Substack is filled with Chatbot slop specialists publishing material intended for coaching in the closet A.I. Dependant Writers to pretend their writing is 100% written by humans.

If they believe in the technology and the quality of writing it produces, why are they trying to put a human like linguistic veneer on their chatbot generated slop to trick people?

People that use generative “A.I.” to create entire articles (and books) and then attempt to edit the computer generated content to appear more human like so they do not lose customers (that would prefer to support non-AI dependent human writers) reminds me of GMO farmers and food companies that try to sneak their garbage into processed food items and then put words like “all natural” on the package. It makes me think of how Pfizer and friends fraudulently marketed their genetic slurry mRNA injections as “vaccines” and “medicine”.

If the GMO farmers and processed food corporations really believed the PR lines they espouse (about how GMO crops are superior “safe and effective”) than why are they not excited to advertise that their product is genetically contaminated (oops I mean genetically “engineered”)?

Similarly, if the people using AI to write for them (and then editing the AI produced words to appear more like they were thought up by a human) believe in the quality of AI writing so much, why are they striving to pretend their material is written 100% by a human ? Why do they not advertise that they are using AI for writing ?

I recently came across a publication that was rapid firing machine gunning articles out about ecology and regenerative living and the articles had that chatbotty vibe to them. So I asked the guy if he uses AI for writing. He was honest and said he does (but explained how he does it so much more responsibly and considerately then other people of course). So I asked why he does not tell people upfront that the articles are written with generative AI tech. He responded by saying :

“I tried that initially but it felt like it devalued the work which I stand behind entirely.. ..Personally, I've embraced it because it allows for a prolific output that wouldn't be possible otherwise. Before Al, I could produce one thoroughly researched essay every 1-3 months. Now I'm producing work every week which feels somehow important given how accelerated collapse and rebirth feels.”

So he doesn’t want to scare people away from becoming a subscriber because they don’t like reading AI generated content, so he doesn’t tell them it is AI generated, but then also says he stands behind the writing entirely?

Hmm something does not quite add up there for me.

In my opinion, if you think generative AI, LLMs etc are wonderful tools that produce high quality, accurate and reliable content then you would be announcing to the world that you use that tool for your writing.

If you are taking steps to use the tool and pretend you aren’t using the tool (like these posts shown in the screenshots below claim to coach people to do) then you are misrepresenting yourself and what you are publishing with your name behind it in the hopes of tricking people (that would not otherwise support your work) to do so under false pretences. And that my friends , is not cool in my book.

I’ll be making a full length post about this at some point but for now just wanted to share that with ya’ll and ask what you think of what I describe above (and what these articles below in screenshots claim to show people how to do).

What do you think?