Category: A Writer’s Journey

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ChatGPT is here to stay, but so am I

The publishing industry has been in a big, confused mess about the emergence of ChatGPT, a freely accessible artificial intelligence (AI) program designed to write creative works based on a series of prompts. [1] While the technology could significantly improve things for some people, writers everywhere are uncertain about the full impacts that the technology will have on the publishing industry.

The ChatGPT program can write any story of any length in almost any style. And therein lies the problem.

At the moment, it is reasonably easy to tell when a piece of writing has been generated by ChatGPT, but as the algorithm learns—and I really mean "learns"—it will get harder and harder to tell. The market was already overwhelmed by the scam writers out to make a quick buck, but when ChatGPT came online, the saturation became worse.

Literary magazines like Clarkesworld became inundated with AI-generated stories, and they closed their submissions portal as a result, while they figure out how to handle this miss. [2] Amazon has seen a sudden increase in self-published books on the platform. [3] And there is now great concern about the future of professional ghostwriters, knowing that businesses no longer need to hire a ghostwriter when they can get an AI program to write their material for free.

Exactly where this is all going and how the industry will ultimately respond to AI-generated stories is still unknown.

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Are we dumbing down language?

Recently, I took a grammar refresher course to help with some aspects of my editing. I took the course because often enough I encounter something in ProWritingAid or in conversations with other editors that I don't understand. The terminology occasionally goes over my head. So, I thought that perhaps a refresher course would help with some of the terminology confusion.

The course certainly did do that, and I was glad I took the course. However, there were a few comments that actually irritated me—and they all revolved around this philosophy that we're dumbing down language.

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Guilty

Slay the Naysayers

Every writer encounters at least one naysayer, even in the early stages of their writing careers. You know the ones I'm talking about. They're the people who say things that make you feel bad about your choices, or they hinder your ability to make progress, they shake your confidence, or zap you of energy.

They come in all different shapes and size. And some of them are stealthy in their actions, not even realizing what they're doing and the negative impact that they have over your writing.

But there are strategies for dealing with the naysayers, so you can make progress towards your hopes and dreams. It all comes down to mindset.

In today's post, I want to share with you some of my personal experiences with the different naysayers and how I deal with them.

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Advice out of the mouths of babes

Some years ago, my daughter and I were having a conversation about what it was she would like to do for the coming year. She's a dancer, and at the time, she was interested in the idea of turning her dancing into a career. She was only 13 at the time, but even then, she knew that if she wanted to go professional, she was going to have to work hard to be the best she could be—and some.

The performing arts are just as competitive as the publishing industry, if not more so.

Anyway, I had received an email from her dance school about auditions for a competition dance team. She had never been part of a competition team, but she was being invited specifically to audition. When I asked her if she was interested, she hummed and hawed for a bit, then she said something that hit a little closer to home than she realized.

"I'm never going to make it if I don't take a risk and put myself out there."

BAM! The fist hit me in the gut, and she never lifted a finger. She was talking about her own dreams and her own aspirations, yet her words carried a message that was powerful.

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The Power of a Name

Within my writing circles, discussions about pen names have come up frequently of late. I guess it's because many of my writing buddies are turning their attention to self-publishing, and many of them have one reason or another to not want to use their real name.

In fact, if I think about it—I mean really think about it—none of my writing buddies publish under their real names. For one writer, it's because she wants to separate her publishing from her real life (so her students can't find her online). Another wants to protect her children from what could become negative backlash if other parents work out the connection between the two names. For another, it's because she wants to separate her fiction from her nonfiction. And for another, it's because their day job would be at risk if their employer ever worked out the truth about the nature of their fictional writing.

Regardless of the reason, it's always interesting to see how others come to the conclusion about what name they want to publish under.

And for me… I laughed at myself when I discovered that I had made the decision about my pen name back when I was just starting high school.

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