There is a great deal of discussion these days about silicon-based AI helping carbon-based individuals write. I do not use any of the many available online writing assistants.
While I wasn’t looking, however, Apple installed just such an AI feature right on my iPhone. Now, when I write a note off-line, I am presented with the option of having it rewritten, including selecting one of a few styles, and even giving the writing tool my own instructions on how to rewrite what I have written.
As a test, for one note, although it was not a plea for assistance, I told it to “make this sound like a plea for assistance.” It worked, but the result was written in a style that is not mine and with expressions that I never use.
The availability of such functions on a device that almost everybody already owns raises the specter of a world in which many people are able to write things that, well, they not able to write, and in a way they are not able to write them (or write anything, perhaps), and this could suggest a persona that they cannot rightly claim as theirs. Essentially, it is AI-assisted persona authenticity spoofing.
This does not bode well for either people whose livelihoods depend upon writing or people who must judge others or make decisions based on what others write. Let the reader beware, and let the writer be real.
