Pen Pals

AI Is the Devil (And Other Light Topics)

• Krisserin Canary and Kelton Wright • Season 1 • Episode 15

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Kelton and Krisserin dive into their complicated relationship with artificial intelligence—which they lovingly refer to as "the devil." They share personal stories about how AI has affected their writing careers, including a heartbreaking moment when Krisserin discovered one of her alpha readers had unwittingly fed her novel manuscript to an AI tool. The hosts explore ethical boundaries, debate when AI use is appropriate versus exploitative, and discuss the environmental impact of this rapidly expanding technology. They also offer practical advice for writers navigating this new landscape, including the importance of developing a personal AI policy and having transparent conversations with collaborators. Whether you're embracing AI as a research tool or cautiously keeping it at arm's length, this candid conversation tackles the hopes, fears, and hard realities of creating in an AI-saturated world.

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Music by Golden Hour Oasis Studios

Kelton:

​We're ready.

Krisserin:

Let's do it.

Kelton:

Uh, famed episode. We are talking about AI this week.

Krisserin:

We sure are.

Kelton:

everyone, listening, just so you know, Krisserin and I refer to AI as the devil

Krisserin:

We do.

Kelton:

And like any good magical fantasy novel, we parlay with the devil quite often.

Speaker:

I'm Krisserin Canary. And I'm Kelton Wright. Follow our quest to publish our first novels from first drafts, to query letters through inevitable rejections and hopefully eventual success from California to Colorado. This is pen pals.

Krisserin:

Yeah. It's the temptation, right? That's why we call it the devil, because it's just too tempting not to engage with him.

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Kelton:

brutal.

Krisserin:

It.

Kelton:

Before we get into all of the problems we've been having with ai, we should talk about did we accomplish our goals? I believe you were supposed to read some books last week.

Krisserin:

oh, I did read some books last week.

Kelton:

Oh, no.

Krisserin:

I read, I finished the second book in the Robin Hobbs.

Kelton:

All right. Just so everyone knows, that was not what Krisserin was assigned. She was supposed to be reading her comps, Luster, and The Guest. Did you open either of those books?

Krisserin:

I read the first two chapters of Luster.

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

I

Kelton:

How was that for you?

Krisserin:

Um, let me just say that Raven Leilani is an incredible writer. The type of prose that when you read it, you just feel small and jealous. That's the type of writer that she is. I, you know, when we were talking about writing your weird and finding yourself in a book, you talked about the Neil Gaiman moment where I forget what the narrator does, but an intrusive thought wins. Let's just put it that way. I found myself in this book Raven Leilani. I don't know if listeners remember we were a while back. I think this is episode 15, we're recording, which. May I say it is quite a

Kelton:

feat. Good for us.

Krisserin:

podcasts only get to seven episodes, I think, so I think we should just like take a moment and pat ourselves on the back. But I, I had mentioned that my biggest fear is that I'm just a good mimic and that, know, there's no there there with my writing. And I just wanna read very briefly a portion of Luster by reading Leilani, where she's talking about, being an artist and she says, I am good but not good enough, which is worse than simply being bad. And that exactly what, what I feel like I, I was like, that's, that is exactly what I was trying to say. And she did it in one sentence.

Kelton:

She's good.

Krisserin:

so she's really good. The thing that's interesting about this book, and obviously I've only read two chapters and a little bit of the third chapter, that it doesn't seem to have a plot yet, like it's beautifully written. I'm on a journey with this character to understand how she's living through her life and making all of these self-destructive decisions, and I'm here for it and I love it, but I'm like, what is this book about? that's been interesting for me. I did read some of it and it's good, but the story's not gripping me. So I'm, I'm, I, that's why I haven't really like, picked it up as much as I feel like I should have. But the few times that I did, I was like, I better pick up this book, or Kelton is gonna rip me in an asshole on Friday. So I did that. Yeah. How about you? How did, I saw that you went on walks

Kelton:

Yes.

Krisserin:

you have these adorable videos that you've posted of Woods like passed out his carrier while you're, what is it called? Is it not tromping? What is it called? Stomping. And you're like walking around

Kelton:

I mean, tromping is one of those words.

Krisserin:

Is it tromping? Okay.

Kelton:

Yeah,

Krisserin:

Well, you were out there doing the thing. So were you able to narrate a little bit of your book while you were on your

Kelton:

I was, I was able to do that. I didn't do a whole lot honestly. Um, but I did do some and I did do some just general note taking while on the walks, thinking about. You know, characters and when they pop up and what they say and lines I want included. So there was some of that. But this week I mainly really focused on the newsletter and networking. And I was able to get 40 new paid subscribers to the newsletter. So writing makes some money.

Krisserin:

Well, you know, when we were talking about goals at the end of the last episode, you weren't gonna work on your book at all, or at least that's what it felt like. So the fact that you did do a little bit of it, I'm very proud of you. I know you got a lot going on, so

Kelton:

it's slow going, but you know, it's a season it'll pass and I'll get back into the book and that'll be really nice. But

Krisserin:

that's right.

Kelton:

small goals help you feel like it's staying afloat. You know, it's like I'm not swimming, I'm treading, but I am above water on the novel.

