My Bluesky feed is all authors listing how many of their books were stolen to feed Mark Zuckerberg’s AI monster. Five of my books were stolen says one author, 7 of mine says another. All my books were stolen. All 10 of them, writes one. For me it’s the first three plus the Portuguese translation of my first book, Popular.

On the internet Mark Zuckerberg posts pictures of the absurdly expensive steak dinners he’s eating. On the internet authors share GoFundMe’s to help cover the cost of medical treatments, to pay their rent, to feed their cat.

Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, pleads hardship. He says if he had to pay for the content he’s using his business wouldn’t be profitable. I think of small business owners struggling to eke out a living and imagine what would happen if they tried to employ the Sam Altman defense—If I had to pay my suppliers my business wouldn’t turn a profit. Something tells me that excuse wouldn’t fly.

I went looking for an appropriate Robber Barons image to use with this post and found instead this Robber Barons shower curtain that you can get right now on Fine Art America because there really aren’t enough bathrooms with decor inspired by old timey political cartoons.

Meanwhile people wonder why AI trained on a diet of pirated novels has such a complicated relationship with truth and facts. Lawyers trying to use AI to do their work for them find the machines routinely cite legal cases that the AI simply invented. Librarians tell stories about patrons who come in seeking a specific book by a specific author. Only after fruitless searching do the librarians learn that the patron found out about the book after using AI software. Patiently librarians explain why you can’t rely on the answers that AI gives you.

I’ve switched my default search engine from Google to Duck Duck Go. Google’s AI summary answers which pop up at the top of every search are riddled with misinformation which isn’t particularly helpful when you’re trying to find out actual facts like what colors a 1993 Ford Escort came in (research for a book) or what the difference is between LVP and SPC flooring (research for the house next door.)

On the Zazzle forums artists and designers are upset by the free invitation templates the site now offers. Unlike my books, which I’ve barely made any money from I do earn a steady income from my Zazzle invitations. I scroll through these new free templates on offer. They are filled with AI generated images which tend to have a very distinct look. It’s a little weird, a little unsettling. If you were throwing a dystopian birthday party for a bunch of robots you might be interested in one of these templates, otherwise I don’t see this unwelcome competition as much of a threat. Still, I remind myself that AI doesn’t create. It only steals. Some digital artist had their creative work stolen by copycat AI that then created these weird designs.

If you’re an author and you want to be depressed, you can search here to see if any of your works were pirated to feed the Meta AI beast. If you are someone who enjoys books, movies, music and other creative content but, like Sam Altman, feel that paying for this content is not in your budget might I suggest getting a library card. They are generally free and with it you can legally enjoy all sort of books and movies, even digitally if that’s your jam.

What does all this AI thievery mean for authors and other creatives? Alas, I do not have an answer. I’m not sure that anyone does. Many other authors have shared their thoughts on this latest demoralising news like this post from Meaghan McIsaac or this one from Jodi Meadows.

Anyway, keep on creating friends and just keep on keeping on.

— Alissa

P.S. A quick programming note. I am making a few changes and updates here, and am in the process of relocating this blog to a new home. So things might look a little wonky and weird next week.

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Weekly Inspiration

What I’m Reading: Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten

What I’m Watching: Detroiters

What I’m Listening to: Ron serenading me with some guitar-playing

Find out more about my books at alissagrosso.com