I am tried of all the focus on "generative AI". It feels overblown for what is essentially spell check on steroids. So, this this title is a little off-putting for me.
I like the title. There is so much negative press about AI that I tend to dismiss it out of hand. Your title is positive and it makes me a little curious about the potential of AI.
I feel like I am missing a cultural hook for what is "More Than Words" (meaning the title is presenting "more than words" as a common saying, but I can't think of what that saying is, unless it's something along the lines of "I love/miss you more than words can say"). Also, I feel like no one is looking to chatbots to teach us about Humanity in the biggest sense (though I have used them to suggest diplomatic email language at work, to temper my own small h human reactions!)
The title is a little long, but I think it will speak to the people who would most want to read it. Someone below said they're tired of generative AI--congrats, my friend, if generative AI hasn't already scraped five + years of your life's work to generate whatever garbage it's putting out.
The students I work with don’t use AI to “learn about being human”- so the subtitle doesn’t work for me. I also think the word “teach” is confusing - the folks I know who use AI don’t use it to “teach” but to accomplish “work.” “More Than Words” makes sense - it even has a negative edge (Thus Speaks the Algorithm). I teach writing, so I’m prime audience for the book - browsing in a bookstore, I’d only stop for this one because I was familiar with the author.
I like the title - could also be "Not Just Words" - and I like the use of can't in the second portion because the great majority of similar titles are in the 'can' camp.
What about a subtitle more like "What AI Doesn't Know About..."? Is that in line with your book's message? The publisher's use of "...Can't Teach Us..." smacks of AI as our Overlord.
The best hockey romance I have read is The Deal by Elle Kennedy. But I would say it’s just as much a college romance as it is a hockey romance. And if I may, the sport in a sports romance is a MacGuffin. It’s the means to tell a certain kind of love story. If a sports romance delves too deeply into the sport then it’s beginning to wander out of the romance genre. What made The Deal work was the chemistry between the couple. I enjoy romance and can find other reasons to enjoy a romance novel but it’s rare to read one that totally nails chemistry and the feeling of falling in love. The Deal accomplished that goal.
Just a bit of history: Susan Elizabeth Phillips essentially invented sports romance with her Chicago Stars series about a football team. I listened to an interview with her, and she said the trick was to have very little sports in a sports romance, ha ha! The romance genre used to have a lot of limits and I was surprised to hear how recently subgenres started to sprout.
Great piece. As always I added several new books to my list from it and had several thoughts while reading.
1. I like your connection to the "culture of consumption" which I think is a deeper theme underlying the effect of algorithms. I wish I could remember where I read it, but there was an article about corporations as slow AI. The basic argument was the narrow-minded pursuit of profit as the only objective leads corporations to reformulate themselves to do whatever they need to make more money. The main difference with the rise of AI/algorithms is the speed with which they're able to do so (and how quickly we see the negative effects).
2. Astra Taylor has a great book, The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age, which used a lot of great research to highlight things like network effects and the impact that online platforms have on movements, culture, and consumption. This was back in 2012, and seems prophetic now, but was just the result of someone recognizing early on how corporate incentives would influence the internet. The Substack saga is probably this same story, as they look for short-term boosts in engagement driven by anger, rather than long-term survival by having values.
3. Beating a dead horse here, but I think the economic idea of opportunity cost, and the concerted effort to get everyone to see themselves as economic actors has led a lot of people to feel anxiety about "wasting their time", and they don't want to take a risk on something they won't like. In my personal experience, some of my favorite movies have been objectively bad. They cross the line from being bad into being very funny, or they are just so unique as to be incredibly memorable and have you thinking back on them over and over while the money-makers are often so similar that you won't remember them a few years later.
I concur that the title seems a little long to me, but I don't have any suggestions beyond that.
Hm. I feel like there are a couple of problems with the "More than Words" part.
1. It seems to implicitly concede that the textbots have mastered words, and to find the distinctly human we must turn to the ineffable. I don't think this is true - as we saw with your recent experiment, textbots are still pretty trash at the actual words part - and I don't think it provides the most accurate or helpful frame for introducing your work.