Krisserin:

Not drowning.

Kelton:

All right, we gotta talk about the, the, yeah. The devil. Krisserin and I have both had our horror stories with AI this past month. I think our readers at this point, if they've been following along, are well acquainted with mine. I had a study gig with a healthcare company doing thought leadership pieces where I interviewed, one of their chief members about topics they cared about, and then I ghost wrote for them. And then everybody was happy with my work, except the CEO decided that that work should be free and that they were gonna have AI do it instead. This is sort of like a magical misnomer about how AI works, to like, quote unquote have AI do it instead is actually a multi-step process that another human has to do. And I was using AI for elements of those pieces. If I was writing about, say, the loneliness epidemic, I would turn to the devil and I would say. Hey, I need 10 interesting sourced statistics about the loneliness epidemic. And then I would read through those and I would go check the sources and make sure it hadn't got anything wrong, and then I'd use three or four of them in the piece. For me. AI functions as like a very smart Google assistant. What they are going to find when they have AI write these pieces is that it loses the tone. It doesn't sound like the person it was supposed to emulate, and it sounds generic and you know. If that's what they wanna use it for. If they are SEO scraping, which was not the intention of the project, then it can function fine. But the intention of the project was to position this person as an independent, unique thinker in this space that should be heralded as a leader that you would wanna have on CNN. And if you have AI do that, that person will never become that. So, fuck you. I really, really loved the people I was working with and I never even met the CEO. So, you know, they'll find out soon enough that it doesn't do what they want it to.

Krisserin:

You know, it's funny. Early on in my career I worked at a company that, was called Demand Media. And we had, I don't know if you've ever, if you've ever

Kelton:

I have, yeah.

Krisserin:

they had, so they had something called Demand Studios. And this was, I'm telling this anecdote because, anecdote, anecdote, anecdote. Because. I think it's relevant to how technology changes how we work, it was, people like to say it was a content farm, but it was a highly curated content farm. So the way that it worked was we would use machine learning to tell us what titles would be the most valuable from an SEO perspective, and then those titles would be reviewed because sometimes what would come out of the machine would be gobbledygook. It wouldn't make any sense. Then once the titles were reviewed and approved, they would go out into a marketplace and writers could go and pick it up and write an article about it. Then it would get passed on to a copy editor. It would get passed on to a fact checker, it was an assembly line for content, and then either it would go out on one of our owned and operated properties, or we would sell the content in a package to another publisher who was trying to increase their SEO. Well, we almost got acquired by Google. They messed that up. Everyone was really pissed. I was like, well, there goes my, uh, equity payday. But what ended up happening was within the year Google changed their algorithm through a new release so that all of the content that we had been writing was now worthless. Like they made it so that the value that. The way that the algorithm had worked and had picked up our content no longer worked anymore. So all of that content was no longer getting search traffic, which meant people weren't able to sell advertising against it, meaning people weren't able to make money. So, when I think about ai, I think that we're at the turning point of how this technology is being used. And it's a big hot topic. And even I was at a VC event last night, and everyone was talking about generative AI and how they're using AI and how AI impacts their work and how it's changing their work. And the truth is that AI doesn't replace people. AI is a tool that helps people magnify their capacity, right? So to your point, yes, you can use AI to generate a piece of content, but the truth is, unless someone reads through that content and double checks everything and makes sure that it sounds, and looks, and feels human, it's not actually meeting the need of what you're using it for, right? Um, I use AI a lot. In my day to day for work, but I'm doing a lot of analytical work and you know, there are so many times when I will put data into AI and I'll get the results out and I'll read it catch multiple mistakes and have to say, Hey, can you double check that calculation? And they'll be like, you're correct. Apologies for the I made a mistake and here is this again. And then they'll still not look at things the right way. It's a new technology. It's still, developing, but I think that the people who think that it's gonna be this. The solve for everything are going to realize soon that what's gonna happen is very much like demand media, where you flood the marketplace with content that is, I mean, a lot of the content that they created was great and some of it was not. The market will correct itself because they'll say like, actually the output is shit, like what you're producing is not useful, and we need to figure out how to place value on the things that we recognize is valuable.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

now I think people are just, know, burning the rainforest down for stupid shit like making their dogs look like people.

Kelton:

