Thank you! And as a book proposal coach, can we talk about why NEVER to upload any of your proprietary ideas or content into AI? I cannot tell you the number of times a new author comes to me and tells me they “gave AI their brainstorming document” and it spit out an amazing book outline! Then I have to tell them they just gave AI permission to recycle all their ideas and work for other users. This is the kind of thing that causes legal trouble down the road. All my contracts state I do not use AI when a client pays me …. And anyone an author hires should promise the same. Publishers will not take the “I didn’t know” excuse well if you violate the terms of a publishing contract (my latest deal from a Big 5 has language in it stating authors cannot use AI). It’s such a mess, but at this point, I see as many authors ruining their own careers before AI can even do it for them. Do not volunteer any of your own words /work to AI if you want to get an agent or publisher, even if it’s “helping” you.
THANK YOU for writing this. You've encapsulated so many of the reasons why I'm terrified and saddened by the rise of generative AI, even as I'm shocked by how many people throw up their hands and say, "well, it's here to stay, so I better start using it." I'm thrilled to find a corner of the internet where people are resisting (but also, I think your link to quitGPT might be broken?). Again, thanks for writing this! As of this morning, I'm a paying subscriber.
I am with you — and this post made me a paying subscriber! I often feel alone among my peers when I say I don’t use AI, period. I won’t go down that slippery slope and be a part of machine intelligence taking over humanity. I winced when my friends said they used AI to create their travel itinerary. Or when a wannabe author used AI to help her write a scientific part of her plot. Thank you for this. Let’s all be part of the backlash.
Raising my hand from the back row! My happiest moment of last week was when my husband deleted GPT off his phone. I've never used it. He only used it for travel planning (we're full-time nomads & US escapees). This has terrified me since I first heard of GPT. Does no one watch SciFi films?!! Seriously, though, thank you for your commitment to this topic.
Thank you so much. It is so cathartic to see another human being who agrees that it is illogical to trade any amount of “productivity” in exchange for the sociological harms that are actively being incurred by wide scale LLM usage. These LLM providers need to be held accountable for what they release upon a populous who never even had a chance to democratically decide who it should be integrated into wider society.
So glad this info is all in one place 🙌🏻 The scariest part is that many people seem to be completely unaware of all the (massively destructive and unethical) implications
I have not and will not use AI to write any of my books. Full stop. I also do not use AI for personal use any longer, though I have not figured out how to disable the AI overview in Google.
Unfortunately, my books have, thus far, earned my family $0. I am the breadwinner for my family and I work in technology. If I don’t use AI at work, I will lose my job, probably quickly. My company highlights the “top users” of Copilot at our town hall meetings. I have to earn money and all of my experience is in technology. I genuinely don’t where to go from here, and the cognitive dissonance is exhausting.
I’ve talked to my colleagues about the (lack of) results I’m seeing with AI and the ethical implications of the pace at which we are scaling our use, but everyone is scared of being perceived as anti-AI, as there are new layoffs in our industry every week.
I also sometimes feel like a baby boomer, screaming that “this whole internet thing isn’t what it’s cracked up to be.”
Latest/most distressing article I've read in the NYT: The man whose father, reliant on AI, refused medical treatment that could have greatly extended his life, but NO, he and the chatbot knew better and refused to listen to doctors and his family, even the doctors who explained that the chatbot was misinterpreting the research on the man's cancer.
So many of us are in danger of being that man--thinking we'll just use a little Claude, a little ChatGPT there, thinking we can see through the errors/manipulation/cognitive surrender issues. (I think we need a name for this shared delusion--that WE can use AI without falling into the trap of reliance on a chatbot whose design involves making the user emotionally and intellectually co-dependent.) And then WHOMP. We don't know what we've lost until it's gone.
Thank you!! As someone whose mom had dementia I can’t even begin to imagine the massive increase in dementia diagnoses we’ll have decades from now because we’re no longer thinking critically.
Thank you! And as a book proposal coach, can we talk about why NEVER to upload any of your proprietary ideas or content into AI? I cannot tell you the number of times a new author comes to me and tells me they “gave AI their brainstorming document” and it spit out an amazing book outline! Then I have to tell them they just gave AI permission to recycle all their ideas and work for other users. This is the kind of thing that causes legal trouble down the road. All my contracts state I do not use AI when a client pays me …. And anyone an author hires should promise the same. Publishers will not take the “I didn’t know” excuse well if you violate the terms of a publishing contract (my latest deal from a Big 5 has language in it stating authors cannot use AI). It’s such a mess, but at this point, I see as many authors ruining their own careers before AI can even do it for them. Do not volunteer any of your own words /work to AI if you want to get an agent or publisher, even if it’s “helping” you.
