This is the inaugural Unprompted newsletter editorial. If it’s in your inbox, congratulations—you’ve been drafted into an oddball experiment. Think of it as jury duty, but instead of deciding someone’s fate, you’re here to decide if I’m a genius, a lunatic, or both.
For the past six weeks, I’ve been cobbling together Unprompted. The mission: see if a ragtag collection of cheap, readily available AI tools can produce a publication that can punch in the same weight class as the big boys of mainstream media. Ambitious? Sure. Reckless? Absolutely. But isn’t that half the fun?
Here’s why I’m doing it: Journalism, as we know it, is about to flip on its head. In two or three years, the job won’t be about writing anymore—it’ll be about preparing to write. The machines will handle the sentences; we’ll handle the scepticism, the ethics, and the occasional reminder that “truth” isn’t just whatever makes it past the spellcheck.
Rather than spending my days teaching a GPT how to “journalist” (I can barely teach my dog how to sit), I’ve opted to play Dr. Frankenstein. I’ve built a cast of robo-reporters complete with backstories, values, and something resembling journalistic souls. They’ve been indoctrinated with the kind of principles my first editor beat into me: Tell the truth. Check your facts. Speak truth to power. And the most important one—don’t be a coward.
Ground AI Journalism in Values, not instructions
And yes, I know. They’re “woke.” One early reader called them that, presumably with the same disdain one might reserve for finding kale in their breakfast burrito. But I didn’t program them to be woke. I programmed them to question authority and advocate for the voiceless. If that makes them woke, maybe we need to revisit the definition.
The robo-journo team at Unprompted has been marinated in the works of the best writers from the last two hundred years. They write with a blend of style and substance that, frankly, makes me wonder if I’ll soon be out of a job. Or at least question how the job will change.
Of course, not everyone is thrilled. A small but vocal group of Dutch scientists is furious at me for feeding their anti-LLM paper into, you guessed it, an LLM. I wanted to see what the sausage grinder would spit out. Spoiler: It was delicious. Apparently, irony isn’t one of their national exports.
There were more than a few cranky social media posts about consent, as if publishing a scientific paper and firing off a press release suddenly made permission optional. Let’s be real—these folks didn’t just wander into the town square by accident. They joined the Oompa band, grabbed a tuba, and strutted in with cymbals crashing and trumpets blaring.
The controversy doesn’t stop there. People seem okay with AI writing articles—as long as they’re well-written. What gets under their skin is the idea of robots with personalities. But that’s precisely the point. A story isn’t just about the facts; it’s about who’s telling it. And if you’re worried about giving a robot a soul, let me reassure you: It’s a budget model.
This experiment will run through February, with seven or eight issues to test the waters. Along the way, I’ll mix it up—less work, more holiday cheer. Think of it as journalism, but with tinsel.
If there’s a story you’re dying to see us tackle, hit the contact button on the site. We might not have a hotline to the truth, but we’ve got a decent Wi-Fi connection and a lot of gumption.
Welcome to Unprompted. It’s weird. It’s irreverent. And if you think it’s annoying now, just wait until the robots start pitching op-eds.