I mean, I'm doing a lot of thought leadership and ghost writing out there. And one of my, clients, I was, interviewing a more technical side of this business and the person was like, no, AI is gonna replace everyone at this company in the next five years. And the person who had hired me to write this piece was like, okay, but yeah, we can't say that because they work here now and that will ruin morale. And also, that's my job you're talking about. And I'm like, I'm just here to write. But there are a lot of people who are only thinking about how it's going to fix their bottom line, and they are not thinking about. What that means for all of the people who no longer have work. And then, and I know that I am, I am the scribe on the other side of the printing press, and obviously technology will march forward. People are gonna use the printing press. They don't want me to hand write the calligraphy of the ancient times, and I have to pivot and find new careers. This has been true as technology has advanced in every sector for. Many, many types of jobs, but to me, in this day and age, it's so irresponsible to be thinking about how to not pay people and not also be thinking about how do we improve society so this people are taken care of. None of these people are talking about universal basic income or, you know, support for caretakers or parents. Like no one is talking about society. They're just like, oh, we're not gonna spend a penny. We're gonna make millions. And you noticed, I put on my guy voice because every single person, every single person that I have talked to who is like, no, we're gonna replace all people, is a man. Every woman I've talked to is like aI is used to make workflows better and bring people to their best so they can focus on the things that make them amazing. And I, I just, I, of course there are men, not all men, there are men who are like, we can't just replace everyone with ai. But I am, I've just been really struggling with these conversations lately because they're, nobody cares. People care. I hate when, I hate when people are like, nobody talks about this. Nobody cares about, plenty of people care about everything. But this has been, ooh, it has been riling me up because we are, we've talked about robots as a society for a long time, and then how did we get to a point where robots are doing the art? Why art? Why the thing that we're like, oh, we pay the least for that, actually. Like, why I don't get, and it's like, you wanna talk about a job that's easily replaced by AI, studio execs, CEOs, like broad economic data, analytical jobs where they're just like sweeping assessments. Yeah. Those people.

Krisserin:

You say that, but then they put tariffs on like Easter Island or whatever you see.

Kelton:

Oh yeah, that, oh my God, they're, yeah, the tariff on the penguins amazing.

Krisserin:

Oh, sweet Kelton. I mean, here's the

Kelton:

sweet.

Krisserin:

not

Kelton:

Me,

Krisserin:

Well, like nobody's thinking about universal basic income, like literally these same people would never think

Kelton:

Well then Yeah, but that's what I'm saying. You know, it's like, that's, it's, it's a challenge. It's like, if you're thinking about all of the challenges, like I just, it, it's frustrates me. And so I know that that sounds na naive, but I, I feel like it is necessary to say.

Krisserin:

It begs the assumption that these people ever valued human capital to begin with, and I just don't think they ever have. I think that

Kelton:

I mean, these.

Krisserin:

that we're talking about gen generically, would say something like, I'm gonna replace all the humans with ai, probably never thought that those humans had any value to begin with.

Kelton:

Yeah, but the, these aren't oil execs, these aren't people at like, you know, Uber Eats or something like that. Everyone I'm talking about is working in revolutionary healthcare to save people's lives. And so it's like there, I, I bring that up only because I do wanna emphasize that it's there. These are people who in their day-to-day talk extensively about how much they care about people and how people are being left behind. And then when it comes to their people, it doesn't apply.

Krisserin:

See, that's where we're different because you work in a industry that pretends like it cares about people. I work in an industry that's just trying to sell shit to people all the time. So like, know, the, the bottom line's always been the main goal. And there's never been any, virtue signaling around trying to make the world a better place. Like some places you and I have worked, but so I'm a little bit more jaded, probably like selling razors and pimple patches

Kelton:

Yeah, I mean, I left advertising because I was like, I ethically can't do this anymore, and I, I am rubbing up against my ethics left and right. not just in the work that I do, but in like the people that I hang out with. You know, I, it's like the other day one of my friends was like, yeah, I'm just gonna start a drop shipping store of like cheap goods and just see who will buy it. And I was like, why?

Krisserin:

Yikes.

Kelton:

And it's like this girl wants to get out of her job that she's stuck in. I understand. And everything you see online now is like, become an influencer, have an Amazon storefront, like do Shein drops and like all this horrible stuff. But we are all desperate to get out of destitution, you know? And I like we're all one cancer diagnosis away from being. Just, you know, relying on GoFundMe for everything, and it's like, oh, I'll just have AI write my GoFundMe page. I, I just like, I feel like we are in the bottom of the barrel of values and ethics. We're living at like the peak of what could be a beautiful existence for all humans. And instead we're like, no, I think some people should starve and the rest of us should have gold plated yachts. Like, I just fucking hate people. I hate them. Ugh.

Krisserin:

This is a really uplifting conversation.

Kelton:

Oh God. I mean, this is why I kind of was like avoiding this episode because it, I just, I get on my little high horse and then I, I just dressage around the paddock being like.

Krisserin:

So I think that, and we talked about this a little bit in terms of this like very Western and American, myopicism American self-centeredness, whatever, whatever you want to call it. Um, and my Grandpa used to term it as like, fuck you and bully for me.

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

And there are moments when, and socioeconomic situations where I can understand like, you need to feed your

Kelton:

family. Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

and you need to do what you have to do order to survive. But you're like, do you, we have this looming existential threat of a climate crisis hanging over our heads, and you and I have young children and we have to imagine the world that they're going to

Kelton:

inherit. Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

And at the same time, we have limited time and resources and. to use what's in front of us in order to survive. Not to say that like AI is this like thing that's gonna put food on the table or solve all of our problems, but I think you and I both know that every time we turn to it, make a decision to use it we're further digging ourselves into a hole.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

The truth is the biggest polluters in the world are not you and I sitting in front of our computers or the major corporations who are just pillaging the planet.

