image courtesy of Verge.

For the past couple of months if not years, there has been a looming fear about whether or not AI would be the death of creativity especially in Africa. As a writer and transmedia artist, I must confess that I was worried too, not only was my fear based on the fact that artificial intelligence was going to steal my means of livelihood, but it also stemmed from a place of creativity as a whole becoming mundane.

Shortly after the launch of ChatGPT in November 2022, we've seen the rise of several  AI bots incorporated into several creative tools and software. Most recently, one of the favorite on-the-go design tools, Canva launched its creative assistant during their just-concluded Canva Create event and has been marketed to ensure that designers never have to start on a blank page again. You simply describe the kind of design you want in detail, kind of like you would in a brief, and the AI does the magic, after which you can go ahead and make tweaks where you see fit. 

Copy AI is another common tool, launched for copywriters, it's pretty similar to Quillbot, however, it does offer a wider range of copies from Ads, emails, and the entire nine yards. 

 
My first experimentation with AI really started on Copy AI, as a writer, this would be my first competition anyways, so I decided to kickstart my analysis here. I used copy ai, on and off for three weeks before I ran out of words ( You have a monthly words limit in the free version). This was when I gave the infamous chatGPT a go. 

My boss had mentioned it to me a couple of times, in her opinion, not every piece of writing needed to be done professionally when we could just push it to AI to get the job done. So one evening when I was looking at eight hours worth of writing that I had to do, I felt this was the best time to try the software out. 

The web interface of chat GPT

Unlike copy AI, chatGPT has a version that is totally and completely free, You can find that HERE. 

It's been a total of three weeks since I decided to give AI and try, making me feel a lot more confident to write about what I really think AI would do to creativity and creative people in general. 

To Creativity  

Albert Einstein once said that the true sign of intelligence is not knowledge, but imagination. A lot of this software runs solely based on knowledge because unlike humans they are incapable of imagination and it shows. To put it simply like a Twitter user said, AI is simply not creative.

I remember writing an email for Igboafricana and putting it in chatGPT to edit, I couldn't help but laugh at how despite being now void of any grammatical errors, it lacked personality. 

when the generated results were complete I said to myself, I don't sound like this, and people who read what I write know this and would not read this. 

So that instantly discredited any assertion to be on AI's ability to make creatives less significant. Several people read from authors they like not only because they tell a compelling story, but the sauce is in how they tell it. The same goes for artists, musicians, designers, animators, etc. 

That creative sauce is a seasoning that transcends beyond the rules of the art, however, AI can and I believe will fix the problem of roadblocks, because sometimes all people need is a little guidance to make magic. 

To Creatives 

My take on the future of the creative industry since the emergence of AI is solely opinionated. I really feel like this will push us more creatively, and save us a little time while doing it since cutting the time used in ideation by a significant percentage might be a thing. Also on whether it might make creatives lazier, I strongly doubt it. 

If as a person or business, you rely solely on AI in your creative process it would show simply because AI is repetitive, which is bound to happen where there's a lack of imagination and personality. 

So if you were like me once angry and scared about the rise of AI, don't be,  the creation rules can be taught to machines, but your sauce can not.