Hey folks, welcome to another discussion thread. This week, I want to focus on your best tips to use generative AI to improve your writing. Not to replace you, not to grind through meaningless listicles, but to really empower you and make you a better writer.
What are the best uses of AI to improve your writing?
It’s OK if your answer is “none”. But if you do have something set up, please share it with us!
I do not like what LLMs do generate when it comes to writing. But I also badly know how biased and ridiculously emotional my own writing can be. So what I do is asking AI to simply comment on my pieces of writing, and eventually list some suggestions for improvement. It works well for me.
Cool, asking for feedback instead of content. Makes total sense. Do you have like specific prompts you use or is it more a free-style conversation all the time?
I do not have any specific template here. Just something like: I will provide you with some writing of mine. I want you to suggest improvements. Here's the text:
I mainly like to do stuff like ask for a summary of my draft, or a grade for a final piece. I can get a lot of actionable info really quickly, but without sacrificing... me.
LLM writing in 2023 is essentially akin to cookie-cutter houses that began cropping up in the 90s where I grew up. It's generic and pretty boring.
It's great for research, though, but you have to verity every fact. EVERY fact.
Stuff like: "read and grade for me" usually suffices for comprehensibility. I ignore probably 3/4 of what it gives me, but I'll take a look if I'm missing some context here or there.
Also: "please fact-check this section" has been a game-changer over the last month or so.
My biggest tip has always been to use an editor where you can customize the AI tools with your prompts. Tools like SoduWrite, Lex, and Copyspace.ai. The more interaction (back and forth) the more the AI is extending your work instead of replacing.
Admittedly, I've been doing a lot of generating, because I'm developing approaches for content developers. For this, you need content ... stuff you've already written. What AI can do with content you've already written is astounding.
That resonates a lot with my experience as well, the more you give it good content (regardless of form) the better the end result. These models are incredibly good at editing, not so much at ideation, and that's a good news!
Interesting. I guess I mean "ideation" in the sense of completely novel ideas, I believe those --still, and for a while-- come from the human part of the equation. Although we can argue no one really has completely novel ideas :)
Yeah. So I'm not sure truly novel ideas are that common ... and ideas don't come from inside us ... but through an interaction between us and everything around us (which now includes AI).
This is a good topic for a more philosophical discussion on novelty and originality and whether AI can ever beat us there. Would love to discuss with you on that subject someday and maybe publish some collab.
This is so cool! I'd love to co-write a short article about your learnings in this process, maybe sharing some specific prompts that you could suggest for other writers. And feature this video up front. What do you think?
AI generated content is helpful in research where the author needs to gather substantial references from different sources. However writing that expresses feelings and emotions can better be done by the author and hence need not be generated from another source. We are react differently in different situations.
My humble opinion... flaws and idiosyncrasies make writing human and original, I wouldn't want to sanitise them all out.
Absolutely agree.
I do not like what LLMs do generate when it comes to writing. But I also badly know how biased and ridiculously emotional my own writing can be. So what I do is asking AI to simply comment on my pieces of writing, and eventually list some suggestions for improvement. It works well for me.
Cool, asking for feedback instead of content. Makes total sense. Do you have like specific prompts you use or is it more a free-style conversation all the time?
I do not have any specific template here. Just something like: I will provide you with some writing of mine. I want you to suggest improvements. Here's the text:
Gotta try this!
I mainly like to do stuff like ask for a summary of my draft, or a grade for a final piece. I can get a lot of actionable info really quickly, but without sacrificing... me.
LLM writing in 2023 is essentially akin to cookie-cutter houses that began cropping up in the 90s where I grew up. It's generic and pretty boring.
It's great for research, though, but you have to verity every fact. EVERY fact.
Can you share specific prompts that you use? In case you have them.
Stuff like: "read and grade for me" usually suffices for comprehensibility. I ignore probably 3/4 of what it gives me, but I'll take a look if I'm missing some context here or there.
Also: "please fact-check this section" has been a game-changer over the last month or so.
My biggest tip has always been to use an editor where you can customize the AI tools with your prompts. Tools like SoduWrite, Lex, and Copyspace.ai. The more interaction (back and forth) the more the AI is extending your work instead of replacing.
Admittedly, I've been doing a lot of generating, because I'm developing approaches for content developers. For this, you need content ... stuff you've already written. What AI can do with content you've already written is astounding.
Don't treat AI like a vending machine.
That resonates a lot with my experience as well, the more you give it good content (regardless of form) the better the end result. These models are incredibly good at editing, not so much at ideation, and that's a good news!
Actually, I do think it can be good at ideation when using our own content ... but we have to treat it like an interactive tool.
Interesting. I guess I mean "ideation" in the sense of completely novel ideas, I believe those --still, and for a while-- come from the human part of the equation. Although we can argue no one really has completely novel ideas :)
Yeah. So I'm not sure truly novel ideas are that common ... and ideas don't come from inside us ... but through an interaction between us and everything around us (which now includes AI).
This is a good topic for a more philosophical discussion on novelty and originality and whether AI can ever beat us there. Would love to discuss with you on that subject someday and maybe publish some collab.
I did a short video on my use of AI in writing my debut novel. Long story short, it has utility but won't replace good writing!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psHFoic0fn0&t=17s&ab_channel=PolymathicDisciplines
This is so cool! I'd love to co-write a short article about your learnings in this process, maybe sharing some specific prompts that you could suggest for other writers. And feature this video up front. What do you think?
Let's do it!
Awesome! I'll email you ;)
AI generated content is helpful in research where the author needs to gather substantial references from different sources. However writing that expresses feelings and emotions can better be done by the author and hence need not be generated from another source. We are react differently in different situations.