2. It seems to imply that the actual words don't really matter that much. Maybe this connects with your argument about ideas, not words, being the basic unit of writing? But it still strikes a somewhat off note for me. Like yes, writing is more than putting words together, but the way we put words together matters. It's the skate on the ice.
3. It's reminding me of a particularly awful song.
I'm write with Eliza and Howie on their spot-on comments. Your title is too long. But,worse, it is dull, tepid, and about as exciting as a napkin( you know -taste). Noam Comsky has a better one word description - plaigarism. It's the new hulabaoo waste-of-time special for procastinators who have one more excuse for not working on our own writing.
What I like about Substack is that are enough writers who are actually sharing their writing. Two are totally oriiginal and among my top twenty writers,which include ( and here's a list not too mny could make in terms of that shallow and divisive word . coined by some Ivy Tower Sociologsts who cant even say RACISM. See how many writers you recognize from my list: Virginia Woolf,Richard Wright, Damon Runyon, Vi Khai Nao, Mahmoud Darwish, Gwendolyn Brooks , Sterling A.Brown,
Ousmane Sembene,, Tadeusz Rozewisz, Victor Serge, Edna Obrien,Yu Hua, AND ESPECIALY two FABULOUS- TYHIMBA JESS , author of the kaleidiscopic OLIO, the best long poem in American literature of at least the last thirty years; he is also the current president of Cave Canem, a dynamic organization of black writers mentoring qnd supporting with workshops,fellowships,and retreats young blqck writers in communities,colleges,and MFA progrqms. in the last 17 yeqrs and along with KUNDIMON/kqyq (Asian Ameicans),GroupoMONDO, the Rqdius of Arab American Writers ,all leading to the biggest sea change in American poetry in this country's literay history, even bigger than the Beat Poetry movment of thefifties. And it was, is, way overdue.
A little long and the negative “what AI can’t teach us” is a little difficult. Prospective readers probably skimming and might miss the nuance.
I am tried of all the focus on "generative AI". It feels overblown for what is essentially spell check on steroids. So, this this title is a little off-putting for me.
I like the title. There is so much negative press about AI that I tend to dismiss it out of hand. Your title is positive and it makes me a little curious about the potential of AI.
I think that the prospective title is interesting enough to draw in readers that have some interest in the subject
I feel like I am missing a cultural hook for what is "More Than Words" (meaning the title is presenting "more than words" as a common saying, but I can't think of what that saying is, unless it's something along the lines of "I love/miss you more than words can say"). Also, I feel like no one is looking to chatbots to teach us about Humanity in the biggest sense (though I have used them to suggest diplomatic email language at work, to temper my own small h human reactions!)
Although that title is too long, it contains more than words which attract my attention: writing, reading and being human.
Really liked this piece, John. Happy new year!
The title is a little long, but I think it will speak to the people who would most want to read it. Someone below said they're tired of generative AI--congrats, my friend, if generative AI hasn't already scraped five + years of your life's work to generate whatever garbage it's putting out.
The students I work with don’t use AI to “learn about being human”- so the subtitle doesn’t work for me. I also think the word “teach” is confusing - the folks I know who use AI don’t use it to “teach” but to accomplish “work.” “More Than Words” makes sense - it even has a negative edge (Thus Speaks the Algorithm). I teach writing, so I’m prime audience for the book - browsing in a bookstore, I’d only stop for this one because I was familiar with the author.
I like the title - could also be "Not Just Words" - and I like the use of can't in the second portion because the great majority of similar titles are in the 'can' camp.
I think it works, I would put the CAN'T into bold or different colours or something.
Since you asked, I like More Than Words, but I think the title is too long. Is generative necessary? Could it end after Us?
What about a subtitle more like "What AI Doesn't Know About..."? Is that in line with your book's message? The publisher's use of "...Can't Teach Us..." smacks of AI as our Overlord.
The best hockey romance I have read is The Deal by Elle Kennedy. But I would say it’s just as much a college romance as it is a hockey romance. And if I may, the sport in a sports romance is a MacGuffin. It’s the means to tell a certain kind of love story. If a sports romance delves too deeply into the sport then it’s beginning to wander out of the romance genre. What made The Deal work was the chemistry between the couple. I enjoy romance and can find other reasons to enjoy a romance novel but it’s rare to read one that totally nails chemistry and the feeling of falling in love. The Deal accomplished that goal.
