Authors face backlash for participation in 2022 Google AI study

The 'Shameful 13' include speculative fiction luminaries Ken Liu and Robin Sloan.

In the spring of 2022, Google began reaching out to a series of writers, including award-winning science-fiction authors and New York Times bestsellers, for feedback on an experimental writing tool. Four years later, their participation has corners of the literary world up in arms.

Google researchers knew at the time that they were approaching a breakthrough point with large language models (LLMs). DeepMind, the company's AI division, was internally testing a natural language generation model called LaMDA which had demonstrated emergent writing capabilities. That model would eventually form the basis for Google Gemini. An internal study was launched to determine whether AI could serve as a brainstorming assistant, researcher or writing collaborator for professional writers.

DeepMind was among other things the incubation site for Magenta, an arts-focused research project for open-source machine learning tools, mostly known for building digital music plugins for Ableton Live. Its focus on the humanities made Magenta a natural home for the study, which was dubbed the Wordcraft Writers Workshop.

Thirteen writers were recruited to the so-called workshop, put under strict nondisclosure agreements and told they'd be given access to a "magic text editor" called Wordcraft, which was actually a writing-centric interface for LaMDA. One of the participating authors Engadget spoke with described the program as resembling Microsoft Word with a chatbot on the side. Each participant was given eight weeks to write a short story, using the LLM for any purpose and leveraging its outputs as much or as little as they pleased. At least one author ended up using no AI-generated text whatsoever. The resulting stories were published on Magenta's website alongside a white paper from the researchers.

In the time between the white paper's publication and now, public sentiment on AI — especially within creative professions — has shifted dramatically. Which is why, when Lily Lachance came across the Wordcraft website earlier this month, allegedly while browsing Codex, an exclusive online forum for professional speculative fiction authors, she was shocked.

Lachance is an author and self-described "anti-gen-AI absolutist," and on August 6, she posted a link to the Wordcraft study on her Bluesky profile. "This just in," the since-deleted post about a four-year-old study began, "13 professional writers teamed up with Google's AI slop engine (WordCraft) to write a story each, helping legitimize the plagiarism machine. Never going to read anything by them again. I hope the money was worth it, you bunch of clowns." (Participants in the Wordcraft Writers Workshop declined to tell Engadget how much they were compensated for the study; Google has not responded to a request for comment.)

The reactions were immediate, and Lachance's post quickly made the rounds among Bluesky's bookish users. Many bemoaned the participation of beloved authors in the Wordcraft study, while others threatened to boycott the works of all 13. "I'll even name and shame," one user whose account is followed by a number of prominent genre writers posted , alongside a list of participants whom they had labeled "The 'authors' who have betrayed all Creatives." The list format proved popular, and a number of other users also shared the names along with their own various decrials and epithets.