After over decade from when I first started writing on the sofa in the early hours, I am making the decision to stop writing anything for public viewing. This is little more than a vanity exercise of sorts as I never really had readers, but if anyone does come across it, I think it's important to see that something which was always hard to break into is now impossible to maintain any presence in.
The recent furore over Alex Preston's freelance ties being severed with the NYT because of an AI-enhanced (and allegedly unknowingly plagiarised) review was the final straw. It isn't that I am against the idea of being empathetic to fuck-ups, but his handling by an editor (and a stellar one at that) who questioned why he did it was not only soft, but neglected to ask serious questions such as 'what was your (AI) prompt'. The response to why was a vague one: feeling overwhelmed, he asked an AI tool (unknown) to 'expand and smooth' the under-count review, along with style adjustments. Why does it matter? Because that's the most honest thing you could show: what your intent was via your instructions.
My deep frustration comes from two things. One, all writers experience difficulty with reviews. You struggle with what to write sometimes, how to phrase it. It doesn't matter how short or long the piece. But this is precisely what writing is about, perhaps more so as a reviewer when what you write about is someone else's writing. Two, if you find you simply cannot do your job, then find the honest way to get out of it. This means going to your editor and either asking for an extension, or sucking up your pride and admitting you can't fulfil your responsibility. I cannot imagine there isn't a writer who hasn't done one or the other. Be honest with yourself and others.
But Alex Preston didn't. He chose to cheat. It matters little to me whether he used AI, got another person to do it, or any other way one can cheat in such circumstances. I have been genuinely shocked at the first response of the UK side of the industry to be sympathetic to the point of dismissal: I know him, he's a good guy, look at what he's done for literature. You can be and do all those things and still cheat. A weak moment? So it seems, at the least. But cheating it is, and the ultimate problem with what he did comes down to how this affects the hundreds of freelance reviewers (of which I was one), not what happens (or not) to him.
You see, Alex is a known commodity. It appears from the outpouring of sympathy at higher levels that this will not prevent him from getting work. What it will do is prevent everyone else from getting work, because now that the AI risk is out of the box in reviewing in this high-visibility way, editors will shut out more unknown pitches from freelancers, stick to commissioning from trusted sources or friends of sources.
I was given my first opportunities by editors who didn't know me, where I had nothing to offer but my writing. No connections, no name, no platform. I took those opportunities and did my utmost. Did I have issues along the way? Of course. My very first review, I essentially got my arse handed to me in edits (by the above-mentioned editor, no less). I had to rewrite the entire thing. The editor was gracious but firm. And for a moment, I considered digging a hole in the garden and burying myself in it. Saying it was all a mistake, I shouldn't have tried, I was out of my depth, I shouldn't continue, sorry to be a letdown and an embarassment. I let myself be overwhelmed for a good couple hours, then got on with the job. And it was fine. My second draft was taken with minimal edits, and published.
What was rare will become extinct. Alex Preston has, whether he wants to admit it or not, given an already difficult industry the excuse it needs to not bother with anyone they do not know, and give passes to those they do. Perhaps in some cases this is warranted. What happens to Alex is what happens to him, and I have no doubt if he didn't think about what the ramifications were, he is now. I have no wish to see him out of writing, but it also seems unlikely there will be any consequences bar his temporary embarassment, if he does indeed feel that. But it does strike me as curious that given the frenzy over 'AI BAD', that the first major example in book reviewing has been dealt with as if it were no big deal, that AI was in fact leading the writer astray. I can't help but feel that if this were an unknown reviewer, there would be no outpouring of empathy and wishes for them to come out right in the end.
As I said, Alex Preston made the choice to be dishonest, and dishonesty is the heart of the matter, not how he went about it; that is a distraction from the point no matter how much you want to pillory AI. But other freelancers will be the ones to pay.
What this left me with was the feeling that, as someone who strove to be honest and have some integrity in how I went about anything in literature (fully aware I lost opportunities as a result of not playing the game and with no regrets), why should I continue to try, given that the message is clear that it isn't valued? I've never stayed somewhere where I felt I was wasting my time. I also worked hard to do the things I did in writing; more than that, I loved writing about books as much as I love reading them. It's natural one wants to feel of value and fulfilled, if only unto themselves. This is especially important in an industry where ego is rampant. I woke up today feeling that there was no longer any value nor fulfilment in continuing to write to publish. I think that's a good time to say goodbye, don't you?