Of AI, Chatgpt and fandom
So, I’m finally getting around to writing that post I mentioned on AI, Chatgpt and fandom, and in particular fanfiction. There have been a lot of very good posts on the topic that I encourage you to check out (here ; here and here among many others)
I’ll preface this by saying that, as far as I know, my writing hasn’t yet been fed into an AI for an ending or alternate version. But I know it’s happening with other people’s fics, and I know it might happen to mine at some point. The very idea of it makes me sick, hence this post. The ‘you’ I’m addressing in this isn’t a specific person: it is targeted at anyone who is thinking about feeding my works into something like chatgpt, and anyone who might have already done so.
Let me be very, very clear right from the start: I do not consent to any of my works being fed into any AI, be they chatgpt or similar bullshit, just as I do not consent to anyone plagiarizing my fics, writing their own endings of my fics or trying to dictate what that ending should be. Anyone doing that with my fics is rudely invited to go sit on a cactus and never interact with me or my works ever again. I don’t give a fuck if you don’t plan on ever publishing that AI-generated shit you got about my work. Don’t fucking do it in the first place.
My problem is not just about my writing being used to train a computer program without my consent. That is part of my problem, obviously, but not the most important aspect of it in my eyes, and in the eyes of many other writers who have already spoken out about the problem - and by that, I mean fanfiction writers and professional, published writers.
My main issue is with the people using chatgpt to write endings or alternate versions of fanfics written by other people.
By all means, if you want to use chatgpt for your own stories, I can’t stop you - I can and will judge you, because seriously, there are so many fics out there you can most probably find exactly what you’re looking for with some good tag filtering, and if not you can just do what the rest of us do, which is write your own. That’s how most of us got into fanfiction to begin with. Don’t use the dubious writing ability of a robot and its absolute lack of creativity that sees it cannibalize other people’s writing and frankenstein it back together. I would rather read a twelve-year old’s first ever fanfic, full of clichés and spelling mistakes, than anything written by an AI, because I know the twelve year old poured their heart and soul into it, put the time and effort into it, and that makes it so much better in my eyes.
But if you put someone else’s story into chatgpt or similar? You are dead to me and do not deserve the hard work fic writers put into their stories. Yes, even if you’re not planning on publishing the results.
Those are our stories. The ones we've put time, energy, effort in. That we've spent hours writing. Some of us have the whole plot planned out for the next thirty chapters. Some of us are making it up as we go along. Some of us are doing both. But it's still our stories. Writing them, finishing them, is our right and privilege.
Chatgpt and similar computer programs have no clue what we have planned for the rest of the fic. They can make calculated guesses based on all the words you've just fed them and all the stories they’ve previously scrapped, but even if - and it is a big if - they do get the basic plot right, it still won't be exactly the same. It won't be the same quality, it won't be the same word choice, it won't be the exact same style.
It won't be written by us. It won't be the ending we planned or are still planning on.
You were reading that fic because you liked the plot, the characterisation, the writing style. Because you enjoyed the fruits of the efforts the writer put into it.
And now you're asking a computer to plagiarize that same writer and ghost write you the ending? And, I'm guessing, the ending you want to see, or to rewrite the fic to your liking?
That is not okay. That is beyond not okay. I don't tolerate people trying to pass off my writing as their own. I have specifically told people they were not allowed to use certain original elements of my writing or of the plot I have come up with, because those are stories I am planning on writing myself, or background lore I have already planned for. I have told people off for trying to tell me which way my fics should go, which pairings I should write, how I write certain characters.
What makes you think I would tolerate you using chatgpt and alike to do the same?
Because let me be clear. Using those is stealing. It’s stealing the time and effort we put into this, and selfishly feeding it all into a machine so it can spew out exactly what you want from it.
This is not you asking the writer of an abandoned fic if you could pick it up and write an ending for it. This is not you asking the writer of an on going fic if you can write a side story for it.
This is not you asking permission for anything from the writer of the fic. This is not you writing a heavily inspired fic, or even just copy pasting an entire fic into a new document and tweaking it to fit your personal desire. This is not even you writing anything.