YES!
This is so informative and helpful!! Thank you, Andi!
THANK YOU for writing this. You've encapsulated so many of the reasons why I'm terrified and saddened by the rise of generative AI, even as I'm shocked by how many people throw up their hands and say, "well, it's here to stay, so I better start using it." I'm thrilled to find a corner of the internet where people are resisting (but also, I think your link to quitGPT might be broken?). Again, thanks for writing this! As of this morning, I'm a paying subscriber.
Thanks for catching that! I’d linked dot-com when it’s http://quitgpt.org. Corrected!
I am with you — and this post made me a paying subscriber! I often feel alone among my peers when I say I don’t use AI, period. I won’t go down that slippery slope and be a part of machine intelligence taking over humanity. I winced when my friends said they used AI to create their travel itinerary. Or when a wannabe author used AI to help her write a scientific part of her plot. Thank you for this. Let’s all be part of the backlash.
Thank you, Sarah!
Raising my hand from the back row! My happiest moment of last week was when my husband deleted GPT off his phone. I've never used it. He only used it for travel planning (we're full-time nomads & US escapees). This has terrified me since I first heard of GPT. Does no one watch SciFi films?!! Seriously, though, thank you for your commitment to this topic.
It really does feel like sci-fi is becoming reality! Cheers to your husband for deleting ChatGPT!
Thank you so much. It is so cathartic to see another human being who agrees that it is illogical to trade any amount of “productivity” in exchange for the sociological harms that are actively being incurred by wide scale LLM usage. These LLM providers need to be held accountable for what they release upon a populous who never even had a chance to democratically decide who it should be integrated into wider society.
Thank you, Ned! Yes, we can’t ignore the way it’s being thrust on us despite urgent, huge, obvious dangers and harm.
So glad this info is all in one place 🙌🏻 The scariest part is that many people seem to be completely unaware of all the (massively destructive and unethical) implications
Yes, thank you for writing this.
"But to look at the list and go, “…but have you tried asking it to make you a vacation itinerary?!” is an incomprehensible reaction to me."
Me too! The creepiness is off the charts.
Thanks for this much-needed post, Andi!
ME!!!!
I upgraded to paid because of this.
Thank you! I really appreciate it.
I have not and will not use AI to write any of my books. Full stop. I also do not use AI for personal use any longer, though I have not figured out how to disable the AI overview in Google.
Unfortunately, my books have, thus far, earned my family $0. I am the breadwinner for my family and I work in technology. If I don’t use AI at work, I will lose my job, probably quickly. My company highlights the “top users” of Copilot at our town hall meetings. I have to earn money and all of my experience is in technology. I genuinely don’t where to go from here, and the cognitive dissonance is exhausting.
I’ve talked to my colleagues about the (lack of) results I’m seeing with AI and the ethical implications of the pace at which we are scaling our use, but everyone is scared of being perceived as anti-AI, as there are new layoffs in our industry every week.
I also sometimes feel like a baby boomer, screaming that “this whole internet thing isn’t what it’s cracked up to be.”
I feel that too! My partner is a data scientist tasked with increasing LLM usage for “productivity” at work too. I talk about why all we can do is, well, whatever we can do here: https://andibartz.substack.com/p/exactly-how-to-resist-generative?r=1nyuc&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true (one tip: include “-AI” in your Google query to skip the AI summary!)
Latest/most distressing article I've read in the NYT: The man whose father, reliant on AI, refused medical treatment that could have greatly extended his life, but NO, he and the chatbot knew better and refused to listen to doctors and his family, even the doctors who explained that the chatbot was misinterpreting the research on the man's cancer.
So many of us are in danger of being that man--thinking we'll just use a little Claude, a little ChatGPT there, thinking we can see through the errors/manipulation/cognitive surrender issues. (I think we need a name for this shared delusion--that WE can use AI without falling into the trap of reliance on a chatbot whose design involves making the user emotionally and intellectually co-dependent.) And then WHOMP. We don't know what we've lost until it's gone.
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/04/13/well/ai-chatbots-cancer.html
Wow! This is genuinely heartbreaking. And yes, we need a name for that AI hubris and delusion!
Thank you!! As someone whose mom had dementia I can’t even begin to imagine the massive increase in dementia diagnoses we’ll have decades from now because we’re no longer thinking critically.