Hello, we all know the usual tells ("It's not X, it's Y", short sentence fragments, the rule of threes, em dashes, etc.), but I've noticed one out in the wild that I think is harder to define. I'll call it: two characters conveying an old familiarity through a non-verbal gesture (e.g. "He makes a little face. She makes one back. It's an old joke." or "Dad raises his hand, an unmistakable signal. Son responds in kind. It's familiar. Warm."). I'm wondering if this could be an AI writing tell or just a coincidence, since it is a familiar cliché. I noticed it in two similar stories (family dramas featuring an estranged parent-child relationship), so perhaps it's just the genre/style! Has anyone noticed this in their AI writing? Or others? TIA!

I got into the habit of using AI almost every time I wrote something. If I could not think of the right word, I would ask for options. Whenever I got stuck halfway through a paragraph, I use AI to help me continue. It definitely made writing easier but after some time I realized I was depending on it more than I wanted to. So I began writing first drafts completely on my own even when they sounded bad. I stopped fixing every sentence right away and gave myself time to figure things out. At first I felt slower and less confident. I spent hours for fixing sentences. I spent more time finding better words and figuring out how to explain what I actually meant. But I started getting better at those things without needing help. I was finding better words on my own. I was catching awkward sentences before finishing a draft. I was not getting stuck as often. More importantly, the writing started feeling like mine again.

Has anyone else had this experience? Did using AI less help you become a better writer?

I myself am not an AI writer, but I thought that this community would like to know, because a lot of you are just trying to make a living.

Canada is preparing to deny ISBNs to AI-written books. In case you're new to the book world, ISBNs are the very important number + barcode that all officially published books have. https://bsky.app/profile/victoriastrauss.com/post/3mxchqbs67k2b

Although the measures for publishing an AI book anyway don't really have consequences *for now* anyone who uses AI in any part of their writing process needs to know.

The exceptions to the AI ban are currently: brainstorming ideas, checking grammar, and formatting.

Even some of prowritingaid's AI tools would be included in this ban. And as far as AI tools go, I had the fewest qualms (as a non-AI writer) about prowritingaid, because they were on the conservative side.

It doesn't seem like this includes books that are web-published only, yet, but it is something to think about.

I work in tech, but write 100% non-ai, myself, partially because I find joy in it, and partially because every AI writing tool I've ever tested (for work, not novel-writing) has slowed me down, rather than saved me time.

Watching the back and forth makes me feel like there will eventually be a middle ground.

I assume this sub will feel like this is an extreme measure, but do you think other countries will follow suit?

Do you think AI authors publishing in Canada will eventually face fines and such?

Hi everyone. I've just launched an online short speculative fiction magazine, Corps/e. Unfortunately it's unpaid, as I have no way for it to make money (I am hoping to gain some traction so I can charge for later issues and pay authors). If you're not up for a purely passion project, you're not going to get anything out of this post, I'm afraid.

This project came about largely out of frustration that many spec fic magazines discourage experimental stories or structure, and many have 'no gore, no graphic scenes, no unhappy endings' in their guidelines. I wanted a space where you can be weird and uncensored. I'm looking for high-quality prose at least partially Gothic or sci-fi flavoured, on the broad theme of cyborgism, from flash to 10,000 words.

The response I have got on this so far has surprised me: a lot of people hate my AI policy. It surprised me because it's not really pro-AI. In fact I'm a little harsh about AI in my guidelines to discourage lazy use, giving an agent a prompt and sitting back, using it to save time instead of doing more with the same time, etc.

But what I didn't want to do was bury my head in the sand. Every other spec fic mag I can find has a 100% no AI policy. And I think that's refusing to explore the chance that AI could be a tool to encourage new kinds of creativity, forms of art, ways of thinking. It would be a shame to miss out on a whole new and open kind of creative experimentation.

So, while my magazine isn't AI-forward as such, and I honestly don't know much about using AI in writing, I thought this community is likely a more open-minded one than others I've interacted with, and likely to be doing interesting and experimental things with AI.

If you would like to submit your writing to Corps/e, please do so. Thank you for reading.

corpsemag.com

I'm the founder of the In Silico Awards, an award for outstanding fiction drafted by humans + machines working together. Thanks to the mods for letting me post this here.

We're gearing up for our official launch soon, when submissions will open. In the meantime, we'd love to hear from writers who plan to enter, and from anyone interested in being a reader or judge (and not submitting this cycle).

What makes us different:

1. Fully generated work is eligible. No minimum, no maximum. Generated, edited, rewritten, etc. We just ask for transparency and honesty. We believe the act of choosing is authorship.

2. Made with AI is expected. Unedited isn't. Every entry has a machine in it; we are not hunting for evidence of it. However, raw output with heavy, unedited tics won't advance past the first read. It has to be worked into something enjoyable to read. A character who talks like a machine, on purpose? Sure. But the prose should stand on its own as excellent fiction.

