@jaysyn not exactly there will always be editors, because artificial intelligence does not have an endocrine system. And a human editor will see things more easily and be able to guide authors but for simple things such as a proofread I think that will end up going away, and it will be taken over by AI. but for those who have zero income to afford editing, this is better than nothing at all.

@Myana @J_Windrow I won't use AI to edit; that should be done by a person, but I will use it for proofreading. It's good at catching punctuation and spelling errors, word repetition, weird grammar.

@ianthealy @J_Windrow Having never used an AI to edit, I'd be willing to have it give it a shot.

I haven't had good luck with human editors (for fiction; the editors on my non-fiction were indispensable). So much of fiction is a matter of personal taste, not objective facts. The only thing I don't trust an AI can do is tell me when something I've written is confusing.

@ianthealy @Myana as long as you can financially afford to have an editor then good on you. I am saying that there are a lot of people who absolutely cannot afford an editor. They go to the library and they compose on library computers and they keep their books on USB drives and they live in subsidized housing and they worry about weather next meal was coming from. They are not hiring an editor.

@J_Windrow @ianthealy Agreed. People will often respond, "Then get a friend to do it for free." But editing is a huge task, particularly if it includes proofing. I don't want to dump that on a friend.

With one exception (which I did pay for) all of my fiction editors were assigned to me by my publisher. One was quite helpful; others were not helpful at all. That experience makes me think there's a decent chance AI could be as useful.

@Myana @ianthealy I've had good editors and bad. Mostly the folks at newspapers were excellent. Tech writing, almost all good. The proofreader at the legal company was so horrific I almost withdrew the book because she had no idea about black letter law.

I have a lot of editing skills. Prefer not to self-edit that much. Do have friends with the skills. AI is something I'm exploring but I'm careful with it because it can do wonky things.

@Myana I have learned how to edit over the years. It’s one of those things where I trained on the job essentially and I can do a lot of the elements that are editing. But quite frankly, I am happy enough to have a machine show me your suggestions and then I can shake them or leave them as I choose. Of course that’s pretty much the way I take editors anyway. I have had one editor, but I said I am taking the story away from you if you make me have the character get nude. That’s not the story.

@WestofMars I talk to people who are pensioners and they don’t have the money and they’re never gonna have the money and they’re not gonna save up the money because they don’t have the money to save up. Some of them only get a computer to use at the local library. They’re lucky to have a little USB drive so you’re not losing any money from them because there is no way that they ever going to pay you anything. I know people who are living on $700 a month and it’s all used up.

@J_Windrow That may be their circumstance, but it does not negate the fact that AI will not help them write a better book.