11 ms·

The floodgates are now open for all the people who believe they have it in them to be great writers, if only it weren't for all of that tedious writing. As if t

The floodgates are now open for all the people who believe they have it in them to be great writers, if only it weren't for all of that tedious writing. As if the value in writing consists mainly in having an idea. This is much like people who believe that their great business idea is (by itself) worth millions.

pixl97 4y ago
Eh, I have my doubts that's actually what this is. Of course this is just a guess as we don't have the information. See, per the article they are paying $.12 per word. Much like those spam sites that copy SO and put up ads on the site and get a few pennies per click, I'm guessing this is somewhat the same. Because there was a potential payout someone(s) realized you could bot farm this to make a few bucks.
- dsr_ 4y ago
  Except you can't, because magazines are already used to receiving large quantities of low-quality submissions. It's called the slush pile. Much of editing consists of sorting through the slush pile looking for gems. This just vastly increased the size of the slush pile. Spamming, basically. Nobody made any money from this.
  - JohnFen 4y ago
    A wise man once clued me in about getting published in print. He said that publishers have a problem -- they own a very expensive printing press that costs a fortune whether it's printing something or not. So they're always desperate for material to feed the beast with. The reason it seems like it's difficult to get published is that they also have another problem -- they are inundated with crap submissions. "Crap" doesn't even mean bad writing, it includes pieces that aren't suitable for the particular publication -- wrong writing style/tone, wrong audience, etc. The trick to getting published is to understand the publisher's problem and help them solve it. You do this by paying attention to what they publish, noting the style/tone, length, topics, etc., and give them something that fits and is high quality. They'll love you to death. Once I really internalized that, I found it was pretty easy to get published. Online publishing changes the economics a bit, but even there, publishers have limited resources and the same rules still apply.
    - em-bee 4y ago
      Once I really internalized that, I found it was pretty easy to get published. yes, but then you only write what publishers want and not what your creativity drives you to write. i am not sure that letting publishers be gatekeepers is a good thing. this is a hard problem though. and i don't know what is the right answer.
      - JohnFen 4y ago
        That's not precisely true. What you do is find the right publication for what you want to write. There's a HUGE variety to choose from. The odds are that there's one somewhere who is on the same page as you. But it is also true that it's a business, and if you want to be published (and don't want to self-publish), then you'll have to do business-related work in addition to creative work. Or, if you're lucky or successful, have a literary agent who will do it for you (for a price).
      - pmontra 4y ago
        > this is a hard problem though. and i don't know what is the right answer. The hard problem is always the same, how to be happy making what we like. Sometimes the solution involves making a reasonable amount of money. > then you only write what publishers want Most software developers write only what their customers / bosses want and not what they would like to write. That allows them to pay their bills and live their lives. Local optima, often easy to reach.
unsupp0rted 4y ago
What does the value in writing mainly consist of? Edit: currently this question is at -3, as though it’s obvious to everyone the difference between valuable writing and not valuable writing. To me it’s a worthwhile question, particularly because the more precisely we answer it the more precisely ChatGPT will become able to produce valuable writing a couple releases from now.
- slowmovintarget 4y ago
  Execution, meaning, and polish.
  - oneoff786 4y ago
    So… what if the AI does better on those things
    - dsr_ 4y ago
      Then the AI will be worth more. Right now the AI is worth negative value.
- floren 4y ago
  It's the way the story is told. If it was all about the idea, you'd just read the Wikipedia plot synopsis, say "ah what a great story that was, so glad I read it" and move on.
  - blowski 4y ago
    Anna Karenina. It basically tells you the plot on the first page, and yet is 1000 pages of something incredible. It's like being able to see inside someone else's mind - not being told what they're thinking, but being able to feel the emotions as they do.
  - snerbles 4y ago
    > read the Wikipedia plot synopsis, say "ah what a great story that was, so glad I read it" I have unironically done this for movies/books/games/media I've elected not to consume but otherwise desired to know for cultural context.
orblivion 4y ago
On the other hand - my dad is an industrial designer. He was initially irritated by how easy it was for lower grade designers to enter the field given the advent of new tools (even before computers). But he eventually embraced it and understood that the nature of his job changed to something more comprehensive. He just advised me to prepare for the same as a software developer in the age of ChatGPT. Perhaps he would say the same about writers.
- chinaman425 4y ago
  [flagged]
- malauxyeux 4y ago
  > understood that the nature of his job changed to something more comprehensive. He just advised me to prepare for the same as a software developer What's that mean to you concretely?
  - orblivion 4y ago
    I don't know yet. I honestly don't want to think about it. (despite my dad's advice) I guess what my dad would say is to find a way to sell some sort of package of yourself offering a service that includes development. The sort of thing where you might otherwise outsource programming, but now you can just have the computer do it. That's not concrete, but that's as far as I've considered it.
    - malauxyeux 4y ago
      Thanks for the reply anyway. I don't want to think about it either and was hoping you had an easy answer.
frankfrank13 4y ago
reminds me of PG > The fact that there's no market for startup ideas suggests there's no demand. Which means, in the narrow sense of the word, that startup ideas are worthless. http://www.paulgraham.com/ideas.html#:~:text=The%20fact%20that%20there's%20no,that%20startup%20ideas%20are%20worthless http://www.paulgraham.com/ideas.html#:~:text=The%20fact%20th....
- basch 4y ago
  This is one of his essays I vehemently disagree with, and think has hurt Silicon Valley. The idea that ideas and idea people are worthless has had a cascading effect of putting non idea people in idea people seats, or locking out a class of people from participating unless they have some other engineering or marketing or leadership skill. Apple would never have become without Steve Jobs being able to see what was and wasn’t a good idea. An idea person doesn’t just have one good idea, and maybe one idea alone is worthless. Good ideas include good taste for scope, what is and isn’t needed for success. Having an idea and handing it off to a startup is very different from having an idea and supervising it, keeping it on the rails. It’s almost crazy to me that an idea is worthless, but an entire startup without an idea is seen as potential. As far as the AI floodgates, the world changed almost overnight, and we are just going to have to adapt to everyone having a calculator in their pocket, and that being good at using it is a more important skill than arithmetic. I’m not sure I’ve seen a technology adaption go from 0 to whatever percent we are at quite like this. It’s barrier to entry is so low, free to use, easy to use, easy to plug into old workflows, and somewhat undetectable by those not in the know. It would be wise to accept this new reality and start valuing prompt and editing skills instead of dismissing what part people “aren’t doing on their own.”
  - satvikpendem 4y ago
    It's rather that developers don't want to work for idea people because they usually are not Steve Jobs, who is the exception to the rule.
    - basch 4y ago
xwdv 4y ago
What a glorious era, where all humans can now be made more equal. Even the weakest minds can create artwork and stories that rival the most talented individuals. Why hasn’t AI come to the field of mathematics yet??
- fl0ps 4y ago
  I'll just leave this here... :https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03166-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03166-w
MBCook 4y ago
That’s not so bad. The big problem is the people who don’t care and are just generating and submitting 1000 stories in the hopes one makes $10 because it’s basically free to them. They only care it gets accepted. Outside of that they don’t care one bit what the story is about or how good it is.