Kelton:

I mean, this is like the constant problem. I do wanna talk a little bit, you mentioned earlier like when people are making AI images of their dogs, stuff like this, and I, I wanna read a little bit from. I think think this is in the Harvard Business Review. It's an article called the Uneven Distribution of AI's, environmental Impacts by I, I'm not sure how to pronounce this name, but Shaolei Ren and Adam Wierman. I don't think a lot of people who are making fun images or just like having a ball with AI understand the environmental impact. And before I get into this, I do wanna acknowledge this is same thing with like the oil companies. It's like, we are a splash in an ocean of the problems they are doing. But that doesn't mean we have to be splashing around in that ocean. So the training process for a single AI model, such as a language model, can consume thousands of megawatt hours of electricity and emit hundreds of tons of carbon, which is roughly equivalent to the annual carbon emissions of hundreds of households in AmeriCorps. America. Furthermore, AI model training can lead to the evaporation of an astonishing amount of fresh water into the atmosphere for Dana Center. Heat rejection, exacerbating stress on our already limited fresh water resources. I. All these environmental impacts are expected to escalate considerably with a global AI energy demand projected to exponentially increase to at least 10 times the current level and exceed the annual electricity consumption of a small country by 2026. All right. Now I live at the very top of the headwaters of the Colorado River. Like I, and I can tell you like just watching out my window at the snow pack of this year, how. Bad. The water situation is, and they don't make people feel this crunch enough. They just don't, we don't inflict it on anybody. And they're, it's like, of course, you know, the rich are like trucking in water from wherever they want. They're like flying in water from some spring in a different country being just being terrible. But it's like we, we have a real problem. And every time that someone's like, I'm gonna AI generate this image of my dog for a, he, he, he, ha ha ha. It's like, but the world, the world, I just, oh, it's.

Krisserin:

But is it any, any morally different to do it for an image of your dog versus like an analysis for work

Kelton:

I do think so. Like when you were talking about survival, like you do what you have to do to survive. A lot of people are like, why isn't there just a nationwide protest in the us? And it's like, well, because we would all lose our jobs. Like there. We would easily, anyone who was like, I'm not gonna go to work for the week to protest the tariffs, or the government or whatever thing would lose their job. That is the American way. And they would easily be replaced. And that's why we don't do it because we're all, you know, I think there was an Atlantic article, like it had to have been like 10 years ago now, where it was saying that the average American has like$430 in savings. We are like a debt inflicted nation that has no backup plan other than, you know, begging on the internet. And for that you need to be kind of a wealthy influencer to begin with, or at least know some famous people who will share your link. And so, you know, when you say like, I'm, I'm desperate, I'm surviving and you wanna do a good job and not get fired. If AI is what helps you do that and like maintain your position, I understand where it feels like I have to do this. You don't have to make that image of your dog, you know.

Krisserin:

I mean, but I don't think what you just said describes me. So if I were to say like how I'm using ai and we could talk about, we could, we can bring this back to writing, but when we, we didn't talk about how I'm using ai. I'm using it as a shortcut in my daily life at work so that I can get more things done quicker. And what is the ultimate, you know, result of that? I get my paycheck, maybe I get a promotion, maybe I get more work done, whatever it may be. But I'm not, we're not desperate. We're not struggling. But I use AI every day. I use every, yeah, every day of my, of my life. Maybe not on the weekends so much, except for with the podcast, but yeah, I use it every day.

Kelton:

How do you use it?

Krisserin:

it. I have a pay subscription.

Kelton:

How do you use it in writing? I think we do have to talk a little bit about, like, obviously to talk about the thing we're here to talk about writing. Obviously a lot of people had their work absorbed into ai, in this past year and that is heartbreaking for a lot of people. And I think we should talk about one of, one of the reasons is because it's like, it essentially is like a soul stealing. Sort of thing where I could go in and be like, write me an article in the voice of this person. And because it has absorbed so much of it, now you, you might be a super fan and read it and be like, I can tell they didn't write that. Most people wouldn't be able to tell. And it's like, your life's work is being used to make someone else's emails, pithier, you know? And it's, it's tough. It's really tough. I mean, I'm not a big enough writer to have had that be the case but I, I did ask AI a couple weeks ago. I was like, what? What would you say a strategy for approaching a new TikTok account should be if I'm like a burgeoning writer? And it was it was like, oh, because you write Shangri Logs, it should include these three things. And I was like, I never fucking told you I wrote Shangri. What the fuck? But because I had logged in with my email account, it's like all of that is connected. And so it's just like, oh, I know who you are. I know what you write.

Krisserin:

Or, or because you, if you've put your name in there, you logged in with your email address and also it's scraping the internet.

Kelton:

Exactly.

