> Are readers generating fiction with AI models?
Why not? Journalists, lawyers and pundits of various stripes are already doing it. Why shouldn't readers?
Why not? Journalists, lawyers and pundits of various stripes are already doing it. Why shouldn't readers?
The big differences:
- fiction tends to be longer, AI struggles with making a satisfying coherent plot structure after a certain length.
- fiction tends to be subtler. You want characters to have nuance, shades of grey, symbolism, etc. Not everything should be shouted in your face. This is the opposite of writing persusaive literature where you are trying to convince someone of something.
There's money in copywriting, there's money in writing code, but long form creative writing? Almost an opposite of money.
Thus, very little incentive for AI labs to spend any effort on improving long form creative writing performance.
Most of tunes on this generation of AI systems are basic RLAF, and aimed at something like "punchy short form writing". The potential is largely unexplored.
If they could reliably generate high quality non-fiction, that would be news.
"non-fiction" doesn't mean "correct".
The challenge is length and the context window. I had to own the plot since once it compacts, it has already lost the plot :)
I will give it pointers and tell where to go next. It will do it but either 1) stop after 3-4 paragraphs, or 2) write in a totally different direction than I expected. So I will nudge it to course correct, and it will do it. And then you keep iterating.
It was a good experiment for a couple of days. It saved me typing and it sometimes gave me lines of thinking that were interesting. But nothing that could be published.
But now that I think about it, I found a use case. If only GRRM could use its help :)
There are things like the character(s) you interact with, the initial setting, and some background information predefined, but the responses/evolution of the RP vary depending on things like the model used and the user's interactions.
It's somewhat like taking a D&D setting/scenario. Each group plays it differently.
As much as it's nice to know another shares my interest (and will partake in it with me), I can't always get that.
When I can't get that, LLMs are not a worthless substitute, especially if what I actually want is just to play out a situation.
I want to act and then get back a description of reaction. LLMs can describe reaction, therefore I find value in them.
Like how in D&D you go to do whatever and the dungeon master tells you what happens in response. LLMs fit there for me.
They don't fill the void of social interaction or anything like that, but I don't strictly need that here.
Take a look at services like AI Dungeon to see the kind of thing I'm talking about.
It doesn't really replace social anything, but it's kind of like text adventure. It's plenty interactive enough.
Like, "why not both?"
Also finding AI-generated content to similar tastes is a great way to potentially finding buddies. I've made a lot of friends from certain ventures