19 Dec 2023

How artificial intelligence can change the world of literatur

We hear a lot right now about artificial intelligence and Chat GPT. Maybe one day a robot will win the Prix Goncourt, who knows? The press across the Atlantic, it should be noted, is already using this software. Artificial intelligence is then responsible for writing factual articles, such as reports of sports matches or election results.

Ten years ago the Washington Post offered more than 850 articles on sports and political themes thanks toHeliograf, a robot reporter designed in-house for the 2016 Summer Olympics. Writing a book using Chat GPT has already become possible. It’s a very sad reality, I admit. 

A massive influx of ebooks (or digital books) are already written using the conversational chatbot. There was a time when writing a novel required time, but also talent on the part of its author. Today, all it takes is artificial intelligence, a little practice and a few days to sell a digital book online.

Literature and artificial intelligence

For the moment, the poor style performance that artificial intelligence can produce does not worry authors. At least, they don’t formulate it…yet! “The road” stands out as the first book actually written by artificial intelligence. Using a Cadillac, a GPS, a microphone, a surveillance camera, a clock, everything this connected to Artificial Intelligence, we were able to release a book. A decent story was produced, telling a journey from New Orleans to New York. Not very original!

If some, and particularly in the United States, promise to be able to analyze the “DNA” of a book, and therefore the reasons for its commercial success, this remains a goal that unconsciously no one wants to achieve. Because, when technology is creative, the editor will disappear. The role of an editor is of course to discover, to introduce and make known new voices, new authors, new literary avenues, and therefore to constantly regenerate fictional works, often by accident. Its primary function is not necessarily short-term trading. At least we think so…

Yet the noose is tightening. In Germany, in certain publishing groups, software measures and evaluates the commercial potential of books based on the criteria of narrative outline, complexity of sentences, innovative dimension of the manuscript, typology of character emotions, density of dialogue, etc. To become a major publisher tomorrow or rather a successful publisher, you will perhaps have to become a great computer scientist and measure out the ingredients of a commercial book as in a recipe: the story of a woman in the United States , who loses her husband at a young age, becomes independent and rich, falls ill… And this, in a 320-page novel which ends well. Who knows? And above all a book of which we will not specify whether it was written by a man or a machine.

How is AI changing writing?

Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the way people read, the way they write, and the products that are made. The development of e-books has transformed reading into a more social and economically affordable experience. Many readers now share their favorite books by broadcasting their reading experiences live on social media. This social reading has also changed the way writers approach their craft. For example, many writers now use blogging as a way to promote their work, while others employ social media to increase their readership.

The digital revolution has also transformed the way writers produce their work. Many now write on computers, while others type their novels on smartphones or tablets. When it comes to editing, many writers now use digital tools to help them make necessary edits.

The advent of AI has made computers very effective writing tools. AI can produce large amounts of content quickly and accurately, and its work is free from human bias. It is therefore well suited to a number of different writing tasks.

But perhaps the most dramatic change brought about by AI is the emergence of new machine-generated literary forms, such as automated fiction, computer-generated poetry, and AI-composed music. While AI-generated content is useful in some contexts, it also raises serious ethical questions. Many writers fear that machines will take jobs away from human writers and journalists.

Additionally, AI has been criticized for promoting harmful stereotypes and reinforcing social inequalities through his writings. AI has also been criticized for its inability to express itself creatively. While machines can generate content quickly, efficiently and accurately, they are incapable of producing creative and original work. But for how much longer?

Your next novelist may be a robot...

Brett Schickler, a salesman from Rochester, New York, was among the first to realize that ChatGPT could potentially help him achieve his dream of becoming an author . “The idea of ​​writing a book finally seemed possible”,” he explains to the American press agency Reuters. “I told myself I could do it”. With the help of the chatbot, he wrote a children's book of around thirty pages. In a few hours, the deal was closed, and the book was on sale in electronic format on Amazon.

His book “The Wise Little Squirrel: A Tale of Saving and Investing” tells the story of a squirrel who learns to savings. Sold for $2.99 ​​digitally or $9.99 in print, it has, so far, brought in less than $100 for its author. But the latter has a lot of ideas: “I imagine that people could make a whole career out of it”, he believes.

Furthermore, all the “books” co-written by ChatGPT listed on the Amazon Kindle store are not novels: there are also guides for learning to use artificial intelligence and even collections of poetry. It is difficult to know if these works really find buyers, but the offer evolves, in all cases, exponentially.

After having questioned many professions linked to writing, notably the press, teachers and even developers, ChatGPT pushes the field of literature to question itself. In fact, it is quite unlikely that ChatGPT will become a “successful author” on its own, but we can imagine that a “writer” capable of effectively manipulating AI could produce a coherent story. Furthermore, apart from the question of quality, there is that of quantity: “This is something that we really have to worry about, these books are going to flood the market and a lot of authors are going to be unemployed”, estimates Mary Rasenberger, executive director of the writers' group The Authors Guild .