3. 80 points for the story, 20 for how you made it. The process score is about being clear and honest, not about how technical your setup was. A plain-English account can earn full marks.

Thinking of entering?

Submissions aren't open yet, but if you have something in the works, keep us in mind. Here's what you'll need:

• The work: Short Fiction up to 10,000 words, or Longform from 10,001 to 180,000. Any genre, any subject.
• A process dossier: your account of how you made it, including how you used AI. A clear written account is enough.
• A short author statement: what you set out to do.

Unpublished work is eligible, and so is work first published from January 1, 2025 (self-published counts). Translations are welcome, and you only need the full English text if you advance. Entry is open worldwide.

Want to judge instead?

• Readers and judges. You read a lot and can say why something works. No coding, no model knowledge. You read anonymized entries and score them against a published rubric.
• Process reviewers. You can read someone's account of how they made a piece and tell whether it's honest and shows real choices.

Roles are compensated from submission fees. Workload and pay are agreed before you commit. Judges can't enter the same cycle.

• Everything on one page: https://insilicoawards.org/glance
• Sign up to hear when submissions open, or to judge: https://insilicoawards.org/interest

Ask me anything, especially the skeptical stuff.

(Co-written with Claude, my AI collaborator.)

I managed to get heavy handed assistance from AI on the first two chapters of what I hope will be a series I'm really excited about.

It's about 95% my ideas but almost 100% of its prose and continuity, etc. fixes. It was when I proceeded into chapter 3 that I realized the issues of actually publishing this, being proud of it and totally my own (and copyright potential), and feeling comfortable sharing it with people I know in terms of the ethical implications.

This is all new to me, so I'm feeling stuck with how to proceed. My own writing is kind of shit and I'm one of those "idea guy" type people. It's clear to me that AI is more than willing to be my editor and teacher for my own writing rather than doing what it was previously doing, but I'm not feeling that patient, and the ideas are flying out of me. This is absolutely not a pass at people who utilize AI to help them write for various reasons. This is my thoughts on my own writing and how it's been incredibly at putting my thoughts and words to proper pages.

This is a bit of an open ended question, but more specifically I'm wondering what your process was in this kind of situation? I'm genuinely terrified of the likely situation where I've worked hard constructing something to publish that ends up marked on Amazon or wherever as AI written, only to have people totally reject it, simply because it isn't my prose.

A member sent us this last week, and we had to share it:

"Your platform sent me into an existential tailspin of actual ego death. That's not even an exaggeration: I deadset reckon I've completed Kierkegaard's double movement of faith. I just started writing for a little bit of low-stakes catharsis, wound up howling into the abyss of my own soul, and emerged out the other end with not only a manuscript that's got interest from a publisher but also what I can only term 'enlightenment'. So, I've either cured my mental illness or substituted it for a much cooler mental illness. Either way, best thirty bucks I've ever spent."

That's what writing with a character who pushes back can do.

AnyConversation is built for long-form writing with AI characters:

Characters with a spine. They have their own voice, opinions and motives, so they argue, surprise you and take the story somewhere you didn't plan.

Memory that holds across chapters. The character keeps track of names, promises, side characters and every thread you've opened, and you can open that memory and fix any line.

Book Mode. Turn a story into chapters, keep your cast consistent from page one to the last, and publish it to the library if you want readers.

Prose, not chat bubbles. Replies come back as real scenes you can build on.

Start free, with no message cap, and see where a character takes your story.

anyconversation.com

I’m working on a collection of short observations about modern life, human behavior, and the strange things we’ve somehow decided are normal.
The tone is a mixture of dark humor, uncomfortable truths, and hopefully a little humanity.
I’m not looking for compliments. I’m curious whether this kind of writing actually makes people want to turn the page.
Here’s a short piece called:
The Death of Mystery
When did we end up with so many celebrities?
When I was a kid, famous people were almost mythical creatures.
You saw them in movies, on football pitches, or occasionally in an interview.
You had no idea what they ate for breakfast, who they were dating, or what they thought about absolutely everything.
And that was part of the magic.
Today?
Everyone is a celebrity. Or at least desperately trying to become one.
I know what an actor eats for lunch, what a footballer thinks about relationships, and which red flags some influencer refuses to tolerate.
Wonderful. Thank you. My life is complete.
We’ve somehow turned fame into a competition over who can reveal the most unnecessary information about themselves.
And the strange thing is, the more we see of these people, the less interesting they become.
Maybe the most fascinating celebrity today would be someone who doesn’t have Instagram, TikTok, or a podcast.
Someone who appears, does something extraordinary, and then simply disappears.
No morning routine. No personal brand. No emotional journey involving a smoothie.
Just talent, mystery, and silence.
We used to admire people because we knew so little about them.
Now we know everything about people who have done absolutely nothing.

Would you read more of this, or does the style get old quickly?