Writer's note 05/09/23: Since this blog post was written, writing AI has changed and improved drastically through programs like ChatGPT and other AI models. Some information in this blog post may be outdated or inaccurate.
Jasper.ai is a writing tool we use pretty regularly here at Frank. Aside from being a general content improver, Jasper artificial intelligence is capable of writing Amazon product descriptions, entire blog posts, social media captions, and so much more. We typically use it to help with writer's block or SEO work, but we’ve never tested its full abilities.
Just to give you a quick rundown, Bramework says, “An AI writer or artificial intelligence writer is an application that is capable of writing all types of content.” These tools work just like any other AI, by compiling information from existing writing content and learning from it. The AI searches for patterns, common practices, and relevant examples to create something new based on your input. It searches the internet for examples to come back with a new, generated result and relies on user feedback to determine the accuracy of its outputs.
But, it’s not perfect.
As it stands now, AI writing is more of a tool for improving and supplementing your writing, not replacing the writer altogether. If you’ve ever worked with a content generation AI like Dalle or Midjourney, you’ll know what we’re talking about. Just like art generation AI can’t make certain things like faces or correct spelling, writing AI comes up short in a few categories. When you’re using it, you can expect to see misplaced punctuation, strange grammar, or other little slip-ups. This is because right now, AI writing cannot learn the nuance of language, it can only learn writing from writing that already exists. Along with beautifully written poems and thesis statements, the AI is also reading grammar mistakes and strange compilations of text that exist online. It picks up the good and the bad, which can skew the results. Many AI models also rely on outdated information, as it is difficult for AI development companies to access real-time, updated information. Having large banks of information to pull from is a great strength for AI, but it can also be a weakness. That's why user feedback is so important to AI improving in the future.
With that being said, some Jasper tools work better than others. The shorter the content, the better AI seems to work and understand your input.
So, long story short, AI isn’t going to steal our jobs… yet.
Short answer? Just about anything, but it’s better at some things than others.
We already talked about how Jasper can write short-form content like social media captions fairly well but lacks when it comes to longer bodies of text. We wanted to test something different though, the age-old question surrounding AI: Can AI replace human creativity?
We put this to the test using Jasper’s personal bio writer.
The Jasper personal bio writer has one of the longest input fields at an 800-character limit to prompt the AI. I filled it out as follows:
Bailey. 22. advertising degree. graphic designer. oklahoma. pet hamster named oso. favorite color is purple. has a lot of house plants. favorite video game is skyrim. loves korean food. loves to go skiing in new mexico. hates milk.
Tone of voice: (left blank)
Point of view: Third person
I kept it short and sweet and filled out the field as the website prompted me to, using short blurbs separated by periods. This is what Jasper gave me:
Bailey is a 22-year-old graphic designer from Oklahoma. She graduated with an advertising degree and has been working in the field for a few years now. Bailey's favorite color is purple, and she has a lot of house plants because she loves nature and greenery. Her favorite video game is Skyrim, and she loves Korean food. Bailey also enjoys skiing in New Mexico during her free time. Unfortunately, she hates milk--but that doesn't stop her from enjoying all other aspects of life!
Wow… I’m impressed! Aside from beefing up my work experience and making it seem like I have enough money to go skiing all the time, the way the AI created a personality for the bio and filled in the gaps is pretty insane. It recognized the uncapitalized proper nouns in my input and corrected them. The AI didn’t just add grammar to my short blurbs, though, it expanded on why I like certain things and added more context.
Of course, the AI doesn’t actually know why I have a lot of house plants, it pulled that from the examples it found online. Based on my feedback, though, I can tell Jasper that that addition to the text was a good move, and the AI learns and improves upon that.
(Also, I said I hate milk, not that my milk hatred makes my life miserable. I will not be milk-hater-shamed by a robot).
A couple more funny sentences Jasper gave me:
Bailey also has a pet hamster named Oso and an advertising degree from Oklahoma State University.
Sorry, no OSU degree, I don’t look good in orange (sorry, Frank).
Her favorite color is purple, and she has quite a few houseplants because of it.
I WISH houseplants were purple! I thought this was a funny little mistake on Jasper’s part. In this instance, it drew a connection between two ideas that don’t have much to do with each other. It’s like a little reminder that the AI actually has no idea what the world is really like, it only sees the world through the lens of what we write!
So, what did we learn?
AI cannot replace a human writer just yet, but I don’t think that means it isn’t useful. When I run parts of this blog post through Jasper later, I won’t be doing it to see if it can write my blog post for me. Right now, AI writing is a tool for inspiration and finding alternative ways to word things.
An AI is like a database. Jasper gives you content based on a large amount of writing from everywhere. In a way, it’s like condensing a ton of knowledge and giving outputs based on what knowledge helps you the most.
If you’re a student or a copywriter, Jasper seems like a pretty good tool to have under your belt. It can’t add the personal touches that make your writing unique, and it does make mistakes sometimes. But, it’s a great tool for finding new ways to write things and switching up your workflow.
Until Jasper figures out that plants aren’t purple and respects my hatred for milk, I think it’s safe to say AI isn’t out to steal our jobs just yet.
