Bruce Byfield@Prentice Pieces: Querying TBR

When search engines and spellcheckers already exist, do we really need AI to duplicate them less reliably? There’s such desperation to find a use for AI that it it is promoted as a solution for problems that don’t require another solution. Especially an inferior solution.

Why do people use AI for research? Sure, the results are quick. But that speed comes without the serendipity of unexpected results & the insight that comes as I revise my search. Moreover, the information can’t always be trusted.

The sooner more people learn to detect AI, the quicker AI can be marginalized in the arts.

Sometimes, I find that the simplest solution is just a change of attitude. When I’m down about my writing, I don’t condemn it (or myself) as garbage. I think, “Hmn, still needs a lot of work.”

Finding the start to a new chapter is a pleasure that never grows old.

I just saw an online ad from a supplier “of all your Viking needs.” I must bookmark that in case I feel like renting a longship and invading England.

Yes, AI content is produced faster than mine. But then a Mcdonald’s hamburger is produced faster than a dinner at a restaurant with three Michelin stars.

“You can’t edit a blank page,” I often hear. True enough. And I understand why the advice is given. But it’s also true that editing a bad page can be a waste of time.

Writing tonight, I badly wanted a synonym for "jeweler" that sounded more medieval, but none seemed suitable. So I settled for "bangles merchant." Which made me realize than men in this culture tie charms in their beards. Of such needs and whims are worlds born. 🤣

Sigh! A novel and a half, and my first impulse is still to under-dramatize and not make best use of my raw ideas. When am I going to learn?

Sigh! A novel and a half, and my first impulse is still to under-dramatize and not make best use of my raw ideas.

One skill that writers don’t discuss nearly enough is how to chose the right place to start a novel or a chapter. Or for that matter, a scene.

I use chapter titles to focus my writing. My latest novel has: The Uses for a Bed A Fox Called Wolf The Welcoming Ways The Court of a Thousand Mice The Midnight Masquerade Calling Up A Scarecrow A Game of Girl and Woman The Riddle of the Shaman The Errand Boy Errant

Revised chapter title: The Ghosts Who Forgot to Die

The worst? Most recently, "Objectively speaking AI art is be anything humans can make."

When someone begins a comment with "objectively speaking," I brace myself for a subjective response that's unsupported by any argument.

Another chapter done: The Forgotten Ghosts! And, as usual, there are so many twists and turns that I didn’t anticipate when I started. Sometimes I think that at night the writing elves come out and make changes.

add -ai anywhere in your search. Or use Duckduckgo, which only uses ai if you click the button.

Many writers seem to manually format, rather than using templates, styles, and other tools to automate formatting. Do many writers really used word processors as a glorified typewriter? Could many actually not know how to use a word processor efficiently? Tell me it's not so

AI users like to compare themselves to writers or movie directors. They are more comparable to someone who commissions a piece of art: they enable, but they do not create.