I use ChatGPT! There, I said it. Sometimes I used Google Bard, which is now known as Gemini. Anyway, that’s not the point.

One has to accept that we are living in a post-AI world. Although it’s still in its infancy and we are yet to understand the full implications of this General Purpose Technology. I won’t bore you with the impact of Generative AI on this society. But I will say this, all General Purpose Technologies have changed the world and this time it won’t be any different. The printing press, steam engines, calculator, and Amazon Kindle publishing (maybe). Each one of those was a general-purpose technology that changed the world. I might write another post to talk more about it.

The world is now split into three groups, those who use ChatGPT, those who don’t, and those who don’t yet know that such tech exists. Right now there is tension between the first two groups and if history has anything to teach us – the second group will shrink to small orthodox groups attempting to keep the art of writing alive. It’s not as black and white and I have intentionally departed away from subtlety in the interest of making a point.

I am part of the first group; I will write another post to crib about the second group.

This blog wouldn’t have been in place if ChatGPT-like tools weren’t standing in line to help me out. I always wanted a personal blog. I even started one 15 years back. The idea of spending hours and hours to perfect my writing wasn’t a great use of my time. Writing slowed me down, polishing took time and I cared too much about the article looking perfect. Because of that, I discontinued my blog. I still repent that decision to this day. I am not a bad writer, you can judge me with this post which is completely written by me. But I have seen a lot of bad writing to know that I am slightly better than the rest. A lot to work on, I admit.

I am still orthodox and principled enough to not ask ChatGPT to come up with an idea, write a post, and publish it. I know we are speeding into the future where even that will be more normal. Heck, I know about some financial news websites that have automated systems in place to copy a post from elsewhere and publish them on personal portals. That’s not me.

I merely want to increase my efficiency and output.

I am inspired by books like “Show Your Work”, “The Practice” where it’s more important to keep documenting your learning, your thoughts, and your insights. That’s precious to me. I come up with a detailed structure, an almost complete first draft, and then use ChatGPT to polish it further. I don’t mind someone else (ChatGPT) polishing my words, checking my grammar, correcting my sentence structure, and maybe expanding it slightly to make it more engaging. Thoughts are still mine, broad structure is driven by me and I am the ultimate gatekeeper of what gets published and what doesn’t.

Presidents, prime ministers, and important heads of institutions, and businesses, many outsource their writing to others. Popular stand-up comics and television celebrities hire smart writers to write for them. If they do it, why not others? What was available to them for a high price, is now available as a general-purpose tool. Everyone should make use of it.

The Internet will be flooded with auto-generated content very soon. It already has. It’s going to worsen further. Search engines have a much more important role to play until newer ways of navigating information become the norm. The audience will continue being the ultimate judge of engaging and quality content. Algorithms model Audiences and all algorithms will attempt to do the same. Auto-generated content that continues to entertain, engage, stimulate, and offer value to readers and viewers will continue being valued by the audience. It does not matter how it was written.

Would love to know your thoughts, please leave comments.

Note: This post was completely written by me. I believe in transparency. So I will start adding a declaration at the end of every post for my readers.