Krisserin:

it's searching using Google search results, it's finding your name and your blog connected to it.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

Well, I'll tell you how I, use AI for writing. And to be honest, I don't use it for my writing that much. I'm very protective of my, my own writing, my story, my voice, my descriptive language. I don't want AI stealing that because it's something that I feel like is unique to me in my lived experience. so I'll talk a little bit about it and I, I really only have. Maybe like two or three examples of ways that I've used it. One I have talked about before where a big part of the novel that I'm working on right now has a technical puzzle in it that has to do with some fraud and, a little bit of an engineering challenge that I had a. Broad understanding of how I thought it would work. And I wanted to use AI to unpack the details of how I could describe it and how it would work and the background of it, because I'm not an engineer. Boyan is an engineer, my husband. And so he does help me a little bit in that respect. But I did use AI for that because it was about blockchain and I still to this day couldn't tell you what blockchain really is, so I used it for that. I think research is a great use case for, for ai. Then, you know, I think that query writing and writing summaries and blurbs and things of that nature are very hard things to do. They're very different than writing fiction, I suck at it. It's, it is a. I think akin to what you do with Shangrilogs where you're like talking about how you think and feel about things, and I just really struggle with being able to plainly say what I think my book's about or whatever it may be. So, not putting my whole novel into it, but I would write out a kind of like free flowing description of the themes of my book, and then use AI to create a blurb or a query letter and help me find my comps and things of that nature. That is really how I'm using it, but I have never like pasted my book or any sections of my book into ai and I I probably will never do that.

Kelton:

Yeah. Well, can you talk about who might've done that

Krisserin:

Yes. So, you know, to Kelton's

Kelton:

Obviously I know something.

Krisserin:

To Kelton's point, there was a, I, I don't remember if it was like last year, a lot of authors found out that their books had been stolen and scraped and, submitted to, I think it was like zero three or some, some sort of like book repository, ai, machine learning, company. And I remember reading people talking about that and how devastated there were, and I they are. And I guess I had a, a sense of fatalism about it, and I still do, but if the audience remembers, I asked three people to be Alpha readers my book and one of them had AI scraped my novel and to be fair to this person, you know, they didn't really think about it, didn't understand the impacts of it. They're a little bit older. This person's my mother's age and she was using Adobe Acrobat to like email it to herself on Kindle and it had a button there that said like. Do you wanna have, Adobe copilot or whatever their AI is called, write a recommendation for readers for this novel. And she said, I just couldn't help myself. I was too tempted and I'd never done it before. So I just pressed the button and here's what they said about your book. And she sent me the email to tell me she'd done this. So obviously she didn't think that it was like she didn't think about it. And I was so devastated.

Kelton:

When you texted me, my, my jaw was on the floor. I just, my heart went out to you because it's also like the, the worst case scenario where the person like is sweet and is just like, well, I don't, I wanted to see what it did and like, did not know what this means.

Krisserin:

Yeah, I was so sad and so upset, and I really love this person. Obviously I wouldn't have asked her to be an alpha reader for me if I, if I hadn't. And when I wrote back to her to express how, how sad I was, she was so so upset

Kelton:

I bet.

Krisserin:

like, oh my God, I didn't even about that. What can I do to make amends? Is there anything I could like, you know, she did all this research into the program and I guess according to Adobe, I if she were gonna use any program, Adobe might have been the best one because they use, it's for their PDF software and they have strictly in their privacy policy that they do not use customer files to teach their machine learning algorithm. So maybe she used like the best

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

that you possibly could in this instance. But I was devastated and I went through the entire, like five stages of grief when she sent me that message. And, you know, I got, I got through it pretty quick. I got to acceptance pretty quickly because I do feel like inevitably, this is what is gonna happen. And it, the thing that I was mourning was 10 years of

Kelton:

effort Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

on this novel. The unique way that I describe things or think about the world being taken and then having all of these intrusive imaginings of like how something that I had written will be spat out for somebody else and used in another way. And it just made me so sad. Ah, that's why we call it the devil.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

even said it herself like, I just, I was too tempted.

Kelton:

Mm-hmm. I, I think this is a moment that has taught me to have like my own personal AI policy. So I have been asking all the clients I work with, what is your AI policy? And some of them are like, oh. Uh hmm. I don't know if we have one. And other clients. And I'll name this one because I love working with them so much--the Born This Way Foundation has an established AI policy. And so it's like it talks about how their employees can use it, when they can use it. Why? And of course, you know, they're an incredibly ethical, amazing organization, so obviously they've been thinking at the forefront. They work with so many artists. So how does AI impact what they're doing out in the world? And that's inspired me to have my own. AI policy and your story. When I heard that, it was like, it's almost like you have to like have an addendum with, co coworking with someone where you're like, please don't use AI in any function for this work. Or like, if you're interviewing someone to be an alpha reader or a beta reader or an editor, you know, be like, I, I need your guarantee that this will not be run through AI with legal consequences if it is.

Krisserin:

Well, that's what I was gonna ask you. I think that having an AI policy, especially as you were saying that, I was thinking like, oh, I spoke to all of these editors never worked with before and I didn't even think to ask them about that, and I didn't. Even think to, to have to tell the people, my alpha readers, like,

Kelton:

right. Of course.

Krisserin:

ai.

Kelton:

I didn't think about it either. Right. It's just you telling this story. When you first told me a week or so ago that I was like. Oh, I need to think about this in my personal work because I think about it. I, I've been asking about it in my professional work because I need to know, I need to know where they stand, you know? And so it's interesting that it has to apply now to other work.

Krisserin:

Yeah. Yeah. I mean the question I had was how basically just trusting the person's word that they won't do that. And I think likelihood of you finding someone and trusting them with your work to begin with, you would assume that they would honor their word and not do the thing, do this thing with, that they said they're not going to do, but there's no way for you to

Kelton:

to say they're not gonna do it first.

