My Take on Editorial Work and AI

Though discussion involving AI (Artificial Intelligence) has been around for some time now, it has become a particularly hot topic over the last few weeks. The very last of my undergraduate courses that runs from May to June is also the very first class I’ve had wherein the syllabus had a clause/policy on AI. It’s growing into something controversial, as can only be expected, and I’ve already had several conversations with classmates, friends, and family about any future I might have with any kind of writing career.

So here I am, at 11:17PM on a Tuesday night in late May 2023, writing a little blog post about AI and how I’m choosing to approach it.

My editorial philosophy (something I don’t actually discuss often, as my primary work right now is more design-focused) is that every editor needs an editor, regardless of your experience or writing prowess or academic history.

This is a priceless lesson I learned from the gallery curator at my exhibition design job. Before curating for the gallery, she worked multiple decades in the cutthroat publishing industry and had lots of experience working with authors, agents, editors, publishing houses, etc.

“The one thing people seemed to consistently forget,” she told me one day as we were talking casually about the major I’d just declared, “is that every editor needs an editor.”

I’ve adopted it shamelessly as its endless potential applications make themselves known throughout my various jobs, positions, and projects. AI is just another one of those applications.

Whether you are using AI to write up a first draft, and then going in and editing it to better suite your voice, vision, or narrative, or whether you are writing a first draft and using an AI software for spell check and grammar support, the writing needs work.

A first draft is going to be messy, regardless of what sort of brain writes it.

AI might be faster, but human-generated content is naturally warmer. After reading and editing and analyzing my own fair share of books, articles, magazines, and papers, I can tell you that much. I’d probably only ever recommend using AI to generate first drafts for instruction manuals.

I don’t believe that editorial careers are in jeopardy with the rise of AI, just as I don’t believe that face-to-face conversations became inconsequential with the invention of phones, Zoom calls, and social media. Rather, it is media literacy skills that I think will see a significant uptick in importance, as well as transcription refinement and research citation competency.

We’ll simply have to continue to sharpen our awareness of the media we consume, and remember that every editor needs an editor—people will always be relevant.