Posted on February 25, 2023 at 11:00 AM by Sadye Scott-Hainchek
There's just so much to report on when it comes to artificial intelligence and chatbots entering the creative world.
And it turns out the editors of some science-fiction magazines can empathize with — and likely top — our sense of overwhelm.
The New York Times reported Thursday that editors of Clarkesworld, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Asimov’s Science Fiction are seeing floods of AI-generated work in their submission queues.
They're less surprised by the fact that it's happening and more surprised at the sheer volume; Clarkesworld, in fact, won't be accepting any submissions until its editor can come up with a solution for this problem.
This news came on the heels of some unpleasantness surrounding Findaway Voices and Apple.
Specifically, some authors and narrators belatedly learned that Findaway — an audiobook distributor that's a tempting alternative to Amazon — has a clause in its contracts that allows Apple to use audiobook files "for machine learning training and models."
In other words, as one outraged narrator told Wired, their work was being used to train their potential replacements.
Rights holders can contact Findaway to opt out of this clause, and labor union SAG-AFTRA managed to get the companies to remove it from all union members' contracts, too.
Victoria Strauss of Writer Beware suggests plenty more is yet to come, so buckle up.
And perhaps turn to Kris Rusch, if you need to be talked down out of a full panic.
Categories: Behind the scenes