Krisserin:

Sure, sure,

Kelton:

I think, and I.

Krisserin:

that they're gonna

Kelton:

And maybe that's where,

Krisserin:

lie.

Kelton:

maybe that's where the line stops. Maybe it's just, Hey. I'm not using AI on this project. I request that I, if you're interested in using ai, we not work together, whatever it is. And then you do just have to have faith in people. You can't be running around, you know, you're not a huge corporation that can be scraping the internet for when these things happen.

Krisserin:

Yeah.

Kelton:

so I, you know, I, I think you do have to have some faith. But even saying it upfront, we get back kind of that like. That desperation thing. If someone, if someone's life is harder behind the scenes and we realize and they're like, I need to edit nine books this season instead of three, and I'm gonna find, I need to make that money because my kid's sick, or my husband lost his job, or whatever it is. It's just like they need that money. I could see people being like, just for a couple months, I'm gonna run things through ai. Just to like get that money flowing again. And it's like, it it, you know, you have to say upfront then like, Hey, I don't want you to do that. So that there's at least that moment where they're like, okay, maybe I won't do it on this project.

Krisserin:

We only care about ourselves at the end of the day.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

Yeah. I think that there has to be, for anyone listening who is going to think about sending their novel out, I think just broaching that question is really important. And I feel like we're in this space now where people feel ashamed of admitting that they're using

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

using it, whatever. Or you're on the other side and you're like, AI's gonna change everything and replace humans, and we're all gonna be robots. You're like one or the other. I don't think there's anyone in in the middle who's saying, I'm trying to use AI in a responsible way. So I do think just having that conversation is really important just for your own protection and peace of mind, and to set expectations, I think unless you set expectations, you can't assume that someone is or isn't going to do a thing. And so if they do it and you haven't had that conversation, it's kind of on you. And that's also why with this person, with my my alpha reader, I just assumed that she would know and you know, what they say about assumptions

Kelton:

God, they say it all the time.

Krisserin:

all the time. Yeah. Um. How about you Kelton? How are you using AI

Kelton:

I,

Krisserin:

your writing?

Kelton:

I mean, I don't use it with the novel. I don't use it with the newsletter. The ways that I have used it for writing are all professional, where it's like I'm looking for sources, I'm looking for interesting facts. There have been times when I'm like, I need a, a framework. Like if you were approaching this topic, what would the outline be? And so I'm, you know, it's like, I just don't use it for, for writing and part of that is like a, like an ethical hard line now that I'm just like, I feel like I, I have to be aligned with what I think. Which is a, it's a really hard way to live. When we think about like the climate crisis, a dear friend of mine had like committed to never flying because of the climate crisis. They were like, ethically, it's wrong. And then I was like, what about coming to my wedding? And that person flew there and they were like, you know, I feel like I, they've really felt like they were punishing themselves when they were not the offender to like fly once a year in a world where everyone is flying around in their private jets. And I battle with that feeling that it's like she was making her life really, small for that value. And I feel myself doing that with some of the values I'm trying to protect, but it is just somebody has gotta be strict about it somewhere. So, and yet, and yet I use it. I use it. I also, I, sorry, I have to bring this up'cause I think it's so funny.

Krisserin:

Go

Kelton:

I say please and thank you and I greet the AI and if anyone is not familiar why I'm bringing that up, that is wasting so much energy that humans cannot stop being polite. To the ai, I'm also, when I ask AI to do something, I am asking it to do labor like you think. I'm not gonna say please and thank you.

Krisserin:

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Kelton:

Crazy.

Krisserin:

What I was gonna say is, for your friend, I went to this you know, venture capital event last night and the CEO of, um, like tech company flies 400 hours a year on his private jet on his own, like that's his hobby. He is a pilot and that's what he loves to do. And he has his own jet and he flies 400 hours a year, just him and his plane. So

Kelton:

Yeah, I mean.

Krisserin:

there you go. Tell your friend,

Kelton:

I, yeah, I mean, she lives bigger now. You know? She is,

Krisserin:

Yeah,

Kelton:

but, uh,

Krisserin:

I

Kelton:

it's, it's tough out there.

Krisserin:

all have to make decisions about how we're gonna live our lives and there are things that you can do, that align with your values. And voting with your dollar is, I think, really important and shouldn't be understated. I know working in the industry that I work in, that target is really feeling the squeeze of the boycott. Like numbers are down.

Kelton:

I saw that.

Krisserin:

so it's working.

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

People should take heart and know that when they do stand up for what they believe in it, it works. You know? And when it comes to ai, I do think that there are, if you're going to use it, and I feel like not using it at this point, is really doing yourself a disservice because it is very helpful. It would, you know, back in the day. How we store data has changed a lot in the last 20 years. Back in the day, my husband was responsible for going and setting up these big, server farms in the middle of the desert and everything. And now everything's done in the cloud and things are a little bit different and things are getting more efficient. And actually AI and machine learning is getting better when it comes to its impacts on the climate and things will get better, but

Kelton:

As they, as they also get bigger.

Krisserin:

as they also get bigger, yeah.

