Write for the Bots
There’s a change coming in how information is used. You’ve probably already noticed that YouTubers and TikTokers and other content creators are creating videos not necessarily for their audience, but instead for an algorithm that will then push the video to their audience. (The first time I read about this phenomenon was with regards to Kid’s YouTube, where the creation for the algorithm rather than children was more explicit.)
Many of the top-performing AIs such as GPT-3 were trained on essentially the entire internet. I think that within our lifetime, there will be AIs that are used to search for good ideas/arguments. In fact, I’m working on developing them right now. (I’m a PhD student at the University of Minnesota currently working on automatic argument mapping.)
So, if you have an important idea, I think it’s important to share it online. Even if very few humans read your original writing, it’s highly likely that your ideas will eventually be read by an AI which can then share your idea with the world.
You’ll notice that I’ve been taking this approach for years. I don’t just write for other humans to read my writing. I realize that my writing will last beyond my lifetime and I hope that the ideas contained within it will reach the AIs and algorithms of the future and be passed on to help the world through them.
