Marketing...

 After writing about writing, I feel I should cover the other side of it if you want your book to be seen by anybody.  Marketing. There are writers who probably enjoy it, but many do not-- especially those of us who are introverts.

To be an introvert when it comes to writing, it works well. We are not prone to partying, like alone time, enjoy researching (which writing can need a lot of), and like having a few close friends, but don't need a lot. As an introvert, I like studying relationships and how people tick-- again works well with creating characters for plots.

But how does an introvert do when it comes to working with crowds, trying to get people to take their work seriously? That's where extroverts excel,and we introverts prefer to stay in the shadows. Let someone else take glory or fame. We like the work but that next part of it, not so much. Maybe that would work better with split personalities. 

 

This meme showed up recently from several writers, and I so related to it. It's funny, but also true. It's funny because nobody really buys books because of the writer saying, pretty please lol. Readers buy books by finding them in a category they know they enjoy. 

This has been a surprising month for me in book sales. Try zero. Yes, not one single book sold. Last month and the months before, there had been sales. Maybe not a lot by some standards but good enough to feel at least a few people wanted to read my work. This month, start with the first, yep, nada. 

When there is such an abrupt decline, a writer, even one who hates the idea of marketing has to wonder why one month suddenly had such a drop off in numbers-- like into a dark hole. 

We had some ads up, although not a lot as ads have to pay for themselves unless someone is independently wealthy. Mostly I've let ads get paid for by sales... Not going to happen this month.

There are some possible reasons at least for one of the distributors. They changed categories. They also might have changed algorithms, that we never really know about.

If someone came here hoping I had some answers for marketing. Sorry as  got nothing. I believe in my work but marketing-- different thing.

I do though have a brand new picture of me while considering what went wrong. I rarely put up pictures with glasses, as I prefer contacts, but when working on the computer, these are my go-tos *s*

None of this was AI generated-- although I don't know about the meme.

Cheating Yourself

 Lavender and one of my sculptures

 For Saturday's blog, I had in mind writing about my second paranormal, fantasy romance. Something else came up though that I felt demanded more attention. 

For some time there has been concern over what AI will mean for our culture. I think Stephen Hawking, before he died, expressed concern over it being destructive for mankind. I had my doubts as a machine can be destroyed if that is so desired. What about when it's not? What about when some feel they can profit from Artificial Intelligence? Teachers right now have to express concern whether their students wrote the essays they submitted. Writers worry about books created by ChatGPT, relatively new to the game, flooding the market and kicking human authors to the curb.

Well, the genii is out of the bottle and AI is here whether some like it or not. I have heard some authors say it does a better job writing their blurbs than they can do-- and faster. 

For a long time, people have used computers to check spelling or find out if a word was used too many times. That's not the same as a whole book written by a computer and submitted under someone's name to earn money or maybe even fame. What do we do about that?

One thing to realize, if someone desires to be a creative person, I believe that using AI for an essay or a book is cheating themselves of the genuine creative experience. For students, learning to research and then writng an essay expands their abilities. To use AI instead is cheating themselves as well as the system.

As a writer myself, I don't worry about it as I think that human emotions and plots with the kinds of twists that don't come from a formula, will always satisfy more than something generated out of a system that only knows rules. 

At my age, I don't depend on my writing to provide a family's income. Lucky me. I can write for joy, which I do, and recognize that formula writing, which is what AI can do, won't do what I do. I also recognize that many readers are happy with formula writing. It's dependable at least. That's been true for a long time, since in the 1800s, readers could grab those cheap dime novels and get excitement even if it's repetitive.

Part of what decided me to write a blog about AI, where I provide no answers, is believing when we know what something is, what feeds our souls or just passes time, that will help us find meaningful material to read. Maybe it won't be my books, lol but there are plenty of good authors out there, who are writing from their souls. Just keep in mind what passes time doesn't always benefit the writer or the reader.

I decided with a kind of dark topic here, I'd have some of our wonderful flower pictures from spring, something that does feed my soul. 

Check out this link for more thinking on AI and where it's taking us.

Writer's Digest what is yet to come with AI

How we bloom

 

My new topic involves something we've been reading plenty about-- some of us with books purportedly written by an author but that were AI generated or from Chat GPT. 

There is a rather famous quote from the Marx brothers originally and evidently paraphrased a bit by a comedian. "Who you going to believe? Me or your lying eyes?"

That's the thing today, who can you believe with not only the ability of our eyes to lie, but also this new world of AI generated writing. How worried should we be about it?

One thing is-- when you see a speech by a politician, watch out as it can have been changed to say what that person would never have said. Movies can generate new faces for the stars, that are much younger. We just saw that with an Indiana Jones film. 

Amazon is going to ban those who publish three books the same day. I don't even know why someone, who is using AI would want to do that many, but apparently some have or there'd not be the ban. Amazon does not want these computer generated books. They want them by real, creative minds. How do they assure that?

This article was out today about what some famous authors are doing about the situation-- or trying to do. Top Authors with a lawsuit.

These are writers, who sell in the millions of books. If they are concerned, should we be who sell far less? What they say is the Chat GPT or the OpenAI source is using what they wrote to learn their style and then duplicate it. The argument by OpenAI is, this is innovation. Except don't we ask who it profits. What authors want is, companies cannot use their books to train AI without their permission and maybe paying some money. Makes sense to me and hopefully it will the courts.

It might seem this is only an issue for writers but what about readers? When someone buys a book, they are looking for inspiration and an exciting or educational read. If it's only duplicating what has been written, what are the odds of that?

 So, now, here's how I see this whole issue of AI and Chat GPT? First of all, I am open to advancements in technology. I've seen them. When I wrote my first stories, they were cursive on blank paper. Then I got a Royal typewriter where you had to type firmly to get the letters to show up and use whiteout for mistakes. I had an electric typewriter when I needed to type Ranch Boss's thesis. I thought it was the way to write a book. 

Years later, he suggested I try the Atari he had bought. No way, it'd never be the same. Then, I found out I could move a paragraph to a new spot when it's where it belonged. Also, no more whiteout or little white papers. From then on, it's been one advancement after another to where I am today with a laptop, monitor and keyboard with computer telling me when I misspelled a word. 

With the internet, I graduated from using card catalogs for research, when I'd jot down the info on note cards, to now using the search engines-- although I don't trust what I find totally and buy books that I learn their titles from the online research. 

As a writer, I have no interest though in AI or Chat GPT. I have used Grammerly to help me know when I've used a word too often but that's not the same as AI.I don't want a system to tell me how to write a sentence-- not here or anywhere. 

Yes, it appears some are using it to write their books faster than I could ever do one. The same would be true if the writer followed a formula. I do not and don't want to do so. I wonder if those writers will develop their own innovative ideas.

For me, from school on, when we do our own work, we learn from it. Writing one books helps me get better at the next one. Would using artificial intelligence do that for me-- or anybody. 

If someone wants to be a creative person, do your own work. It pays off in the end.

These hedgehog cactus are blooming again because of the rain we had earlier. We bloom likewise by how we water and feed ourselves.