Don't look now, but the machines are catching up

From today's Seth Godin post:

Typing the right things into Google makes it more likely you will find what you’re looking for.

Now, with GPT and Stable Diffusion and other machine learning AI tools gaining widespread use, there’s a gap between people who are simply stumbling around with silly short prompts and folks who are figuring out how to engineer an excellent prompt.

We’re all the boss. Giving better instructions gets better results.

I have been fiddling with ChatGPT for a few days, establishing an OpenAI account and experimenting with various prompts that might approximate assignments I make in my online writing classes. 

Here's a quick example:

My prompt that I shared with the AI software: write a Hallmark TV movie parody opening scene. 

What the software came up with: 

As the camera pans across a cozy suburban neighborhood, the narrator's voiceover begins:

"Welcome to the town of Maplewood, where the picket fences are white, the yards are perfectly manicured, and the residents all seem to have picture-perfect lives. But as we all know, things are never as they seem...

Cut to a montage of scenes showing the main characters: a perky housewife struggling with her husband's infidelity, a single mom working two jobs to make ends meet, and a high school mean girl scheming to ruin her classmates' lives.

"Join us for an emotional rollercoaster of love, heartbreak, and triumph as we explore the deep, dark secrets of Maplewood," the narrator continues. "Will love conquer all? Or will the town's hidden skeletons come back to haunt its inhabitants? Tune in to find out on tonight's episode of 'Maplewood Lane: A Hallmark TV Movie Parody.'"

Not a bad starting point for something more, IMHO. Note the choice of "Maplewood" for the town name, which is entirely the computer's decision. Note the rhythm of "three" in that second graf (fences are white. yards are manicured, and all seem to live perfect lives. Note the main characters that the software created: a housewife, a single mom and a mean girl. I don't know why they are all female, but the AI knows that female characters are usually the leads in Hallmark movies. 

Of course, the AI also chose to explicitly create a title for the show that gives away the fact that the show is a parody, which is a bit clunky. 

But there is quite a bit to work with here if I were trying to write such a script. There would be lots to do to develop each main character, plus the supporting characters we would need. But I would have some basic themes to work with, including the importance of love as well as the carefully hidden "sins" that many in the town would like to keep covered up.

Let's face it: students will soon be exploring AI software for writing assignments, among other things, which makes Mr. Godin's advice about teaching how to write more sophisticated prompts quite timely. 

The point is not that traditional writing assignments are going to become obsolete (though they certainly MIGHT) but that we can add ChatGPT to student "toolboxes," along with spellcheck and grammar check.

The best writing often surprises us. In our little parody test above, I have say I was a bit surprised, and in a good way.