Writers' Trigger Warning - Brian M Logan

This post is for the writers in the room. But – TRIGGER WARNING – you are NOT going to want read it.

It’s about AI. But not as you know it. Not even close.

The time will come in the very near future when AI will conceive, write, format and auto publish novels WITHOUT human interaction.

It will be a turn-key app given initial instructions such as ‘Write novels based on best-selling books in the last 12 months,’ or ‘Write novels based on the logline/concept of book deals reported in the trades.’ Meaning that long before ‘Jurassic Park’ (as a well known example ) is published – traditional publishing taking so long – the market will be flooded with books about dinosaurs being cloned. Some being released WITH THE EXACT TITLE OF THE BOOK REPORTED IN THE TRADES.

Because, as you know, you can’t copyright an idea, just the expression of an idea. And you also can’t copyright a book title. However, you CAN trademark a book title or a book series, because it functions as a ‘brand.’ And trademarks trump everything.

However, trademarking a book doesn’t come cheap. I’ve done it for my own company in Australia and it costs between $1,500 and $5k give or take, depending on how many rounds of trademarking you are forced to do. So, yes, big publishing houses will trademark their titles. But indie authors, who don’t have a spare $5k, will not.

The AI will connect to Amazon via an api and the entire book from idea to design to publication will be done by AI without human interaction.

The AI author will have a photo, bio, videos of them talking about their books, videos of them being ‘interviewed’ by an AI interviewer, will have their own websites, their own social media accounts, etc.

And the ‘author’ will spit out hundreds of books a year.

And the AI author will get famous. And become an influencer. Don’t believe me? Google AI Instagram influencers. They’re a real phenomenon who have millions of followers, and get big money sponsorship deals.

AI authors are not real if course. And behind the scenes will be some tech-savvy nerd masquerading as a real author and making bank.

AI authors will get their own writers guild, their own writers awards (with a video ceremony where the AI authors attend to collect their awards), and their own ‘Best Seller’ lists.

And before you push back and say, ‘Oh, whatever. The books will be CRAP! A lot will, yes. But a lot will not. And human readers will not care either way. Did they enjoy the book or not? If they did, then it could be written by monkeys for all they care.

Keep in mind that in 25 years we will have an entire generation of humans who have never grown up in a world where humans had to write books themselves. So you and I, caring about the book we’re reading, being written by a human, as we obviously do, will become the outlier, not the norm.

You think AI is bad for human authors now? Fast forward a generation and we’ll be nearly extinct. AI is the comet, and human writers are the dinosaurs.

Fellow authors: welcome to Hell.