Re:370 Books in 20 months: South African author defends her ...
by beej71 on Monday November 09, 2026 @09:57AM
(#50426527)
I can assure you that no writing of mine is LLM-generated.
But I wish I had some way to prove that. (Live writing? Git logs—but a lot of my chapters see a big first commit? Some kind of PGP web of trust thing?)
For one thing, the goal of writing for me is not to produce a book. The goal is to learn and help others learn. The goal is to make the most concise, best quality material that has ever been written on that topic for that audience. It's a lofty goal that I can't claim to achieve, but that's the target. LLMs appear to be light years away from being able to do so and are easily bested.
And, perhaps most importantly, writing is fun, relaxing, challenging, frustrating, rewarding, and human. Having an LLM write something for me is none of those things.
But I wish I had some way to prove that. (Live writing? Git logs—but a lot of my chapters see a big first commit? Some kind of PGP web of trust thing?)
For one thing, the goal of writing for me is not to produce a book. The goal is to learn and help others learn. The goal is to make the most concise, best quality material that has ever been written on that topic for that audience. It's a lofty goal that I can't claim to achieve, but that's the target. LLMs appear to be light years away from being able to do so and are easily bested.
And, perhaps most importantly, writing is fun, relaxing, challenging, frustrating, rewarding, and human. Having an LLM write something for me is none of those things.
I wish AI would do my fucking dishes, though.