Chatting About ChatGBT (Laurie Faria Stolarz)

     

    The topic for this month is A.I. Do I use it? What do I think of it? The answer to that first question is no, I don’t use it. I’ve experimented with it, sure – to see what it could do. Not long ago, I asked ChatGBT to write a few passages in the style of Laurie Faria Stolarz. Admittedly, the result was pretty impressive, on first glance, that is. It was able to replicate my sentence structure, my rhythm patterns, some similar word phrasing (from my first novel Blue is for Nightmares). If I hadn’t known better, I may have even thought I’d written the passages myself.

But on closer inspection, I could safely say that ChatGBT had plagiarized my work. It was a little too similar to my style – for better or for worse, depending who you ask – and when comparing the ChatGBT-version against my original work, the A.I.-produced text indeed fell within the parameters of plagiarism.

It’s disheartening, to say the least, but I don’t think it’s a far cry from the changes we’ve been seeing in entertainment consumption. When I ask young people about their favorite shows, many say they don’t really watch TV or movies – at least not on a regular basis. Instead they watch YouTube and scroll TikTok videos. And, I don’t think this practice is reserved for young people either. I know plenty of adults who do the same. I'm guilty as well. I'm watching YouTube content more than I ever have. Have I learned some things from it? Absolutely, but how is it changing my content consumption - and is change a "bad" thing? I don’t know, but it’s certainly a different thing. 

I also wonder about the quality of some of this content – because that’s different too. Is it good? Or is it simply good enough (as the ChatGBT-rendition of my work?) 

Are we demanding great anymore? Also, who gets to decide what good or great is? And, which factors are involved in that vote (content, authenticity, visuals, appearance, lighting, sound, special effects, number of views/downloads/followers/plays)?  

Another question: how does the current content shape what’s to come next? 

As a part-time creative writing teacher, I love what I do. It thrills me to be able to share some of what I’ve learned with creative writers. But, I’ve received more ChatGBT-produced work than I’d like to admit.

And while some feel the A.I.-produced work is a good starting point to get one going, I haven’t seen evidence of that yet (at least, I’m not sure I have.)  Instead I’ve seen entire assignments submitted (copy/pasted) that have been A.I.-produced. 

When I ask the students about it, I get an array of excuses: 

“I ran out of time.”

“I have too much on my plate.”

“I’m not really creative.”

“I’m only taking this class to fill an elective.”

“This class was the only one that fit into my schedule.”

"I like poetry, but I'm not really into fiction."

I get it – all of the above, in fact – but do such excuses excuse plagiarism? Especially when I make myself available to students before and after each class - for conferencing, idea-generating, edits, and assignment help. The college has a writing center, as well, with peer tutors who specialize in creative writing. And, we do lots of free-writing and peer workshopping in class. 

Maybe, as some would argue, I should just look the other way because A.I. is harmless, the wave of the future, a tool one can use, no different than a calculator. So what that it can simulate voice, tone, speech, language, word choice, intonation, content… 

What’s plagiarism or copyright anyway? Ideas are ideas are ideas. Information is shared, out there, and free for the taking. No big deal. 

Right?