Thursday, July 20, 2023

All the Perfumes of Arabia, by Catriona

Chime in with your thoughts on writers using AI. Is it okay to use it for some tasks? Where do you draw the line?

The Stone of Scone (pronounced Scoon)

Nope. Nyet. Pas du tout. Aye, naw. 

Got that? I don't think it's okay. Is it inevitable? That's a different question and (for once) I'm staying on topic. 

For me, it wouldn't matter if I was using generative AI technology to produce a whole novel, develop a character, bounce an idea, or hammer out a synopsis. Why not? 

Currently, as far as I know, the corpora of linguistic matter fed into whatever language models are used by whatever processing applications are themselves . . . misappropriated. Like pirated. As in stolen.

And contracts are pretty clear about the copying and commercial use of artists' work. (Ever wondered why only Stephen King can have Beatles' lyrics as chapter headers? Ch-ching, basically.) 

To me, it doesn't matter what my stolen work is used for, it's still a grubby business to steal it. And if your shiny-amazing new toy, let's call it The SplurgaPlot 3000X, now with integral CliffHanger Capability, starts as a shabby little theft, there's no way to clean it up as it runs its course.

As Splurga would never have made Lady Macbeth say "Here's the smell of blood still. All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!"

She's in my mind because I was just at Scone Palace in Perthshire today. (It's pronounced Scoon, because . . . well, look at Worcestershire; who the hell knows what's up with all that.) One of the bits of history is the Stone (Not pronounced Stoon) of Scone, the throne that kings of Scotland used to be crowned on back when the kings were Kenneth, Duncan, Malcolm and ohhhh who's the other one?

"Macbeth enthroned 1040"

I've been in California long enough to look at stuff like that and think, "Blimey". And it doesn't half help you remember that all things will pass, too.

Cx




4 comments:

Ann said...

Out damed AI, out I say

Josh Stallings said...

Brilliant and concise as ever. Plus, "“it doesn't matter what my stolen work is used for, it's still a grubby business to steal it.” Is spot on. As for staying on subject, I tried this week and where you succeeded I fear I fell short go the mark.

Cathy Wiley said...

I know consent and copyright are why many people are against it. If it were all generated from all licensed material, would you use it?

Lyda McPherson said...

I have tinkered with AI...in a very limited capacity. It has been useful in generating marketing content such as "Is there a better way to say 'sparkling clean'? And, if I ask for a list of the 100 most practiced sports by men in American, viola! Here's a super nifty list of a target audience. All that said, I did the same thing on Goggle. It took a little longer and a lot more keystrokes. To your point abut the grubby foundations, I do see litigation in the future. Some day the AI algorithm is going to spit out a plot, a character or a phrase that belongs to a real human in an already published real book. Things are going to get messy.