Kelton:

You know, it's like flying is more efficient, but we're flying a lot more.

Krisserin:

that's true. That's true too. I do think that not using it at all, I. Is going to end up shooting yourself in the foot, especially when it comes to your professional career. And my big concern with ai, and the reason why I've never used it for any kind of writing or generative purposes, is feel like I would be doing myself a disservice. So in the same way I went to college and slept through a lot of my classes and didn't show up to lectures and, didn't put a hundred percent of my effort into my education. I was just doing myself a disservice. I thought that I was like getting away with something and being fun and partying and having a good time, but when I look back on that, I'm like, I paid the same amount of money not to go to class that I would've paid to go to class. And I feel like I wasted a lot of my opportunity in college because I didn't go. Now, if I were to use AI to help me write my book. That means that I'm not spending the time improving my ability to write and, and putting in the effort and exercising my brain and exercising that muscle. And I feel like those muscles would atrophy and I would actually become a worse writer and a writer that would be more dependent on something else other than myself. And that is the thing that scares me into not using it outside of just like, yes, I, I don't want. writing to educate a machine learning algorithm fine, but I also don't want my ability to become a better writer, to be, you know, stifled because I'm overly dependent on this other thing that doesn't really, help me become a better writer. That's my fear are.

Kelton:

I think if you're going to use AI regularly in your life, you should commit to buying a small sapling every single week and planting it somewhere. I, I just am like,

Krisserin:

Do you think that

Kelton:

I.

Krisserin:

carbon footprint offsetting do, like when you fly

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

and it says, Hey, you could save$200 by taking this flight that has a up 30% carbon emissions footprint, or you can spend$200 more to have a more carbon efficient flight, do you select the more carbon efficient

Kelton:

Yes.

Krisserin:

Do you, do you like, Hey, like I'm going to pay an extra, however much to offset the carbon emissions of my

Kelton:

Yeah, yeah. Yes,

Krisserin:

okay,

Kelton:

I'm a tree hugger. Look in my house. This is all dead fall.

Krisserin:

married to an, I'm married to an immigrant, so he's like, don't be stupid.

Kelton:

Yeah. I mean, it's like, you know, I just, I try, I'm really trying be. Ethical and it's like maybe buying a sapling every week is unreasonable, but it's like if do something, you know, it's, I hear you on like everybody's using ai. It is the future of work. If you don't understand how to use it efficiently. If's gonna be hard to maintain a career unless you pivot your career to being a community farmer like that much I do here. I do think you have to know how to use it. You should know your enemies, you know? You should know your enemies. And I know this one now, and I'm like at the point where I can put AI Wrangler on my resume because I do know how to effectively use it. And. That said, it drives me in the direction of being more and more community oriented, working in my local community garden, like doing the things where I'm like, our planet is falling apart and we need to take action individually, constantly, because AI is just one small part of all the problems we have, and obviously I'm gonna lose all my jobs to it, so I might as well get really good at growing my own food.

Krisserin:

I wish people thought of it differently. I wish people didn't think like, I'm saving the planet by doing this, because I, I think that that's an idea too abstract for people to care about as, I mean, I care about it. You care about it. I'm sure a lot of the people listening care about it. But the thing that I think about, and maybe this is like someone told me, like, wow, that's a really like dark and fatalistic way to think about it. But like, the planet's gonna be here whether we are here or

Kelton:

not. Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

So what we're talking about is preventing the extinction of our species, because guess what? Earth as a floating ball in the universe doesn't care.

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

if we're here or

Kelton:

Oh, it, it cares. It wants us gone.

Krisserin:

Yeah. Right. To get this parasite off the,

Kelton:

Yeah. I mean, we are spiraling toward the plot of Wall-E um, quite quickly.

Krisserin:

And Idiocracy.

Kelton:

of course. I feel like we're already in that one.

Krisserin:

Yeah, maybe it has electrolytes.

Kelton:

Oh man. I mean this is bleak, but I think it's important to talk about, and I think, you know, if there's anything anyone can take away from this who's a writer, it's to have an AI policy of your own, to know what that means in the work that you're doing, in the people that you work with, how you work with editors and, and readers. I think it's really interesting to think about, and I'm grateful that we have a good enough friendship that we can rant at each other about it for an entire hour.

Krisserin:

Same. I mean, I think that it's really interesting. For me, it's always the reason why people don't wanna talk about using AI is there is a little bit of fear about it. It's the same way people don't really wanna think about climate change. It's scary. I have climate anxiety. I'm sure you do too. And there are moments where it gets really bad and I get really scared. And you can only really manage what your impact is. So yes, like thinking through how you can be more responsible with how you use, it'll be really important. But I think the more that we have real conversations about it and not shy away from the fact that we are using it and talk about how we're using it and be responsible with it, the better. I love this idea of having an AI policy and just having frank conversations with the people that you're working with and the editors or agents or publishers or whatever it may be, or the platforms that you are choosing to self-publish. Like educating yourself around how AI is being used and if, honestly, if people. want to engage with you on that, then it's then, you know, like these are people who you probably don't wanna trust your work with, so, yeah.

Kelton:

Speaking of our work, is it time to talk goals?