pixl97 4y ago

Eh, I have my doubts that's actually what this is. Of course this is just a guess as we don't have the information. See, per the article they are paying $.12 per word. Much like those spam sites that copy SO and put up ads on the site and get a few pennies per click, I'm guessing this is somewhat the same. Because there was a potential payout someone(s) realized you could bot farm this to make a few bucks.

dsr_ 4y ago
Except you can't, because magazines are already used to receiving large quantities of low-quality submissions. It's called the slush pile. Much of editing consists of sorting through the slush pile looking for gems. This just vastly increased the size of the slush pile. Spamming, basically. Nobody made any money from this.
- JohnFen 4y ago
  A wise man once clued me in about getting published in print. He said that publishers have a problem -- they own a very expensive printing press that costs a fortune whether it's printing something or not. So they're always desperate for material to feed the beast with. The reason it seems like it's difficult to get published is that they also have another problem -- they are inundated with crap submissions. "Crap" doesn't even mean bad writing, it includes pieces that aren't suitable for the particular publication -- wrong writing style/tone, wrong audience, etc. The trick to getting published is to understand the publisher's problem and help them solve it. You do this by paying attention to what they publish, noting the style/tone, length, topics, etc., and give them something that fits and is high quality. They'll love you to death. Once I really internalized that, I found it was pretty easy to get published. Online publishing changes the economics a bit, but even there, publishers have limited resources and the same rules still apply.
  - em-bee 4y ago
    Once I really internalized that, I found it was pretty easy to get published. yes, but then you only write what publishers want and not what your creativity drives you to write. i am not sure that letting publishers be gatekeepers is a good thing. this is a hard problem though. and i don't know what is the right answer.
    - JohnFen 4y ago
      That's not precisely true. What you do is find the right publication for what you want to write. There's a HUGE variety to choose from. The odds are that there's one somewhere who is on the same page as you. But it is also true that it's a business, and if you want to be published (and don't want to self-publish), then you'll have to do business-related work in addition to creative work. Or, if you're lucky or successful, have a literary agent who will do it for you (for a price).
    - pmontra 4y ago
      > this is a hard problem though. and i don't know what is the right answer. The hard problem is always the same, how to be happy making what we like. Sometimes the solution involves making a reasonable amount of money. > then you only write what publishers want Most software developers write only what their customers / bosses want and not what they would like to write. That allows them to pay their bills and live their lives. Local optima, often easy to reach.

