I am obsessed with disruptive technologies and their impact on culture and am following the impact of AI on writing and publishing with a zeal that borders on religious devotion. As a result, I was one of those Dragon Con attendees who stayed for the last day of the con so I could see the panel “AI & The Future of Writing,” held on Monday in Hyatt Embassy at 10AM. The description is what got me. “It’s here, and it’s not going away… Please come with an open mind.” When someone starts a conversation with the admonition to keep an open mind, I lean forward in my seat.  

Author Tony Sarrechia led a rousing conversation with authors J.D. Blackrose, James Nettles, Sean Taylor, Gini Koch, and Les Johnson. The group began by level-setting what is meant when folks talk about how AI is going to change writing. Blackrose admitted to having strong feelings about AI in the arts, but she believes it could eventually, probably, maybe help make strides in science and physics. She’s hopeful culture can find a balance.  

Nettles and Taylor agreed on the notion of balance. For his part, Nettles spoke of the AI as endemic, but “If you’re going to be a writer, be a writer.” AI may be “meh” right now, but he acknowledged it will continue to improve and could serve as an accelerator in editing. He sees the biggest author benefits on the business side. AI could be a valuable assistant in running, managing, and marketing a business.  

Koch is not worried about AI writing like her. Along with three other members of the panel, the LLM’s were trained on her pirated work. She relayed an experiment where she asked generative AI to write something in her voice. The results were cringe worthy. The best she could say was that it was adequate. “It won’t hurt people like us,” she said, meaning established authors with a built-in audience. It would hurt new writers because people who read 15 books a week won’t care if the writing is just good enough.  

Johnson and Taylor were worried about the impact of AI on young writers and students. Johnson saw the impact on math students, and Taylor, an educator by day, talked of students who get to college and can’t write a simple three-point essay. The idea of “deskilling” is a concern across industries, and writing and publishing is no different.   

When asked where the line could be drawn between ethical use of generative AI and licensed work, Blackrose discouraged any use. Besides the “shoulds,” that writing is a human action and shouldn’t be outsourced to a machine, AI content isn’t protected intellectual property, meaning publishers can’t draw up contracts to protect AI-generated content.  

In his day job, Nettles has taught about AI impact in several environments and is amused every time he hears that “AI is ethical to use everywhere except in my industry.” Seems like everyone is in the same boat on that point.  

Koch reminded the audience that we’ve been using AI for longer than we all think. Spelling and grammar checks, Google Maps and Map Quest. Some of her readers are visually impaired and have an AI assistant read her books to them aloud. “We want it when it’s helpful,” she said but warned against garbage in garbage out.  

All agreed that generative AI is a hard “no” for the creative act while assistance is situation dependent. Johnson, who spent his career with NASA, believes that AI is essential for research but not for generative text. He and others still check those sources, though, as AI has a habit of hallucinating. “I think we are living through a Rossum’s Universal Robot’s moment right now,” he said, referring to the 1920’s play by Czek writer Karl Capek, where robots are created to free mankind from tedious labor.  

AI checkers got a collective laugh and groan from the panelists. One mentioned that the Declaration of Independence was verified as AI. As for spotting fakes and the new “watermark” solution the tech bros have developed to identify generative AI text, Johnson called it an arms race. All agreed it wouldn’t work, with Nettles providing the best quip. “Locks only keep out the honest and the lazy,” he said. “If I improve the lock, I only get a better lock pick.”  

Koch wants technology to clean her house so she can write. She encouraged us to think about the kind of culture we want to be. “Technology isn’t bad,” she said. “We have to make the choice about what we want the machines doing.”