ChatGPT For World Building?

[skip.knox]

I was speaking to all, in my ModVoice, including to future readers of the thread. No worries.

 

[Graybles]

AI is a toy to me. I would spend more time dicking with ChatGPT and correcting it's crap than actually writing to make it work. Even for pure world-building, it sucks for me. Maybe if I was working from scratch it would be more useful. The AI Art is a better toy for inspiration. Although I didn't use anything it produced, I tinkered around with a variety of thoughts on flags and what I generated pointed me in curious directions that led to a flag description that didn't even make it into the book... Fun, but in the end, still wasted more time than I should have, LMAO.

I think I agree with this statement the most, AI Art is a very handy tool to visualize certain things about your story like the look of characters in the world and certain other things. Using ChatGPT I feel is a double-edged knife.
If people learn you use ChatGPT to write stuff for you it diminishes your final product, there is still a lot of taboo around it. What ChatGPT does do extremely well is being your Editor. It is perfectly capable of fixing your finished texts as far as punctuation and writing errors go. But I would never use it for creation of "Original Content" that I would use in actual stories.

If you want an amazing reference piece for Worldbuilding, TSR (the original creators of D&D) had a accessory called "The Worldbuilders Guidebook" - TSR Code 9532 this contained a full list of everything you need or should implement in a story world to make it feel alive and real, from population to weather and more. If you'll look for it, I'm sure you can find a Digital PDF of it as the original is from about 1992-1994 or so and is not that easy to find anymore!

 

[pmmg]

Never is a strong word. The AI will have other iterations and evolve. What if it did not suck for world or story creation? Would it remain just a curiosity, or would we slowly slide into using the shortcuts to do what we could have done ourselves?

I am sure I could take that TSR world building guide and us it as instructions for an AI.

 

[Graybles]

Never is a strong word. The AI will have other iterations and evolve. What if it did not suck for world or story creation? Would it remain just a curiosity, or would we slowly slide into using the shortcuts to do what we could have done ourselves?

I am sure I could take that TSR world building guide and us it as instructions for an AI.

The true question is would it still be your fantasy, or would it be the AI's creation you pretend is your fantasy?
- This is more philosophical than anything else I believe.

On one side you can claim you provided initial input to get the subsequent final stuff the AI spits out, so you are in part it's progenitor.
On the other side is the argument that you wouldn't have been able to create anything if the AI didn't produce material at your requested as it is the integral part that makes your world function.

Which one of those is true and if both are, which is more important?
Taking into account that ChatGPT has numerous authors' works in its database, how can you be certain you aren't involuntarily plagiarizing somebody?

It would be pretty crappy if you spent a good chunk of time creating a whole world to then be pointed at the fact that your brainstorming buddy lent 50% of its material from another famous Writer without your knowledge...

 

[pmmg]

The true question is would it still be your fantasy, or would it be the AI's creation you pretend is your fantasy?
- This is more philosophical than anything else I believe.

Yes, that is the question... but the question is also about who you are, and who you want to be.

 

[Demesnedenoir]

ChatGPT checking for corrections? I'm not that confident yet, but humans miss stuff, too. At some point, AI will become (more or less) a perfect "editor" program for commas and whatnot, and that's where I draw the line for AI's use in the written word for fiction. If AI can do things in nonfiction, say, translate for doctors and whatnot, then more power to them. Using it for stock art and world-building and inspiration? Honestly, I'm far more worried about AI's potential for abuse by governments and the tech sector than I am by some writers, LOL. I don't like it, but I'm doing my best to roll with it because it's here.

 

[jackwilson]

Yeah I feel like it’s super useful for fact checking or research and making sure the world is functionally believable. I just wonder if anything ever gets published like is there a copyright thing or how would anyone even be able to tell if an idea or sentence came from chat gpt

There are some tools to find patterns in GPT written texts. But they aren't reliable.
Concerning the copyright, you retain the rights for all that you publish. OpenAI clearly gives you all the rights of the chats in the terms. Other models might be different though.

 

[jackwilson]

Copying is copying. If someone were to take prints from their Midjourney account in the style of [insert artist] then that would be copyright theft. Just the same as someone in real life making a copy of a famous painting and trying to make a profit from it. It’s happened many times before and will continue to happen. With AI what’s murky about it is that because it’s a third party operator somehow it gets around copyright theft. Hopefully not for long.

I have to agree with other responses, that is not how the current law works. It might change, as copyright laws are evolving, but right now this is not correct.

Your statement about "copying" a painting is not true. If another painter is painting the same picture and it looks perfectly the same and then is selling it under his own name, it is completely legal. There is no right for a specific style or a specific way to think.

Any artist ever has used what came before them to influence them. Everyone learns based on previous understandings. There is nothing inherenctly bad about that. What any society should do in my opinion, is simply look to balance the needs of different groups to provide the most benefit to all. AI will make this extremely difficult extremely soon, so brace yourself. Though I am sure the protectionists in most political parties will make sure that there are a LOT of guardrails. In my view I expect them to overdo it hindering a lot of cool things, but that's just me.

 

[HaydenCreed]

In my opinion ChatGPT makes life a lot easier, that is true, but as i saw it’s use by people, mostly students to do all their work for them i think it might do more bad than good imo. But as you said.. if you use it to brainstorm and maybe fill out some blank spaces in your narration, it might be very good tool. But still use it just for inspiration and give it lots of reforming in your own way.. otherwise it feels like it the stuff loses the essence of writer.