unsupp0rted 4y ago

What does the value in writing mainly consist of? Edit: currently this question is at -3, as though it’s obvious to everyone the difference between valuable writing and not valuable writing. To me it’s a worthwhile question, particularly because the more precisely we answer it the more precisely ChatGPT will become able to produce valuable writing a couple releases from now.

slowmovintarget 4y ago
Execution, meaning, and polish.
- oneoff786 4y ago
  So… what if the AI does better on those things
  - dsr_ 4y ago
    Then the AI will be worth more. Right now the AI is worth negative value.
floren 4y ago
It's the way the story is told. If it was all about the idea, you'd just read the Wikipedia plot synopsis, say "ah what a great story that was, so glad I read it" and move on.
- blowski 4y ago
  Anna Karenina. It basically tells you the plot on the first page, and yet is 1000 pages of something incredible. It's like being able to see inside someone else's mind - not being told what they're thinking, but being able to feel the emotions as they do.
- snerbles 4y ago
  > read the Wikipedia plot synopsis, say "ah what a great story that was, so glad I read it" I have unironically done this for movies/books/games/media I've elected not to consume but otherwise desired to know for cultural context.

orblivion 4y ago

On the other hand - my dad is an industrial designer. He was initially irritated by how easy it was for lower grade designers to enter the field given the advent of new tools (even before computers). But he eventually embraced it and understood that the nature of his job changed to something more comprehensive. He just advised me to prepare for the same as a software developer in the age of ChatGPT. Perhaps he would say the same about writers.

chinaman425 4y ago
[flagged]
malauxyeux 4y ago
> understood that the nature of his job changed to something more comprehensive. He just advised me to prepare for the same as a software developer What's that mean to you concretely?
- orblivion 4y ago
  I don't know yet. I honestly don't want to think about it. (despite my dad's advice) I guess what my dad would say is to find a way to sell some sort of package of yourself offering a service that includes development. The sort of thing where you might otherwise outsource programming, but now you can just have the computer do it. That's not concrete, but that's as far as I've considered it.
  - malauxyeux 4y ago
    Thanks for the reply anyway. I don't want to think about it either and was hoping you had an easy answer.

frankfrank13 4y ago

reminds me of PG > The fact that there's no market for startup ideas suggests there's no demand. Which means, in the narrow sense of the word, that startup ideas are worthless. http://www.paulgraham.com/ideas.html#:~:text=The%20fact%20that%20there's%20no,that%20startup%20ideas%20are%20worthless http://www.paulgraham.com/ideas.html#:~:text=The%20fact%20th....

basch 4y ago
This is one of his essays I vehemently disagree with, and think has hurt Silicon Valley. The idea that ideas and idea people are worthless has had a cascading effect of putting non idea people in idea people seats, or locking out a class of people from participating unless they have some other engineering or marketing or leadership skill. Apple would never have become without Steve Jobs being able to see what was and wasn’t a good idea. An idea person doesn’t just have one good idea, and maybe one idea alone is worthless. Good ideas include good taste for scope, what is and isn’t needed for success. Having an idea and handing it off to a startup is very different from having an idea and supervising it, keeping it on the rails. It’s almost crazy to me that an idea is worthless, but an entire startup without an idea is seen as potential. As far as the AI floodgates, the world changed almost overnight, and we are just going to have to adapt to everyone having a calculator in their pocket, and that being good at using it is a more important skill than arithmetic. I’m not sure I’ve seen a technology adaption go from 0 to whatever percent we are at quite like this. It’s barrier to entry is so low, free to use, easy to use, easy to plug into old workflows, and somewhat undetectable by those not in the know. It would be wise to accept this new reality and start valuing prompt and editing skills instead of dismissing what part people “aren’t doing on their own.”
- satvikpendem 4y ago
  It's rather that developers don't want to work for idea people because they usually are not Steve Jobs, who is the exception to the rule.
  - basch 4y ago

xwdv 4y ago

What a glorious era, where all humans can now be made more equal. Even the weakest minds can create artwork and stories that rival the most talented individuals. Why hasn’t AI come to the field of mathematics yet??

fl0ps 4y ago
I'll just leave this here... :https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03166-w https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-03166-w

MBCook 4y ago

That’s not so bad. The big problem is the people who don’t care and are just generating and submitting 1000 stories in the hopes one makes $10 because it’s basically free to them. They only care it gets accepted. Outside of that they don’t care one bit what the story is about or how good it is.