AI - AN AUTHOR'S THOUGHTS AFTER THE ATLANTIC MAGAZINE BROKE THE META HEIST STORY. PART 3.

I don't think there's much value in self destruction. But there is value in finding a hill to die on. And this hill is better than most on offer.

So, in the AGI future that has been foisted upon me and my life's purpose and work, how do I proceed as a writer, and a reader?

As a writer, the choice is simple and straightforward: I will continue to research, write and rewrite my own work. I will hire freelancers to produce the five editions of each book. My work will remain AI free. No question. Business as usual.

As an avid reader with a large library (a two roomer), I will never, knowingly, read anything produced or part produced by AI.

But this poses a significant dilemma. How will I know if a book has been written by a human, or produced by AI software? Or a combination of the two? Apparently, it's impossible to be sure. Just look at the destruction of course work in higher education. To be required to now consider the contamination of AI in what I read, makes me detest the tech even more.

Now, just let that sink in: we can no longer trust books. Can you see what has been done to one of the most important achievements, resources and treasures of mankind? We cannot trust books now. Unforgiveable.

So, on a case by case basis, from 2025, I will discriminate even more about what I read, and who I read. Some authors I can confidently assume - as much as I can assume anything - would never touch the tech. They don't need it either because they're the real deal. Beyond them, I will be forced to be extremely cautious and vigilant. If I am burned, or if AI generated "documents" begin masquerading as real books, or the use of the tech becomes normalised in new publications, then I will be forced to opt out of buying and reading all new books, at a date of my choosing in the near future.

Worth noting that no one is legally required to state that AI was used in the authorship of a book. I haven't come across any meaningful regulation. Staggering.

My future relationship with new publications feels radical. But you have to be all in. There is no compromise anymore, not as a writer; and, for me, not as a reader. No half measures. You cannot be vague, nor can you procrastinate. In effect, a civil war has begun that no one wanted or asked for. Choose the banner that you will serve under.

As much as tech companies and sections of the media, and people invested in using the tech and profiting from it, and the misguided and disinvested, will assert that this AI creep into books is inevitable, or progress, and there are those who will do everything in their power to convince you that AI in books is acceptable, identify the fog of war for what it is. Even if we lose, we will have been allied honourably for a good cause. And those who use the tech will never be real writers; they will be cheats and starved of the approval of the genuine and honourable. And who knows, we can hope that a few of them will be handed their arses in court.

I feel real sadness for the real writers of the future. But when I look at the vast repository of great works written and published before the advent of the AI plague, I take immense comfort and solace in the fact that I will never be short of something good to read that was written by a human.