Author Archives: Berthold Gambrel

Writer of fiction, poetry and essays.

WSW Chat – Progress Report and A.I. : Threat or Menace?

The latest WSW chat is up! We discuss progress on our latest projects, as well as our thoughts on what AI means for writers.

(Apologies for some technical issues. Edited most audio-related issues out, but the result is that Lucinda moves around the screen a bit.)

WSW Chat: Book Fairs, Writer Conventions, and other Introvert Nightmares

-Berthold Gambrel

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the limits of social media. While it’s an absolutely great way for writers to connect (it’s how I met everyone here, so, I mean, duh) it’s still not a perfect substitute for in-person interaction.

Social media is a fragile thing. Things happen. Technology breaks. Management changes. Connections formed here are frighteningly easy to sever.

And yet… as we discuss in the chat, we writers aren’t exactly keen to go out and <shudder> network. The great paradox: we want to be writers because we are introverts, but to succeed as writers, we need to meet people, build relationships. :/

What does ChatGPT mean for writers?

–Berthold Gambrel

You probably know about the new AI chatbot, ChatGPT. If you somehow don’t, Kevin Brennan wrote a blog post about it here.

There is a lot of concern in the community that it will mean the end of writing as we know it. And, understandably so. After all, AI destroying everything is an age-old science fiction trope. Everyone knows it, and yet people build it anyway. Welcome to the Torment Nexus, ladies and gentlemen!

However, I’m a glass half-full kind of guy. The optimistic view on this is that, as the traditional publishing industry turns towards churning out mediocre by-the-numbers writing, people will start to long for that hand-crafted touch that only a human writer can provide. Enter indie authors, who can produce unique, offbeat, and interesting stories that traditional publishers wouldn’t touch.

So, basically, the same as now, only more so. 🙂

Of course, there is a possibility the AI will get so powerful it can produce truly human-like writing. However, if that happens, we’ll probably have much bigger problems to worry about than just our future careers as writers. Survival of the species, for example.

I say, don’t worry about what you can’t control, and in the meantime make the best of things. You can’t compete with the machine, so don’t. Instead, produce things so original and creative that you’re in a completely different market than the computer-generated pablum.