AI Policy + Use
I use AI in my process from thought to page in my public-facing posts and blogs on this website.
Mostly, that looks like transcribing my audio notes (on the front end) and adding keywords and SEO optimization (at the back end). Very rarely, I use AI to generate images like the one above.
I do not use AI to write or compose my work, to write or compose my social media posts, or to write or compose my articles.
Even so, most of my work is flagged as AI-generated (see below, with timestamps showing when the original work was created).
I have thoughts about why that is:
First, I was trained in academic writing and am a student of philosophy, so “if this, then that” construction is built into my thinking and writing process.
Next, as a child, my preferred author was Edgar Allan Poe (famously verbose with an astonishingly rich vocabulary), and I challenged myself to expand my vocabulary in a similar style.
Also, I spent years writing on the internet (blogging since 2009); thus, I am part of the community of creatives whose collective works were stolen by the AI companies — they called this theft “training data.”
Finally, I spent a good bit of time “training” the AI LLM’s we all now rely on —as did many other “experts” in their fields. One cannot export one’s brain to the machine for as long as I did without it impacting both ways.
I'm transparent about where I use the medium— and, just as importantly, where it never touches my work.
AI doesn’t touch my research meant for publication or my client’s sensitive information. Full stop.
AI doesn’t touch my emails, client conversations, or editing process (all typos, odd phrases, and dangling participles are my own). I’ve opted out of Gemini in my Google workspace and do not use Notion or AI transcription without explicit consent: if a client requests a transcription or recording of our calls, I disclose that use of AI to them and get their opt-in in advance.
When I do use AI, I use paid, enterprise-level tools with the strongest data privacy agreements currently available (they explicitly do not train on my data).
Every idea, argument, and turn of phrase is mine. I built an accessible process, employing AI for transcription and SEO because 1) I'm a verbal, nonlinear thinker, and 2) I used to pay for the work I now use enterprise-grade AI to do faster, and 3) because I think an honest answer to "did you use AI" deserves more than a “yes” or “no.”
Pictured below: receipts.
The image below refers to a essay I wrote for publication on Substack. I uploaded the first draft to a Google doc from the transcription. It was edited (by me) to read like a narrative, not a rambling voice note to the Universe.
No other AI was used in the essay except transcription from an audio note: it was still flagged as 67% percent AI.
