Lately, I've been thinking of people on social media as one big flock of sheep. One says "baa," another echoes it, and a third joins in because it's easy and the pattern is clear. Everyone wants to "baa" louder than the others. Some don't even know what they're bleating about, since they've been leaning heavily on AI for a while now, but the important thing is to make noise... intellectual noise.
Great to read your thoughts on this, as I feel similarly in a lot of ways. I like the idea of social media, I love what social media used to be in the 2010s, for example. But I myself have clocked out of almost all social media platforms except Instagram, which feels like the one platform I can keep my algorithm in such a way that it actually shows me what I want to see, even if it's becoming harder.
I am craving a slower life. But as you said, the implementation of AI everywhere is accelerating life even more than it already was. I wish I could clock out of the whole AI thing, really, as I like its possibilities, but not what it is being used for on a grand scale: to replace humans, especially in the arts, which I'm not liking. But I work in a field that is heavily affected by AI, so I have no choice but to adapt and learn to live and work with it. I totally see how it's fun to explore and loved what you did with it in your video, for example. But I don't want major corporations firing illustrators to create AI-designed book covers, you know?
And I don't mind content. I like content. But I wish content and longform/art could coexist more; I love the longform stuff, I love art in all shapes and sizes, even if I'm always behind on consuming and admiring it. I like the short, bite-sized content, too, especially as an entryway to discover new artists, for example.
In any case, I agree with you, and I love that you're working on finding a good path for yourself with the digital life and content. You and your art deserve to be seen by many more people!
What a post! I have been looking for a post of this quality for a long time. You write with passion and have managed to dissect what I think is the greatest problem of our time.
This was a revelation.. made me really question my trajectory of late and indeed who I take advice from. As always thank you for your wonderfully worded wisdom. So much I relate to in here.
JIm, this is incredible stuff. I can see that so much of pain and angst went into writing this. The only way is through. Yep, we have no say in what is thrown at us in the name of technology and algorithms but we can decide how can we deal with it, the choice is still with us. But, I'm an optimist because I feel the more raw talents will get recognised more in the future when everything out there looks monochromatically sophisticated. I can already see that happening here on substack where people crave for typos and sentences with grammatical mistakes in their quest to read genuine articles. People are happy to find such real raw talent with no sophistication. It's like that verse you sing little off-key when you're singing with all the emotions you've got and it goes little overboard. People still would nod and say "it's fine, go on, you've got it". But, my only worry is that to sound more humane and raw, people may start asking LLMs to include even them, grammatical mistakes or wrong punctuation marks, I don't know. But I am definitely hopeful that people like you who've spent 25 years of their life in honing the craft, building it from scratch should have the most hope for the better future. It's you that AI cannot replace, you are so adamant that people have to applaud you for staying yourself despite the noise. In my case, I have learnt a great deal from LLMs because there is no way I can learn storytelling and creative writing from a university now. But I use AI as a relentless always willing professor who is teaching me everything I ask for. I am practically asking a machine everything that was out there to learn in a super-niche field so that I can learn a lot in a little time. AI is great with that stuff. But then, whatever I have to find to hone my craft is the work I still I have do it myself. I am ready to train for the battleground but I am not here to sell my soul, I am here to protect it and express it in a way only I can. I am still hopeful brother, that if we stick to our principles and don't let AI and algorithm sway us, that we will find a way and as Frost said, "the only way is through." Thank you for writing this piece, I loved every bit of it.
Lately, I've been thinking of people on social media as one big flock of sheep. One says "baa," another echoes it, and a third joins in because it's easy and the pattern is clear. Everyone wants to "baa" louder than the others. Some don't even know what they're bleating about, since they've been leaning heavily on AI for a while now, but the important thing is to make noise... intellectual noise.
Yes and yes.
And this is what concerns me the most about my own work:
What’s left isn’t creation.
It’s output.
Acceleration.
Noise — dressed up to look like meaning.
Here's to hoping I can stay true to my work and process without caving to the needs of the algorithm.
