): The "Scam" Bestseller

This is part of my series of essays for writers. Get them delivered to your inbox by signing up here!

A perturbed Buck allowing me to take a selfie with him.

Recently, I went to a workshop offered by someone who claimed to be a bestseller and award winner, and said they were going to walk the audience through their path for how they got there. I mostly attended out of curiosity, and because I’ve been to other “bestseller” workshops, and wanted to see if it was just their story or if they were going to offer practical advice.

I was severely disappointed.

The author was counting “bestseller” as having once received the “bestseller” sticker on Amazon; they had not gotten on the USA Today, NYTimes, or any other list. Their “award” was one of those small ones you pay to get. And based on their Amazon rankings and cover design, I’m confident this author was not making a living from book royalties.

And yet, they used their “success” to create a workshop for authors.

Most of their tips revolved around how to use extroversion to sell books to strangers in person. And while these strategies can absolutely work for the right type of person, the fundamental premise of the workshop was flawed. Because this author wasn’t actually a bestseller or award winner—they were just like the rest of us, figuring it out as they went along, and having the occasional spot of luck during their journey.

The thing that really hit me the wrong way, though, was that this particular person was also selling marketing services. Their packages ranged from $100 to $1000 dollars per month and included: tweeting about their client’s book, posting about the book on their blog, sending out a newsletter to their audience, and being available to chat throughout the month.

The author was clearly hosting events targeted at newer, less experienced authors who wouldn’t know about other marketing options, and would hopefully buy their services for at least a month or two.

I have to be honest: I was pretty upset by this.

Not only because they misrepresented their qualifications in a clear attempt to get clients, but also because they couldn’t even answer the most basic questions asked by the audience. One person asked how they got reviews, and their answer was “I put a note in the back of the book requesting readers leave one.” (If you’ve been around a while, you know that this method is a particularly frustrating paradox: you need reviews to get sales, and sales to get reviews.) Another audience member asked how to get paperbacks into bookstores if you publish through KDP, and the author’s response was, “Oh, I carry them into the store,” with no information about other paperback distributors and the various methods available to indie authors.

My impression walking away from the workshop was that this author was a scam artist who used charm and charisma to get clients. Only three or four clients a month would be all they needed to get a pretty basic salary.

And this is not the first time I’ve seen this. These authors aren’t doing anything illegal, of course, but it feels extremely unethical to me—preying on newer, desperate authors who simply want to get the word out about their book and find new readers.

But there are many better, cheaper ways to do this. There are legitimate services out there that cost a lot less than $1000 a month. An author could pay for Amazon or Bookbub advertising, $0.99 and free book promos, or any number of other services from legitimate companies. This author wasn’t offering those. Just their own twitter account and blog. They didn’t even provide analytics for how many visitors they got per month, or how many likes and retweets.

To be honest, I’ve never attended a workshop by a “bestseller” (even at the New York Writer’s Digest Conference!) focused on explaining how they achieved that status, that turned out to have anything more useful than, “I wrote a book and got lucky.” One author I listened to speak, basically said they got several BookBubs in a row, but had no advice on how to actually get said promotion (it’s a selective lottery, but there are some choices you can make to possibly increase your chances). Another author happened to have a cousin who was a celebrity who then tweeted about the book. (I don’t know about you, but I am not related to any celebrities.)

I’m becoming more and more wary of workshops from authors who claim to be “bestselling.” Particularly if I’ve never heard their name before. In my opinion, the best approach is the slow approach. It’s not about making a bajillion dollars overnight, as nice as that would be. It’s about building a business slowly over time, making and following through on a plan, and sticking with it. If someone promises a shortcut to success, it’s probably a scam.

Wilfredo Potato doing acrobatics to try to force the door open while Rowan and Buck look on with mild bemusement.