76 Comments
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Jenean McBrearty's avatar

You're providing a great service to authors. Thank-you!

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Minaz Ansari's avatar

Thanks. Great to know so many AI free writers on Substack

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Hanna Delaney's avatar

Thank you for putting this together. I think as well as taking the work away from artists, AI is also absolutely awful for the environment. I'm not sure many people realise this. It's so sad.

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Yes, takes HUGE amounts of electricity to run the AI data centers. Grrr!

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Janine Eaby's avatar

So none of these writers use Grammarly or Quillbot to check their punctuation? (Not talking about sentence rewrites, just commas and other punctuation.) Is that over the line for AI use?

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Grammarly has AI elements but avoidable. Quillbot seems to be AI free and has a checker to find AI generated content. As for the list, I state that I accept people’s word. They have said they don’t use AI for their writing process.

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Jon Sparks's avatar

Personally, I've never used Grammarly or any other grammar-checker, from well before current concerns about AI. On the rare occasions I've been forced into using Macroslop Word, I've noticed that its onboard grammar-checker frequently makes suggestions I don't agree with. I've relied on a traditional education, and 30+ years of writing professionally.

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Janine Eaby's avatar

You have to think about every suggestion, and only take the ones that make sense. MS Word makes since pretty comical suggestions. It doesn't seem to recognize the word "copse," and suggests I use "corpse." Ah yes, because "corpse of trees" makes complete sense.

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Yeah, I don’t rely on Word’s spellchecker. Amazed that copse isn’t on their word list, though. And a corpse of trees could make sense… depends on the story. Hee!

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Leanne Shawler's avatar

I don’t use either, for what it’s worth. Maybe it’s a generational thing. (I sound old saying that.)

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Stella Maris Designs's avatar

Hi! This is a wonderful thing! Is this list for authors only? There’s no AI in Stella Maris artwork. I forgot to comment on the last post, I think!

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Andy Darby - Sword Songs's avatar

Hi, I would love to be on your list. All my writing comes from my fevered brain - definitely no AI.

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Busy today. I get you added tomorrow along with some others I missed. Thanks for letting me know.

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Thérèse Judeana's avatar

Thank you, A.C.! I’m going to have to add the “May not be used for AI training” to my books, as well!

I’ve used the summarize feature of the search engine before to help narrow down what posts to read in my research, but as you also noticed, the answers it presents are frequently significantly incorrect when I then study the pages it’s referencing! It’s funny, and terrible, how wrong it can be. It’s much better to dig through many articles, so I won’t be using it for writing. (Anyway, rabbit holes are fun. I learn about so many random thing for my writing.)

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Sometimes research is the most fun part of writing. I travel down those rabbit holes and find lots of goodies—maybe even a tea party going on with some odd attendants!

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Thérèse Judeana's avatar

So true!

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Jim Cummings's avatar

Thank you for the time and effort it took to compile this list. I am happy to see that some of my favorite writers have committed to keeping AI out of their work but I'm disappointed that some have not.

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Well, not everyone responded to me. 124 writers who had been on my other lists didn’t answer me back about AI usage, so I couldn’t include them on these new lists. Sigh.

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Gary Coulton's avatar

Thank you for the mention Mr Cargill.

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Joseph L. Wiess's avatar

Uh..

I don't use AI for any part of my writing process.

The only thing I use is a thumbnail generator, as I haven't included images in months.

So, why did I get left out?

You said people with the DHM would still be included.

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A.C. Cargill, All-Human Author's avatar

Oops! I missed that. You are on the Mostly AI Free Zone. I will move you to the AI Free Zone.

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D.L. Lee | SISTERLY LOVE's avatar

Great initiative!

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Miriam H. Monarres's avatar

Thank you very much for the mention!

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C.P. Night's avatar

What did I do to get dropped? I responded to your initial request then thanked you for your efforts on the last request. I’ve never used AI and never will.

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C.P. Night's avatar

Ah! I should never comment so early in the morning. I see what you did there and missed the "mostly"! Thank you for setting me straight.

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Sarah Crowne's avatar

Thanks for including me on this list and for providing this list! I look forward to checking out the work of others listed.

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Jim J Wilsky's avatar

A.C., thanks so much for the mention and link. Much appreciated. This is the list I intend to always be on. There is no middle ground on this issue - and that will never change for me. Thanks again. - Jim

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An American Writer & Essayist's avatar

Thanks for the shout-out. 👍

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