Authentic Composition

We are experiencing a crisis of authenticity as the rise of generative artificial intelligence (AI) encourages us to delegate our voices and creative expression to machines.

I hereby declare that everything I say, write, draw, play, present, or publish under my own name is authentically composed by me, Steve Kobes, a human. None of it is generated by AI.

Yes — even the em dashes.

Just to be clear, I’m not saying “Never touch AI for any reason.” Used with caution, AI can be a pretty good research assistant. It can even be a better search engine than traditional search engines. I use AI chatbots to gather ideas and discover things. What I don’t do, and what I wish we’d all stop doing, is

• copy-pasting the AI’s words into that email, document, blog post, etc. you are sharing with another human, and
• letting an AI act as your “agent”, doing things in the world pretending to be you.

When we act or express ourselves through AI, it erodes our individuality and our humanity. Stand against slop!

Further reading and cautionary tales:

• Sam Kriss, “Why Does A.I. Write Like… That?”, New York Times Magazine, Dec. 21, 2025 (link requires subscription).
• Scott Shambaugh, “An AI Agent Published a Hit Piece on Me” (Feb. 12, 2026).
• Vincent Driessen, “15+ years later, Microsoft morged my diagram” (Feb. 18, 2026).