The Creator's Heresy On Artistry's Future of Digitization:
A Treatise on Digital Narration & Generative Graphic Design

First, to clarify: the stories here are mine. I want to make that abundantly clear. AI is terrible at creating storylines. Every sentence is built the same, words are overused and the content it writes is not just formulaic...it's also very, very bad. I would like to preface the following statements with this one:

Every word here is a weird little slithering thing that clawed its way out from somewhere deep inside me. I know better than to ask from where. I write because I love to write, and I do not, and will not use AI to write my narratives for me...and nor do I consider AI a threat to creation in the way that so many unadaptable creators do.

I strive to streamline my process because I am human. I am flawed, disorganized, and forever chasing efficiency. I'm not afraid to adapt to an ever-changing world, though many are. They're framing it all wrong. New technology is simply the birth of different tools. It's here to stay. You evolve, or you fade.

AI cannot write the way I write, nor would I want it to try. It cannot summon the awful writhing creations moving within my head, but it can spot my errors, my cloudy phrasing, the little scars I miss because I'm too close to the work.

I say all this to preface the following statement regarding the use of digital narration you are likely to find on this website moving forward:

Stories should reach as many ears as they do eyes. It is not good at writing, but it does a fine job reading and I am unbothered by opinions to the contrary. More people would rather listen to my stories than spend time reading them. I would rather listen to something than spend time reading it...and I am not going to record myself reading the things I write for a number of reasons...

Don't think of my decision to use AI narration as a shortcut. This audio is an intentional bridge. It lets more people enter the dark hallways I build: readers with low vision, restless minds, the neurodivergent, the busy and the bored, or those who find comfort in sound instead of text.

The voices you hear in the podcast episodes and attached as narrations to my newest tales are artificial. I am not presenting them otherwise. I choose not to speak for myself for several reasons. I dislike my voice, and my persistent stutter would turn narration into a time-consuming ordeal, defeating its purpose of preference, inclusivity, and accessibility. This doorway exists for readers who struggle with focus, blindness, or patience. Even the lazy. All are welcome.

If the sound of the machines unsettles you, ask yourself why. What is it about progress that makes so many feel threatened? These words are mine. They came out of my head as they always have. I see no problem letting a motherboard give them voice. If you do, I don't understand why. I wrote these words, not you. How I choose to present them shouldn't occupy your time. That behavior is exceedingly odd, come to think of it.

Some prefer stories told aloud; others need them that way. If the inclusion of these narrations offends you, remember this: you are welcome here, but I do not make anything for you alone. The text sits below the player, unchanged. No one, certainly not me, is forcing you to listen. I create this space for many. For a moment, consider those who benefit from my choice.

What matters is that the stories live. I am simply providing the charge of electricity that brings their voices to life.

A secondary statement regarding the use of AI generated imagery on this website:

While we are peeling back the veil, let me offer one more transparency: I am also a skilled graphic designer with over twenty years of Photoshop experience. In my earlier incarnations, I spent countless hours crafting branding material for individuals and small businesses. I have crafted over a dozen book covers for small publishers and I did so with tireless care...as a habit formed of my years spent building the visual brands of others, you will notice that I have a visual brand and style of my very own. Each of my original stories posted here on scottsavino.com is accompanied by a featured image.  They have been crafted carefully to fit the tale to which they are paired. Aesthetics are integral to my personal brand, and while I am wholly capable of crafting every one of these visuals from scratch myself...hand-painting, tracing, cropping and editing them the way I did for decades...I don't spend as much of my time doing such things anymore.

I now choose, quite purposefully and with complete lack of apology for my choices to embrace the ability of AI to streamline my visuals here as well.

You may believe this to be a form of laziness. Go fuck yourself. It's a form of liberation. Pure and simple.

My focus is on writing. My time is better spent garnering new followers through effective storytelling and giving wretched birth to narratives no one asked for but I now force them to endure. I will not apologize for choosing to use tools that saves me hours as well as my sanity.

There are those of you who, a small but loud contingent who decry anything created by an AI as the enemy of art itself...but what you don't seem to realize is that professional graphic designers, people who even you would agree are artists, have long stolen and manipulated images found via Google searches. They've twisted and altered the formatting, translated and recolored them just enough so as not to be caught in the act. Artists conducting outright acts of theft is not a new concept. It is simply now automated. At least the algorithm builds from the things is learned and creates something entirely new. Before the goal was just to ensure you'd changed the source images enough that nobody would possibly notice you'd done it. We were already doing this. The stealing was already happening. The machines may have been trained using the work of artists without the artists' consent, but at least the machines are using that training to create things that are entirely new, rather than changing something stolen from elsewhere. And they are much, much faster at all of this than we can ever hope to be.

This is matter of fact that is not even being hidden at this point: Photoshop itself has AI built into the very structure of its latest iteration. You can lazily draw a circle and tell it to generate objects from nothing within. Conjuring objects into images that were never there moments earlier. This is now an accepted aspect of a digital artist's workflow.

And so, I will repeat myself for those still clutching at their pearls...
You either evolve or you fade.

AI helps me maintain my strange, specific and cohesive visual brand and it does that shit fast as fuck boi and because of this, I will continue to use it. I do not care if that bothers you. There are enough people unbothered by it that I have little concern on external opinions of the use of these new highly efficient tools.

My time is better spent writing...
And write I shall.

--Scott