Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing: EP 284 - Collaborations in AI with Elizabeth Ann West

EP 284 - Collaborations in AI with Elizabeth Ann West

Dec 30, 2022

Mark talks with Elizabeth Ann West about her writing and using AI tools such as Sudowrite for intriguing new types of collaborations.

Prior to the interview, Mark shares a comments from recent episodes, a personal update, and a word about this episode's sponsor.

You can learn more about how you can get your audiobooks distributed to retailers and library systems around the world at starkreflections.ca/Findaway.

During their conversation Mark and Elizabeth talk about:

Elizabeth's start in indie publishing back in the "early days" of self-publishing
The Jane Austin Fan Fiction that Elizabeth writes for a living
The panic in the writing community with the dropping of chatGPT (GPT = Generative Pre-trained Transformer)
What Public Domain content is and a look at the grey area of AI generated content and copyright
Changes to Public Domain and copyright law related to Disney and Mickey Mouse
How Public Domain is really important to culture
Some of the areas where AI has already been integrated into the tools we use as writers and just in general
AI as a robotic co-writer that you can lean on as an author
Sudowrite and how it's based on a UNIX command called "Super Do" and not "pseudo" making you the super user
How as the human in this equation, you are the "creative director" still responsible for all of the final writing, the research, the voice, etc
How prompts work within Sudowrite and the way authors can be very specific with them
The importance of authors being unique and creative when creating their prompts
How the AI works within the context of the most recent segment of the document an author is working within
The idea that's in development of performing something like a "fine tune"
A bit of the tech about how "tokens" work within the technology
Playing within "Open AI Playground"
How much time a tool like Sudowrite can help writers with outlining and summarizing a chapter
Simulating readers reacting to a piece of writing
The process of interviewing an AI character
The cost structure for using Sudowrite
How Elizabeth has written and released three books since Nov 2021 with the assistance of AI
The re-write function in Sudowrite that performs a "show, don't tell" on a sentence
Feeling like a writer with super-powers by having access to these types of tools
How Elizabeth teachers her online classes for learning how to collaborate with AI
The $99 fee that gives people access to all of Elizabeth's "Learning AI" classes and recorded live sessions past, present, and future
Elizabeth's thoughts for writers who are nervous, anxious, or worried about the disruption that AI will bring to writing
And more...

After the interview, Mark reflects on a few things Elizabeth said. He then shares his own recent experiment with creating a book description using chatGBT.

Links of Interest:

A Jane-of-all-trades, mistress to none! Elizabeth Ann West is the author of 12 novels and 11 novellas, 22 of which are story variations of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice. Her books have won reader conference awards and hit the Historical Bestseller lists on Amazon, Kobo, and the iBooks stores multiple times. A lover of all things geeky, Elizabeth codes websites, dabbles in graphic design, and is always looking for new technology to learn and master. She teaches authors at conferences like 20Booksto50KVegas, RWA Nationals, on topics of technology and business in the digital publishing world.

The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0