NaNoWriMo is in disarray after organizers defend AI writing instruments

The group behind Nationwide Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is being slammed on-line after it claimed that opposing using AI writing instruments is “classist and ableist.” On Saturday, NaNoWriMo revealed its stance on the know-how, saying that it doesn’t explicitly help or condemn any strategy to writing.

“We imagine that to categorically condemn AI can be to disregard classist and ableist points surrounding using the know-how, and that questions round using AI tie to questions round privilege,” NaNoWriMo mentioned, arguing that “not all brains” have the “similar skills” and that AI instruments can scale back the monetary burden of hiring human writing assistants.

NaNoWriMo’s annual artistic writing occasion is the group’s flagship program that challenges members to create a 50,000-word manuscript each November. Final yr, the group mentioned that it accepts novels written with the assistance of AI apps like ChatGPT however famous that doing so for the complete submission “would defeat the aim of the problem.”

This yr’s submit goes additional. “We acknowledge that some members of our neighborhood stand staunchly in opposition to AI for themselves, and that’s completely positive,” mentioned NaNoWriMo in its newest submit advocating for AI instruments. “As people, now we have the liberty to make our personal selections.”

“Generative AI empowers not the artist, not the author, however the tech business,” Star Wars: Aftermath writer Chuck Wendig mentioned in response to NaNoWriMo’s stance. “It steals content material to remake content material, graverobbing present materials to staple collectively its Frankensteinian thought of artwork and story.”

In response to the backlash, NaNoWriMo has since up to date the submit to acknowledge issues concerning the impression of generative AI instruments on the writing business. “We’re troubled by situational abuse of AI, and that sure situational abuses clearly battle with our values,” the group mentioned in a brand new paragraph. “We additionally need to clarify that AI is a big umbrella know-how and that the scale and complexity of that class (which incorporates each non-generative and generative AI, amongst different makes use of) contributes to our perception that it is just too large to categorically endorse or not endorse.”

It’s actually a standard prevalence for individuals to conflate generative AI (ChatGPT, Gemini, Midjourney, and so on.) with non-generative AI instruments (Grammarly, e-mail spam filters, and so on.), however the variations are distinct, and AI resentment among the many artistic neighborhood is sort of solely concentrating on the previous. That pushback has additionally grown as generative AI instruments grow to be more and more higher and extra accessible.

NaNoWriMo has not responded to our request for remark on the time of publishing.