An Open Letter to the Authors Guild and the Greater Writing Community

Dear Authors Guild,

With what I will assume are good intentions, your organization came up with this scheme where your members, and non-members, could get a special sticker for their books to ensure readers that the book was written by a human, not AI. An author I respect posted about this on their social media all excited that they had obtained said sticker for their books.

No shade to that author about this. It's their prerogative to go through that process or not. But, as I read the guidelines for obtaining this sticker, something really bothered me about it. After a bit of thinking, it hit me: with all it's good intentions, I truly think this is a very bad direction for your organization, and the writing community, to go in. Here's why:

First: We're already seeing anti-AI sentiment being weaponized against authors, especially in the FanFiction community. There's been instances of writers being drummed out of fanfic because they use too many em-dashes in their fic or their writing style is too formal. People assume, incorrectly, that those fics must be using AI because of those "tells" (which aren't) and then will send the internet mob after them. I've seen some instances where it's just a matter of a reader or fellow author not liking another author's content. It's easier for them to claim it was AI and sic the mob on them.

I'm not saying there aren't authors creating stories and books with AI, there certainly are, but, as I'll talk about later on, it's not easy to actually tell if a particular writing or book is AI generated or not.

Second: According to the Authors Guild website, if you're a member of the guild, you get vetted automatically, but if you're not a member of the guild, I'm assuming you'll have to pay for the third party service used to vet your book. This would be cost prohibitive to many authors, especially poor, disabled, retired, and/or marginalized groups. Even the lowest guild membership tier can be cost prohibitive if someone is living on a fixed income. (It's actually why I haven't joined the guild in the past, plus now I don't live in the US anymore.)

Third: I couldn't find out who your third party vetting service was, since the Authors Guild website didn't seem to have a link to them. More than likely, this third party service is using some sort of computer keyword/text search or even AI to try and find AI content. This would, in my mind, defeat the purpose of your labeling. Also, even if they are humans who are looking for AI content, to quote my Wife, who is an AI expert and PhD computer scientist,: "It is difficult to spot [AI errors/content] even when you are an expert, so nonexpert users have no chance whatsoever." Most people who say they can spot AI content might get lucky some of the time, but most of the time they can, and will be, wrong. Trying to say you can spot AI content because you got lucky a few times does not a reliable system make.

Fourth: This kind of labeling system is creating stigma and classism where there shouldn't be. Being a self-published author is hard enough, but then we have to shell out even more of what little money we get from sales (if any) to get approved as a legitimate author by some unknown third party company? Soon that will create, yet again, a stigma against self-published, impoverished, and marginalized authors. It will end up creating, yet again, a sub-class of authors that, if they don't get this sticker, will be considered illegitimate authors.

As a transgender and queer author, given the state of the world right now, this scares me. Marginalized, independent authors have a hard enough time in the writing community getting published and even marketing their books, let alone being seen as legitimate authors. Or has the writing community forgotten things like the fact that Facebook won't really let queer and trans authors advertise their books as having queer and trans content anymore? Or the fact that authors of color, especially women of color's works, were (and still are in a lot of cases) consistently categorized differently than their white counterparts? This gives people who don't want certain types of books to exist an easy way to ban books but not make it look like they're banning books. All you have to do is declare them "written by AI," make the vetting process prohibitively expensive, and viola! Instant ban, plus an internet mob to make sure the author never writes another word.

I'm sure this isn't what the Authors Guild intended, but I really would like you, and the entire writing community, to think more before using these types of systems. I get it. AI in it's current state is complete crap. I don't disagree about that. But weaponizing the Anti-AI movement and creating systems like this have unintended consequences, which no one seems to want to really think through when they decide they want to "do something about AI content."

To be honest, I don't think my letter will make any difference to you. You've spent the time and money to create this system, so I doubt you will get rid of it because one author is pointing out it's injustice and discriminatory nature. There will also be many authors who think I'm over-reacting, or who will think that it's a really good idea because they think this is "combating Big AI." It's not combating AI, it's creating more of a problem for writers than it's ultimately solving. We should be supporting our fellow writers, not stigmatizing and attacking them. This system is doing both.

Again, I'm sure that wasn't your intention, but the long term consequences of this system plays right into the hands of capitalism and fascism, doing their work for them by demoralizing and banning many new and marginalized authors before they can even get a foot in the door.

You are better than this. We, as a community, should be better than this.