My ArtificiaI Intelligence Experience
I am sure you have all seen ads like the one above.
Have you ever taken the time to find out what it is all about?
I have been into writing practically all my life, and for the past 10 or 12 years, I have actively been involved in helping people self-publish their books. During that time, I had created dozens of eBooks. I increasingly became aware that the use of Artificial Intelligence in my industry was increasing and decided to try to find out what it was all about.
I found out that, yes, you can produce a book in just a book in 11 minutes, but if you want a quality product, that is just the beginning. If your instructions to the AI tool are clear and definitive, you will get a Book with some good basic information, but being the editor that I am, I found that it needed quite a lot of “human intervention”, in the form of editing and also adding information from my personal experience – I had decided to create eBooks that were relevant to what I do.
There are other considerations as well – the templates available in the tool that I used were not to my liking, so I imported the text (after I had heavily edited and added to it) into my trusty Page design software and did it “My Way”! I also did not like the covers the tool generated for me, so I designed my own. So yes, you can “write” a book in a few minutes, but I found that you still need to do a lot of work. (But perhaps that is because of who and what I am).
I also made an undertaking to myself that I would never try to sell “machine-created” books but would give them away, and I would always be totally transparent about their origin. In the case of my two eBooks, you can get them by simply signing on to receive my newsletter!
Of course, that is a personal preference, and there is nothing at all wrong with monetising AI-created books
Using AI to write eBooks can be fun, and if done properly, could even be profitable! Having said that, you should always exercise caution, as some eBook distribution and sales platforms are very strict when it comes to AI-generated content.
My experience was fun, and even though I put a lot of additional work into the books, I still think I was able to produce credible and enjoyable books in far less time than if I had done the research and writing from scratch.
AI is particularly good at producing non-fiction, fact-based work, but writers of fiction should proceed with caution. I personally do not believe that AI can write a good fiction novel. Use it to assist you with editing etc, but nothing beats human imagination!
However, apart from actually writing the entire book, AI can help authors in other ways as well. There are top-notch editing tools that help you enhance and improve your phrasing (and spelling!). When writing fiction, there are tools that can assist with character development and can help in many other ways. There are innumerable resources on YouTube and Google that can point you in the right direction.
When you are done creating your AI-assisted book, you, of course, know where to come to for your proofreading, editing and design! Right here with the Words Boffin!