I love these words Daniel - because you're so honest.
There's absolutely no shame in working with this amazing, cutting edge technology.
But the danger is that it cuts off a part of us along the way.
I started using Substack Notes actively a few weeks ago.
To start with I thought that I'd just process my essays through Chatgpt - pop the cut outs into Notion - and then distribute them throughout my week.
Helpful.
Easy enough.
Weird thing?
Every time I came to a posting a Note, it felt like me but not me.
I couldn't post these altered versions of myself.
So went back to the drawing board, and now am either
1) shooting from the hip with my notes
2) going to the source material of my essays and manually adjusting along the way
It means I'm not "getting ahead" by skipping the process
But it means that if someone follows me, they know what they're getting!
Very glad for you dropping in and to connect man!
Thank you & till soon, Jim
Great to read your thoughts on this, as I feel similarly in a lot of ways. I like the idea of social media, I love what social media used to be in the 2010s, for example. But I myself have clocked out of almost all social media platforms except Instagram, which feels like the one platform I can keep my algorithm in such a way that it actually shows me what I want to see, even if it's becoming harder.
I am craving a slower life. But as you said, the implementation of AI everywhere is accelerating life even more than it already was. I wish I could clock out of the whole AI thing, really, as I like its possibilities, but not what it is being used for on a grand scale: to replace humans, especially in the arts, which I'm not liking. But I work in a field that is heavily affected by AI, so I have no choice but to adapt and learn to live and work with it. I totally see how it's fun to explore and loved what you did with it in your video, for example. But I don't want major corporations firing illustrators to create AI-designed book covers, you know?
And I don't mind content. I like content. But I wish content and longform/art could coexist more; I love the longform stuff, I love art in all shapes and sizes, even if I'm always behind on consuming and admiring it. I like the short, bite-sized content, too, especially as an entryway to discover new artists, for example.
In any case, I agree with you, and I love that you're working on finding a good path for yourself with the digital life and content. You and your art deserve to be seen by many more people!
What a post! I have been looking for a post of this quality for a long time. You write with passion and have managed to dissect what I think is the greatest problem of our time.
Keep it up.
Mikhail.
This was a revelation.. made me really question my trajectory of late and indeed who I take advice from. As always thank you for your wonderfully worded wisdom. So much I relate to in here.
JIm, this is incredible stuff. I can see that so much of pain and angst went into writing this. The only way is through. Yep, we have no say in what is thrown at us in the name of technology and algorithms but we can decide how can we deal with it, the choice is still with us. But, I'm an optimist because I feel the more raw talents will get recognised more in the future when everything out there looks monochromatically sophisticated. I can already see that happening here on substack where people crave for typos and sentences with grammatical mistakes in their quest to read genuine articles. People are happy to find such real raw talent with no sophistication. It's like that verse you sing little off-key when you're singing with all the emotions you've got and it goes little overboard. People still would nod and say "it's fine, go on, you've got it". But, my only worry is that to sound more humane and raw, people may start asking LLMs to include even them, grammatical mistakes or wrong punctuation marks, I don't know. But I am definitely hopeful that people like you who've spent 25 years of their life in honing the craft, building it from scratch should have the most hope for the better future. It's you that AI cannot replace, you are so adamant that people have to applaud you for staying yourself despite the noise. In my case, I have learnt a great deal from LLMs because there is no way I can learn storytelling and creative writing from a university now. But I use AI as a relentless always willing professor who is teaching me everything I ask for. I am practically asking a machine everything that was out there to learn in a super-niche field so that I can learn a lot in a little time. AI is great with that stuff. But then, whatever I have to find to hone my craft is the work I still I have do it myself. I am ready to train for the battleground but I am not here to sell my soul, I am here to protect it and express it in a way only I can. I am still hopeful brother, that if we stick to our principles and don't let AI and algorithm sway us, that we will find a way and as Frost said, "the only way is through." Thank you for writing this piece, I loved every bit of it.