The only good thing about NaNoWriMo’s absurd defense of so-called “AI” writing devices is that it was announced at the same time as Ted Chiang explained in the New Yorker why large language models are incapable of producing good fiction: “Why AI Isn’t Going to Make Art”
Ted is as brilliant a writer of essays as he is of fiction, so that piece is full of excellent observations. I recommend reading the whole thing. One key point he makes is that writing requires making thousands of choices – maybe ten thousand for a short story – while the prompts for the writing bots don’t allow anything like that many. As he says:
The selling point of generative A.I. is that these programs generate vastly more than you put into them, and that is precisely what prevents them from being effective tools for artists.
A bot that allowed you to make all the possible choices wouldn’t save you any time, but that’s the only kind that could even conceivably create art. All you can really put in a bot prompt box is your basic idea, and as Ted says about writing:
Believing that inspiration outweighs everything else is, I suspect, a sign that someone is unfamiliar with the medium.
For those who missed it, NaNoWriMo issued a statement saying that it’s OK for people to use AI when participating in the program where everyone tries to write a novel in the month of November. They even claimed that it is “ableist” and “classist” to prevent people from using AI to write their novels.
The organization – which is apparently a 501(c)(3) – was taken to task on social media by a large number of writers, including some who are disabled and others who don’t come from money. There are, after all, a number of useful tools not powered by LLMs that are useful to the disabled and, as more than one person has pointed out, all you really need to write is a pencil and some paper.
It’s worth noting that NaNoWriMo’s supporters include ProWritingAid, an “AI” writing “toolkit” that costs money.
Well-known writers have stepped down from any involvement in the organization and, given the fallout, I wonder if NaNoWriMo will survive.
Just as an aside, most publishers don’t want anything generated by “AI,” so I’m not sure there’s much point in participating using AI if you want to actually publish what you write.
Plenty of smart people have responded to this nonsense effectively, so I won’t repeat all the things they said. But here’s the thing that gets me that doesn’t directly involve the controversy: Why did people make NaNoWriMo into an organization? Why couldn’t it just be an informal project?
There are many things in this world that need to be structured in order to function both well and fairly. Writers’ organizations, such as SFWA, allow people to band together to fight for their rights and get benefits, just as an example.
But NaNoWriMo invites all to participate and doesn’t have any instructors. What the nonprofit organization offers is a way to sign up, set up a profile, apparently get some prompts and recorded pep talks (though I’m pretty sure that some of the writers listed as giving those are furious about the AI stuff and won’t be doing that anymore), find a community if you want one, and earn a certificate. There are apparently moderators who lead groups, but I can’t tell if any of them get paid.
It’s the ability to do all this – and the hiring of staff to do all this – that led them to become a 501(c)(3). And it’s the need for sponsors and donations that has led them to partner with an “AI” writing company and compromise the very purpose of the organization.
After all, the purpose is to get people to actually write. Writing prompts for a chatbot is not the same thing (see what Ted Chiang said).
Obviously you can do this kind of project on your own without signing up for anything. It is probably very good for some writers to do precisely this. I have gone off by myself for a week at a time to do nothing but write a novel, just as an example.
What NaNoWriMo gives you is the chance of doing this in community – kind of like a writers’ retreat, except you don’t have to (or get to) go anywhere – and a certificate if you meet your goal.
I’ll point out that writers who want to find community with other writers have been doing that for a very long time. These days the online version of community is very easy and accessible. Between social media and online classes and workshops, there are multiple ways to find your writer community and fit into it.
As for the certificate, that’s kind of like the stickers my piano teacher used to put in my music book to show that I’d learned a piece of music. The certificate isn’t going to get your work published anymore than the accumulated stickers from my piano teacher would have gotten me into Julliard.
Until all this came out, I didn’t even know that NaNoWriMo was an actual organization. I knew people who participated – I know a lot of writers – but I always thought it was informal.
It seems to me that it could and should have stayed informal.
Now I say this as someone who advocates strong charters and bylaws for co-ops and other kinds of enterprises. It is my experience that weak structures will cause a project to come crashing down when a problem crops up.
But not everything people do needs to be an enterprise. If you put together a critique group with other writers, you don’t need to set up a formal organization. You can just decide when and how you’re going to meet, how far in advance people should submit their work, and what the rules are for discussion.
Right now, I’m involved in four writer-related things. There’s a daily zoom for writing run by a friend where we just show up and write (and check in if we’re on time), two critique groups, and a bimonthly meetup of writers who’ve been at it for awhile and want to discuss business matters and problems.
None of those are official. Nobody gets paid. There are no sponsors, no donors, no meetings to discuss the business side of the group. I find them all very useful.
I think NaNoWriMo would have benefited from staying informal. And in fact, I think we need a lot more of that informal community in our lives, both online and in real life.
I notice people talk a lot about being raised as “free-range” kids – that is, kids who went off to do stuff with other kids without supervision. A lot of people tie this to Gen-X, but as with many things, it was around long before those folks came along. It’s more that it stopped being such a thing after that generation was grown.
Seems to me both kids and adults need a lot more free-range activities and a lot fewer structured ones.
What I loved about NaNo the first couple of years I did it was that sense of community. I loved the get-togethers at local restaurant and pizza parlors back when they were called that. I loved the word count tracker that made me feel like I was accomplishing something, and I loved the camaraderie.
As you point out, all of that can be done for free these days… and really, any and all months of the year.
An organization that wants to help people take the plunge and write could do well, I think, to offer encouragement and writing prompts rather than directing them to LLMs or “writing aids” that cost money. I think the steering committee shifted to a commercial/profit model (in spite of their status) when one of the directors published a How to Write book, and they started offering the other thing like “boot camp.” In my opinion, it lost its luster then.
Once you set up an organization with paid staff, funding the organization often becomes more important than its original mission. You need some sort of check in place to keep from losing the purpose.
And of course, while people should get paid for doing necessary work — and I’m sure there was some work involved — not everything needs to get monetized.