The Future Role of Computers in Writing Entertainment in Game Development

#1

The Role of Computers in Writing - According to a report(Harnessing Automation in the Future ) by management consultant McKinsey (experts in Automation) the future role of computers in writing is as follows:
Writers and Authors
13% of your job can be done by a robot
Your job is safer than 85.4% of jobs
Tasks a robot can do
• Train others on work processes
• Write material for artistic or entertainment purposes
Tasks a robot can’t do
• Coordinate artistic activities
• Collaborate with others to prepare or perform artistic productions
• Promote products, activities, or organizations
• Confer with clients to determine needs
• Discuss production content and progress with others
• Collaborate with others in marketing activities
• Present work to clients for approval
• Write advertising or promotional material
• Conduct research to inform art, designs, or other work
• Determine presentation subjects or content
• Develop promotional strategies or plans
• Edit written materials
• Monitor current trends
• Obtain copyrights or other legal permissions
• Conduct market research

This is what experts say computers can and can not take over in writing. Yet, in my day-to-day experience I am finding that some of what they say can be done isn’t and some of what they say can’t be done is being done by the computer.

Let’s take • Edit written materials and examine it closer. There are spell checkers and grammar aids galore in our world, many of us use these tools and have shared resources for this type of specific automation of work. So, if what I see as every day and obvious allready being done, why do the experts in the field of automation feel the opposite? Is it because the level of automation has peaked and what we have today will be the pinnacle achieved 100 years from now?

I think their claim that computer automation could take over the writing of entertainment worries me the most - Can a computer automate the CoG guidelines and come out with an entertainment product as good as our human authors currently produce? Or is it possible, that it is because humans break such formulas and rules that entertainment writing is accomplished?

Will computers be churning out If games 10 years from now?

These are the people that our societies are relying upon for road-maps of future investments and training, education and governmental support - are they on to something that will cause the human writer to disappear from producing entertainment products and regulate us to be editors for computer writers?

#2

Robots can do anything.
Just ask Bender.

bender.jpg750x670 56.5 KB

#3

I think this would be possible for a self-learning AI whose intelligence is equal to or surpasses human intelligence. At that point, I think the AI would be able to do everything in the can’t do category. Just going to put this here too:

#4

Lel. I finished watching a Horizon LP, and then stumbled upon this thread thinking
"Nope. Robots gonna do 'em all"

Anyway, as long as real human can’t code a binary code to have a heart and feelings, I don’t think robots/AI/computers can really take over the job of human.

#5

In the future humans probably won’t have to code in binary. In fact, look at what Google is looking to achieve. Just putting that out there.

I think you’re looking for soul and self-awareness and what it means to have them. Emotions are merely chemical reactions in the brain; I’d argue it’s the expression of said emotions that matter. If you haven’t already, I’d recommend reading Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? and watching Blade Runner.

#6

There’s more to editing than checking for grammar and spelling. An editor or a beta-reader also needs to keep things like cultural context, idiom, stylistic concerns, and proofreading based on “higher level” factors like consistency-of-tense, plotting, setting, continuity errors, and tense.

Comparing a computer-edited piece of work to one done by a good copy-editor is like the difference between feeding text into Google Translate and giving it to a decent localiser.

#7

Thank you for your contribution - the thing is, I am not (and the authors of the study are not either) comparing any automation effort to complete replacement.

Before modern grammar checkers and spell-checkers, a copyist had to be employed in a news room to oversee every minute detail of the reporter pool. At 50 cents a day, the cost effectiveness for the newspaper in question is so large that the value-added far outweighs not having the expert copyist.

Now, the cost effectiveness of adding such a human copyist for the same details are not. Fewer specialist Copyists are employed and only utilized for the complex issues detailed out in your post. Part of a human filled job is now automated. Automation is able to replace their efforts on the non-complex processes and save on the most expensive cost of production.

During the 2000’s, it was more cost effective to move localization efforts from home countries to newly European Union orientated Eastern European countries such as Poland and Hungary. The same process playing out but utilizing human resources newly made available.

The authors of this study don’t see the ability of our current tech to evolve to the point that it will be able to fully automate the editorial work. I take it from your post, neither do you. Each higher-level factor of a job can, if the automation tech evolves, become more automated over time.

I guess, I see this possibility as more probable for the editorial type of process then the creative and artistic process of actual writing an original piece of writing. Perhaps not in my life but based on what exists, I see tasks such as editing for local cultural context becoming automated before I see Big Blue tech writing the next great Shakespearean play.

The authors of this report see today’s tech and its ability to evolve and they claim the creative process of writing for entertainment will be eventually automated. I’m not clear from you post if you agree or disagree with this.

#8

Personally, I consider editorial work as personal and “creative” as writing fiction. Every editor has their personal biases, idiosyncrasies, and preferred styles. They may choose to replace one sort of work with another sort of word, and the conversations authors have with editors (or beta-readers) help the process along immensely. Each editor has their personal stamp, and although automated editors may become more and more proficient at imitating this sort of thing, I still think most professional authors will prefer working with proofreading and feedback which comes from people they can interact on a person-to-person basis with.

Honestly, I think the day that human editors become obsolete, we’ll probably have the tech for AI authors as well.

#9

I totally agree - now to complete one of those duties of my own now involving some musty crypts…