To AI or Not to AI? That's not the question

AI is here to stay, and will only get better, and quite rapidly. The sooner content creators figure out where AI fits into their workflow, the more successful they will be in an AI-dominated world

In the discussion around AI-generated vs human-written content, I feel that the main point about why we consume content gets lost in the noise.

The debate is not about whether we would want to consume human-written or AI-generated content. Neither is objectively better than the other. If we just scroll through our LinkedIn feeds, we’ll see that a vast majority of human-generated content is, in fact, quite mediocre - brands screaming about themselves, self-proclaimed experts sharing random inspirational quotes from other actually influential people, emotional or inspiring videos with a caption that’s promoting a lean 6 sigma course. Junk content is all around us already.

The real question should be - who can deliver content that adds value, teaches us something, or inspires us, regardless of whether they used AI assistance or not. I do not mind reading a sentence that starts with “In the ever-evolving digital landscape…” or “Let’s delve into the intricacies of…”, if what follows is meaningful and insightful.

I think judging AI-assisted content by its style may be too superficial at this point when the access to LLMs for everyone out there is barely a year old, and some of the more advanced models haven’t even been around for more than a few months. It is only a matter of time that AI-generated content won't sound AI-generated, and the substance within it becomes more important, as it should.

AI is evolving faster than anything we’ve seen in our lifetimes. And it should be more exciting than a drag to see AI-assisted content in our feeds. Those trying to do arbitrage or make a quick buck will fizzle away in the near-medium term. But those who can augment their knowledge and expertise with the agility to share it that AI offers will thrive. We couldn’t be in a more exciting and transformative period for content creation.

It would be rash and near-sighted to choose not to adopt AI in this inevitable transformation. The sooner one figures out where AI fits into their content creation lifecycle, the better the chances that they’ll end up winning on the other side of this transformation.