Embracing the Role of a Writer in the Age of AI Content
“You’re screwed!” Andrew grinned. “ChatGPT will kick you off the niche.”
I sighed and smiled.
As a writer, I’ve been listening to prophecies about AI replacing me and writing texts instead of me for about ten years already. In 2024, those prophets perked up and sang their favorite “I told ya!” song again.
Why is that?
After ChatGPT hit the world in November 2022, the demand for AI tools grew like mushrooms after rain. The AI content era has (finally!) come, and now we have dozens of AI-based instruments actively performing in all niches. What does it mean for writers?
“You wish!” my reply to Andrew was. “I’ll have even more work now.”
In the evolving landscape of writing and content creation, the role of professional human writers transforms yet remains fundamental. If you’re like Andrew, who buries my career, or my fellow writer, afraid of AI tools leaving you without a job soon, this article is your must-read for today.
Who Is John Galt?
An AI content generation technology is about NLP (natural language processing). This branch of computer science teaches machines to understand text and spoken words. ,
“NLP combines computational linguistics — rule-based modeling of human language — with statistical, machine learning, and deep learning models.”
In plain English, AI text-generating tools are LLM (large language models). Trained on massive text databases, they can generate coherent content assets that look like convincing imitations of human writing.
Why do I call it “imitations?”
Tools like ChatGPT don’t understand word meanings and semantics. They take statistical patterns from databases, predict likely word sequences, and combine them into sentences. As a result, you get generic answers with no unique insights, human perspective, storytelling, and emotions — all crucial for engaging the audience and making them love and remember our texts.
“Oh, please,” Andrew interrupts. “Can’t we just ask AI to add emotions and insights when prompting it?”
Let me use the “Show, don’t tell” principle here and address ’s stellar example demonstrating AI’s significant lag behind writers:
Another one comes from . Read these two samples: I bet you won’t find it challenging to guess which one comes from AI and which — from a human.
“But both guys asked AI to write it and then revised what they got.” I can hear Andrew whispering again. It seems he isn’t going to give up the idea of winning this battle.
That’s the point!
AI doesn’t kick writers of the niche; it gives them even more work to do. Now, we don’t just write our texts from scratch; we get extra tasks from marketers, SEO specialists, and others in need of compelling content:
“Here’s the ChatGPT text. Please check, improve, make it sound like our brand, add visuals, structure it for better SEO and readability…”
And so on.
And so forth.
Don’t get me wrong: I don’t want to say AI text generators are stupid, useless, and worthless machines.
They are excellent assistants. They enhance productivity, helping with research and dealing with low-effort repetitive tasks like writing:
- Titles and meta descriptions
- Content briefs
- Article outlines
- Wikipedia-like definitions and answers to “what is” and “how to” questions
- Product descriptions
- Social media posts
- Standard reviews
ChatGPT is fine for generating writing ideas when you’re on writer’s block. AI tools are super helpers with proofreading your texts for grammar mistakes. They can generate beautiful visuals to include in your content and assist with editing your drafts for better readability, consistency, and style.
The benefits are many, but the limitations of AI-generated content are also here. My point is that while AI learns fast, it still needs a human to polish its texts and sparkle them with context, insights, emotions, and… voice!
As for now, AI texts are voiceless, superficial, and monotonous. Plus, they sound robotic or as if written by a fifth-grade student: Poor word choice or stuffed with sophisticated language patterns to look “smart” in the teachers’ (readers’) eyes.
Besides, AI text generators still present some false information from online as if it’s true. (Hello, fact-checking!) Also, tools don’t cover controversial issues (politics, religion, etc.), providing outdated or biased answers to corresponding prompts.
With that in mind, savvy website owners don’t trust their content writing to AI. They mention this no-no in guidelines and ask contributors to check drafts via AI detectors to ensure their texts don’t look AI-generated.
Who Is a Writer in This Brave New World?
Thanks to AI’s rapid growth and boost across the digital world, the writer’s role evolves, not disappears:
We adapt to new content demands and shift from content creation to curation. It’s more challenging yet exciting and multifunctional: We work to humanize AI-generated content and maintain creativity and originality in writing.
Savvy writers are more in demand now because they can help brands stand out and outperform competitors. Sinking in similar-looking messages from AI, users crave articles that are more human than ever.
What can a writer do that AI can’t?
- Craft engaging narratives and tell stories. (AI doesn’t have any.)
- Interview experts and include their insights. (AI can’t interview people. Yet.)
- Include internal and original data in the content to add credibility to our work.
- Add value using the DIA structure: Description + Illustration + Analysis.
- Communicate missions and visions via specific writing styles.
- Build connections with readers via personalization and .
- Maintain ethical standards in content creation: no copying, rewriting, or plagiarism.
AI is our assistant, not our replacement. We leverage it for research and data analysis, automate routine writing tasks, and beat writer’s block. We enhance collaboration with AI with to get better results and elaborate on them.
We know how to balance AI efficiency with quality and authenticity.
New World, New Challenges
The age of AI content brings the enduring importance of human creativity and innovation. So, the exciting future of writing in a tech-enhanced world is waiting for those who love words and have skills in making their words work.
Andrew takes a step back and looks at me suspiciously. “Less talking, more doing,” I read in his eyes. He gives me an uncertain smile:
“Can you write that guest post for me?” he says.