Even if it's fanfictions, we writers still have rights to our intellectual property, to the stories we write. There is a reason AO3 reacts quickly to any complaints of plagiarism or reposted fics. There is a reason mirror sites or apps of AO3 are taken down. There is a reason writers like @neil-gaiman, @seananmcguire @dduane and so many others will never read fanfictions of their own works and have to regularly remind their own fans to stop sending them headcanons or fanfics: because even if what we write is based on their work, it’s still our ideas and if they write something too similar to the ideas their fans sent them, there could be legal consequences. Plagiarism accusations. For similar ideas. Not even the exact same words. Ideas. Yes, even for fanworks.
There is the plagiarism issue, as I just mentioned, but there is also the respect issue. You obviously don’t respect my writing, if you’re so quick to feed it to an AI just because you’re not getting exactly what you want right this second. You obviously don’t respect me, as a person or as a writer either, if you’re willing to disregard all the time, effort and thought I put into my work.
Yes, sometimes fics are abandoned, and you really, really want to know how it would have ended. Sometimes, the writer fell out of the fandom, sometimes real life got busy, sometimes you never know. Sometimes they died, and we mourn their silence. Often, an explanation is never given. Sometimes they reappear years later, sometimes they don’t. It’s a fact of life, a fact of fandom.
I myself have stories I haven’t updated in years that I still have plans for, that I haven’t abandoned but that I just need time and inspiration to continue writing, and yes I know I have people who want to know what happens next. Some of these people are more polite about it than others. Some act like entitled spoiled brats and get their comments deleted because I’m not here to cater for them.
No amount of time passed since the last update makes it okay to use something like Chatgpt to finish their stories. At the very least, have the decency to respect the effort they put into it and write your own version, yourself, and keep it to yourself.
Or, if they're available/if you're able to contact them, ask the writer for permission to write a continuation, or a fic based on their own, with proper credit given and a link back to the original! Or even ask them POLITELY how the fic would have ended! Some of them will happily tell you what they originally had planned, even if they are never going to finish the fic! A writer I follow actually did that just today - updated their fics to say ‘Hey, I might never finish this, but here’s what I had planned for it in case I never come back to this.”
But don’t use chatgpt, or any similar program.
Because if you do, what is even the point of us writing anything in the first place?
I have been writing fanfiction for a long time. Over fifteen years. I have dealt with a lot of different readers, some way worse than the majority of them, and even then I consider myself lucky when I see what some of my fellow writers had to deal with back on ffnet, and still have to deal with on AO3. I have built a community around my fics, with my readers, and I love it. I love fandom, despite the drama that always comes with it. I love my readers, too, love their enthusiasm when I post a new chapter, love seeing their reactions and getting yelled at in the discord for leaving them off on yet another cliffhanger.
But anyone who puts my writing in an AI? I don’t love you. You have no place in fandom, and especially not in the part of it that I have built.
You make me feel sick. You make me furious. You act like you are entitled to an ending, to a continuation, to getting exactly what you want… for what? Reading my fics? Maybe leaving a comment at some point (one that probably demanded an update, or that I write your specific pairing, or that I change this character to your specifications)?
Fuck. You.
I don’t write for you. Unless I’m specifically writing a gift for someone, I don’t write for anyone but me.
I share it on AO3 because I’m proud of what I wrote, because I think other people might like it, because I like getting feedback and interacting with others in the fandom. That does not mean it becomes your property, or that you can do anything you want with it.
I don’t get paid for writing. You are not paying me to write. You do not get to tell me what to write, or what to do with my writing, or to do what you want with my writing.
I write because I love writing, because I have too many ideas in my head and need to get them out of it, and putting words on a page is the best way for me to do that.
I don't make any money from writing, and can't afford to be a full time writer. And even if I could, unless you were my publisher and I actually had a contract with you stating that I'm being paid to write something for you, you still wouldn't get to demand updates from me.
I’ve taken to straight out deleting comments that are demanding updates or asking if a fic is abandoned. Not only are these rude, they're actively detrimental to my mental health and make me want to work on the fics in question LESS.
You feeding my work into AI? The only thing you’re doing is making me want to share my writing even less than that.
So just don’t.