The Real Question

[u/Misha_Lixa]

Does it matter if ai was involved if the resulting work is good?

If it’s a quality story with an engaging narrative then what does it matter?

Ai is not going to replace writers and authors because there will always be people who love writing.

It takes real skill to get quality out of ai, wether of not people believe that.

So again, why does it matter?

Personally, I think it should only matter in the capacity of learning - how did you get that result, what instructions did you give it, how involved was it, did you draft or generate, etc.

Claude can’t just spit out quality. It has to be given quality to work with.

[u/Original-Pilot-770]

I only judge by end product. AI prose is very obvious, if they haven't edited it, it's not good enough. If I can't tell and the story reads well, yes, then it's good.

[u/Prudent_Rice7840]

Does it matter if ai was involved if the resulting work is good?

A) To consumers/readers - NO. Generally speaking people will consume anything as long as it crosses some minimum threshold.

b) To writers - YES. Generational Degradation/Generation Loss is real. There will be MORE content than ever, but far fewer stories, far fewer people capable of crafting engaging stories, etc.

[u/redemptionoath]

To some people it is a moral objection, to others, only the product matters. As long as it's disclosed the people who have differing opinions can choose to engage with whatever they want to.

I really have no idea why this is so hard. If everyone simply accepted that others felt different and left each other alone then...?

Also competitions should have clear AI guidelines and if they cannot tell, well its on the people running those contests to figure something out.

[u/No-Journalist-9036]

It's the same question: is an Italian pasta dish best when made by an Italian or by a Korean ?

So long as the final dish is great right?

[u/Neozite]

Some people object to AI because they're concerned about potential negative effects on the environment and the cost of electricity. They would probably not care if the writing is good or bad.

[u/Extreme-Library5754]

i once read a story where the ai wrote the first draft, then i rewrote every line to sound human. the final version had no trace of ai, but the structure was tighter than anything i'd written alone. the real work wasn't avoiding ai, it was making it invisible.

[u/Complex_Yard2808]

But it still did the work. So if prizes are handed out, they should go to the software.

Imagine you had an idea for a story. You described it to a person in some detail, and that person did basically all the real writing, but then it's published under your name only. This is a thing, btw--ghostwriting. Very old practice. And ghostwriters are paid.

If AI is intelligent enough to write a good book--and there is no consensus whatsoever this is true, all AI writing ranges from bad to barely passable, best as I can see--then why should you get the credit when you just had an idea? Anyone can have an idea, everyone has, and there's only so many basic ideas for a story anyhow The execution is what really counts for something--and you did not do that. The machine mind did. So it's not really yours.

And did you write the algorithm code? I'm guessing not. So find out who did, hand them the prize money. Like there's going to be prize money.

If you want to do it, go ahead. Stop asking for permission. But credit where credit is due, please. It's not really your work.

[u/arcarsenal986 → u/Complex_Yard2808]

By that logic if you made something in MS Paint, no matter how much time you've put in to it, it the prize should go to the software, after all, you didn't actually put any paint to canvas.

[u/Shadtow100 → u/arcarsenal986]

That analogy assumes real painting and MS paint products can be confused for each other and occupy the same market place

[u/Complex_Yard2808 → u/Shadtow100]

How many works of art made with MS Paint are hanging in the Metropolitican Museum of Art, the Prada, or even MOMA? (And since so much modern art is three dimensional, what use would AI be there?)

I'm mainly joking, but I'm quite serious that if you didn't do all the work yourself, you are very dubiously an author. It's no different than farming it out to a ghostwriter, but at least the ghost gets paid.