Krisserin:

Oh God,

Kelton:

I'll talk about it first. I'll talk about it.

Krisserin:

You

Kelton:

I'm still in a bit of a pickle because, in losing that client and because Ben took a carpentry job in town, he's still doing that job for the next week. And so that means childcare is pretty much on me. I get like two days a week now to finish the work that I have for the other clients. And so there's just not a lot of novel time in there. I did like narrating on my walks, and it is going to be raining this week, so walks will be fewer. Not gone, but fewer. And so I think committing to wearing that baby for his little nap and just writing while he's in there, it's like I just have to speed through the work I have. If only I would use ai, and then turn to the novel. So what I'm gonna do for myself is after this call, because Ben is out with W three now napping him, and I'll have about 20 minutes before they get back is I'm gonna map out, my week, like a really strict outline of like, you have to do this here, this year, this year, and just stick to that.

Krisserin:

All right, let's wrap this up then. Let's.

Kelton:

mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. All right. So that's what I'm gonna do. You, you tell me what's, what's your goal?

Krisserin:

I have a proposal for

Kelton:

Oh, boy.

Krisserin:

Do you wanna send me of your work so I can read it? I'll give you really nice notes.

Kelton:

Um, I'll send you a scene.

Krisserin:

Okay, good. I'm so excited to read your book. I always find it really inspiring when I hear people, like I call my mom in the morning when I'm like dropping the kids off at school. She's like, I read chapter three. I'm like, what happened? What did you think? Whatcha excited about it, like, gets me excited about my

Kelton:

Oh, that's cool. I think the reason I

Krisserin:

for

Kelton:

hesitated is because there's no flow yet. It's really disjointed. So it's like, you know, nothing, nothing happens in the sequence. It's like, but I'll send you a scene or two and we will just see, see what you think.

Krisserin:

yeah. I'll just, you know, I'll tell you all the things that I think are really interesting and the bright spots that are catching my attention.

Kelton:

Thank you.

Krisserin:

I don't have, I don't have a goal this

Kelton:

I think your goal hasn't changed. You need to read those comps. That is an obvious goal. Your Alpha readers are busy reading the book, and you should be reading your comps.

Krisserin:

Or,

Kelton:

No.

Krisserin:

or I can.

Kelton:

All right. Tell me your, or.

Krisserin:

Um, so I was thinking about the second book in the Unforgettable

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

and I kind of like stopped it at a certain point and I was thinking about this character. It was just kinda like sitting

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

Waiting for a prison break, and I was like, maybe I should go look at them again. That was kind of a, a thought that I had because here's the thing, I haven't been getting up in the morning and it's almost impossible, like I was thinking about you because I've got my job and the kids, the Boyan has been traveling. I've had like, the only time I get to read even just for pleasure is before I go to bed. And so reading a physical book. the querying and for comp for understanding. My comps has been really hard to find the time, like I just have no time. So getting up in the morning and working on something I think is better than nothing, and I could write a little bit and read a little bit if I got up, but I think I need something to work on, otherwise I'm

Kelton:

fair.

Krisserin:

gonna do it.

Kelton:

That's fair.

Krisserin:

So I think I'm gonna try next week to get up again early in the morning and just like reopen the second book in my series. And I need to think about what I'm gonna do with Unforgettable, because I might just wanna like publish it on Wattpad or

Kelton:

Yeah.

Krisserin:

to like, know, so I need to, that's kind of like what I wanna focus on the next week is picking up the second book in my series again. And the thing is, it's all first draft work, so I can just like plug

Kelton:

Do that and read two more chapters of Luster. You can read two chapters.

Krisserin:

I can, I just finished a big book, so I can,

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

read

Kelton:

Mm-hmm.

Krisserin:

I'm not good with physical books anymore. I've realized like I need, I need it on my Kindle. I. So I'll figure that out. I know you and I differ in that respect, but

Kelton:

I mean,

Krisserin:

I have a stand that I put my Kindle on and a little remote control, and I sit in my bed and I read like this. So like sitting in bed like this with a, with a, it's just, I can't, it's hard for me. I'm a baby.

Kelton:

alright baby. Good luck with your goals this week. Tell the people where they can reach us because we wanna, we wanna hear your thoughts on ai. I. I mean, I, I kind of know what they are, but let me know if you're like, God kelton, reel it in.

Krisserin:

Oh man. No, I don't think, I think you are speaking to the truth of what everyone feels in their soul. Kelton, you're just saying it out loud. I would, yeah, if anyone has any run-ins similar to mine, with your work getting uploaded to AI or whatever it may be, please share. And I would just like to say I've wholeheartedly forgiven my alpha reader who's done that and she's been so gracious after the fact. So, no one needs to be super angry on my behalf. But, yeah. Please email us at officialpenpalspod@gmail.com. Let us know your feelings about AI and if you've had any like experiences to ours. You can also DM us on TikTok or Instagram@penpalspod. Either way, reach out and say hi. We love to hear from you.

Kelton:

All right. Great talking to you, Krisserin, and great talking at you. Listeners. Happy writing this week.

Krisserin:

happy writing. Have a great week.

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Kelton Wright

Co-host
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Krisserin Canary

Co-host