Artificial Intelligence and creativity

I've noticed a trend recently, a trend I am not a fan of. And that trend is people letting artificial intelligence write entire blogs and articles for them. Some would argue that it's a savvy use of technology that saves time. I think it's just lazy!

Don't get me wrong, I am a fan of AI tools like Claude, Gemini and ChatGPT, which are brilliant in helping me be more productive. They save me time on research, proofreading and formatting - all the boring bits. But I'm not about to hand over my blogs to them, and here's why.

I blog and write because it's good for my creativity, and I believe creativity is important; in fact, I would go a step further and say it's essential.

But creativity is like a muscle. If we don't use it, we lose it. Whenever we ask an AI to come up with our ideas or opinions, we miss a chance to exercise our brains.

If you write blogs, you will know this, but it ain't easy. Some days, writer's block kicks in, and getting the words to come out feels torturous. Still, I endure the torture because I get a lot of satisfaction from having an idea and a title and turning that into something I am happy to put into the interweb. It builds resilience that radiates into everything else I do. I also find it cathartic to explore my own mind with writing. So, it's not something I intend to give up any time soon.

But I am also a realist; written articles, newsletters, and blogs are becoming less and less of a thing. People have shorter attention spans and prefer videos and podcasts, formats that will only grow in popularity.

I am reading fewer blogs and unsubscribing from newsletters, and it's not because I don't enjoy reading; it's because the stuff they are putting out is just weak, dull and vanilla. What's sad is that they didn't used to be, and I know this is all down to their use of AI. The reason I know that is down to a tool I use called Grammarly.

Grammarly is brilliant; it helps me get the spelling and formatting right, and it has another useful feature: the ability to detect AI-generated text. I put two recent blogs I read and 3 newsletters I subscribe to into Grammarly, and they all came back with over 80% AI-generated text. I will read them no more.

I want to read things with soul in them, things with a human side, things that give me an insight into the unique personality of the person who wrote them. AI can't replicate that.

So, if you're tempted to outsource your creativity to AI, I encourage you to stand up to that temptation and keep doing it yourself. You need that powerful, problem-solving, creative brain you were gifted with, so use it, or you'll lose it because, believe me, you'll miss it when it's gone.

And as someone who consumes a lot of written blogs and articles, I can tell you that one well-written, human, heartfelt post trumps a social feed full of AI-generated stuff any day of the week.

Take Care