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| February 2025 |
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| ChatGPT spelled out in Scrabble tiles |
For those of us who actually read, the output of ChatGPT and similar LLMs is not exactly something to write home about. Unless you know how to prompt it and train it to write in a truly readable style, it will default to the worst of wordy, opaque corporate style text.
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You know what sounds exactly like this? Cover letters you ask ChatGPT to compose for you.
I've tried those out a few times and never been happy with the results because they always sounds like the text above. Trying to tell it to sound less stiff doesn't make it sound any less canned, and forget about getting it to copy my own writing style.
It's possible that Kerri used ChatGPT to create her "About" section. Given that she's been in the marketing biz for some time, though, I'd think she had to have had something filled out for years before ChatGPT was available, and it likely sounded very much like this even if she did let some LLM or something like Grammarly tweak it for her.
People like Kerri, who ignore all writing advice from the masters like Orwell, White (watch for a upcoming blog about him), and others made this the public face of corporate communication who are to blame for the bombastic and soulless style that LLMs replicate at scale.
That's the reason for this apology too ChatGPT for mocking its output. You're not the one at fault. You had no way of knowing better. Humans do, and they should have provided you with better models for writing.
Note on the title: I thought of giving this post the title "Apology" intended in the classical sense of a defense or justification for something others take as wrong with the hint of an apology to AI. Knowing that that wouldn't be clear to some readers, I opted to make this just a straight apology instead.
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Some of the work I do for clients extends to drafting Letters of Introduction (LOI) for them to use as a cold email or introduction on LinkedIn. The general principles behind crafting such letters is to keep them brief (like five sentences long), focused on the interests of the receiving party, and not to attempt to sell on the spot.
Rarely do people get all the above right. Instead of starting with LOIs to ease into gauging interests, they tend to move directly into pitches, and many of those are the opposite of intriguing.
I recently put up a post on LinkedIn about red flags in cold pitches. Someone seems to have mistaken that as an invitation. Today I saw an Inmail that ticks most of the boxes for how not to message me.
This message came from someone who describes himself as a content writer and ghostwriter hitting up someone who also offers exactly those services for potential work. Here's the screenshot:
The person claiming writing expertise already gets everything he could get wrong in just the opening with "Hello Mr. Ariella Phd."
I have 3 strong objections plus one more nitpicky one.
1. Why assume Mr.?
2. Why not use my last name that is listed before the the PhD?
3. Why show that you don't know what a PhD means by treating it as a last name and not using it to come up with a gender-neutral title of Dr.?
4. In direct address, you really should have a comma between the Hello and the name. I know very few people bother with that for emailed messages, but a professional writer should still know that.
It doesn't really get better after that. After the "Good Day!" greeting, the writer goes on to say, "I'm asking for a few seconds of your valuable time to offer my content writing expertise in your endeavor to keep the industry thriving."
1. You can't literally mean just a few seconds of my time, as that wouldn't suffice for your pitch.
2. What do you think is my "endeavor," and which industry do you have in mind with the definite article?
The next sentence is: "It will be my pleasure to get the chance for a progressive discussion with you."
Of course it will be your pleasure. You're the one reaching out to me to try to pitch your services, so you assume it will be beneficial -- "progressive" not the right word in this context -- for you. But that's hardly a point to convince me to hear you.
Needless to say, I didn't respond.
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be. Only one standing in your way is yourself.And Jan wrote:We should agree to disagree and give the current administration 2 full years to show American just what they will do for us. I may not have liked prior Presidents but I never wished harm on our working people. After 2 years, THEN speak up and change things with the Mid-Terms. However, I believe we will see our economy turn around over the next 6 months and no one will want to change anything! It's only been 5-6 weeks...... Wish for the BEST for our Country! We the People have spoken with our votes
What does the data show?
Everybody lies with visualizations