Have you used AI at all? I am bit of a dinosaur when it comes to technology, and I tend to only learn what I absolutely have to learn, in order to achieve what I want to achieve. (I am waiting for when AI can clean a dirty bathroom and sort the laundry out–that would be an excellent use of resources.) However, I have used the picture-drawing tool on my WordPress site, for my blog, and this has been fun. Mostly though, AI has removed some of my fun. One of the features that WordPress offers is details of various stats–how many people have read my blog, which countries it has been read in, which posts are particularly popular. It was fun, and after publishing a new post I would usually check to see how much traction it gained, always hoping it would be shared on social media so it would spread beyond my faithful email followers. Maybe one day something would ‘go viral’ and a post would become ‘famous,’ read by millions.

However, this changed recently. I noticed my normal stats (in addition to my 500 followers, usually around 30 extra readers each week) had suddenly shot up. I didn’t think this was because I was more popular, I think it’s because my work is being read by bots. I think computers are reading everything on the internet, AI is learning, my blog just happens to be one of the things hundreds of bots are reading. Which is much less satisfying than humans reading my work. I do not think it’s coincidental that most of my ‘readers’ are now in the US, India and China. It feels a little weird to be ‘read’ by a machine. But I guess if they are ‘learning’ then my blogs are as valid as any other voice. Perhaps they will one day even understand my humour.

I am regularly ‘fooled’ by AI in everyday life. Like when I try to complain about something, and am having an online conversation with a ‘person’ who seems to be on a loop–a sure sign that I am talking to a machine. I also believe things that I shouldn’t–like that a restaurant has lots of brilliant reviews, when I know that AI is able to write reviews and post them to any business willing to pay. I understand that even online news articles are sometimes written using AI, which means what we read as ‘fact’ might not be factual at all. It makes for a confusing world, one where we are not sure what to trust. I guess we need to learn new ways of looking at things.

I think it’s more of a problem for older people (like me). I was discussing my fears with one of my sons, saying that when I watch cute cat videos on Instagram, I am sometimes aware that they are fake. Cats would never behave like the ones in the video, it has been created by AI not filmed by a loving owner. My son said this problem was not particularly one for younger people. They have grown up knowing that anything online might be fake, seeing is not believing. He said it is my generation who read something in the news, or see a video, and automatically assume it is true. Because in the olden days, when I was a child, it would have been true. Something in a photo really happened. But not today. Today we need to be wise, we need to not trust the media, not trust what we see. Which seems a shame. But perhaps it has always been like that. Perhaps we gave authority too easily to the church, the school, the BBC. Perhaps even in the olden days we should have paused more often, we should have questioned ‘is this true?’ Perhaps information has always been unreliable, or biased, it’s just that today we are more aware of it. What do you think?

For my readers who are not bots (and who might enjoying sharing the occasional blog with other humans) thanks for reading. Be wise and pause before you trust.
Take care.
Love, Anne x