The Dearth of the Author in AI-Supported Writing

TL;DR

This paper discusses how AI writing tools often produce text with limited expressive intent due to reduced creative input from users, highlighting implications for AI-supported writing and proposing new goals for AI creativity support.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of the 'dearth of the author' to explain limitations in AI-assisted writing and suggests a new direction for developing more expressive AI writing tools.

Findings

AI tools often produce text with limited expressive intent

The 'dearth of the author' explains user-AI interaction issues

New goals for AI creativity support are proposed

Abstract

We diagnose and briefly discuss the dearth of the author: a condition that arises when AI-based creativity support tools for writing allow users to produce large amounts of text without making a commensurate number of creative decisions, resulting in output that is sparse in expressive intent. We argue that the dearth of the author helps to explain a number of recurring difficulties and anxieties around AI-based writing support tools, but that it also suggests an ambitious new goal for AI-based CSTs.