Just a bit of history: Susan Elizabeth Phillips essentially invented sports romance with her Chicago Stars series about a football team. I listened to an interview with her, and she said the trick was to have very little sports in a sports romance, ha ha! The romance genre used to have a lot of limits and I was surprised to hear how recently subgenres started to sprout.
Interview here:
https://fatedmates.net/episodes/2021/7/6/s0346-susan-elizabeth-phillips
Great piece. As always I added several new books to my list from it and had several thoughts while reading.
1. I like your connection to the "culture of consumption" which I think is a deeper theme underlying the effect of algorithms. I wish I could remember where I read it, but there was an article about corporations as slow AI. The basic argument was the narrow-minded pursuit of profit as the only objective leads corporations to reformulate themselves to do whatever they need to make more money. The main difference with the rise of AI/algorithms is the speed with which they're able to do so (and how quickly we see the negative effects).
2. Astra Taylor has a great book, The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age, which used a lot of great research to highlight things like network effects and the impact that online platforms have on movements, culture, and consumption. This was back in 2012, and seems prophetic now, but was just the result of someone recognizing early on how corporate incentives would influence the internet. The Substack saga is probably this same story, as they look for short-term boosts in engagement driven by anger, rather than long-term survival by having values.
3. Beating a dead horse here, but I think the economic idea of opportunity cost, and the concerted effort to get everyone to see themselves as economic actors has led a lot of people to feel anxiety about "wasting their time", and they don't want to take a risk on something they won't like. In my personal experience, some of my favorite movies have been objectively bad. They cross the line from being bad into being very funny, or they are just so unique as to be incredibly memorable and have you thinking back on them over and over while the money-makers are often so similar that you won't remember them a few years later.
I concur that the title seems a little long to me, but I don't have any suggestions beyond that.
Hm. I feel like there are a couple of problems with the "More than Words" part.
1. It seems to implicitly concede that the textbots have mastered words, and to find the distinctly human we must turn to the ineffable. I don't think this is true - as we saw with your recent experiment, textbots are still pretty trash at the actual words part - and I don't think it provides the most accurate or helpful frame for introducing your work.
2. It seems to imply that the actual words don't really matter that much. Maybe this connects with your argument about ideas, not words, being the basic unit of writing? But it still strikes a somewhat off note for me. Like yes, writing is more than putting words together, but the way we put words together matters. It's the skate on the ice.
3. It's reminding me of a particularly awful song.
I'm write with Eliza and Howie on their spot-on comments. Your title is too long. But,worse, it is dull, tepid, and about as exciting as a napkin( you know -taste). Noam Comsky has a better one word description - plaigarism. It's the new hulabaoo waste-of-time special for procastinators who have one more excuse for not working on our own writing.
What I like about Substack is that are enough writers who are actually sharing their writing. Two are totally oriiginal and among my top twenty writers,which include ( and here's a list not too mny could make in terms of that shallow and divisive word . coined by some Ivy Tower Sociologsts who cant even say RACISM. See how many writers you recognize from my list: Virginia Woolf,Richard Wright, Damon Runyon, Vi Khai Nao, Mahmoud Darwish, Gwendolyn Brooks , Sterling A.Brown,
Ousmane Sembene,, Tadeusz Rozewisz, Victor Serge, Edna Obrien,Yu Hua, AND ESPECIALY two FABULOUS- TYHIMBA JESS , author of the kaleidiscopic OLIO, the best long poem in American literature of at least the last thirty years; he is also the current president of Cave Canem, a dynamic organization of black writers mentoring qnd supporting with workshops,fellowships,and retreats young blqck writers in communities,colleges,and MFA progrqms. in the last 17 yeqrs and along with KUNDIMON/kqyq (Asian Ameicans),GroupoMONDO, the Rqdius of Arab American Writers ,all leading to the biggest sea change in American poetry in this country's literay history, even bigger than the Beat Poetry movment of thefifties. And it was, is, way overdue.