How I use AI

As of 16 May 2024

I use AI primarily for research and summarising. I do not subscribe to any leading LLM providers, and I openly switch between the free versions of Claude, Chat GPT, and Gemini. I also use Perplexity—Perplexity is a dedicated research assistant— it always returns its sources, which is essential for fact-checking. I still use Google Search, but avoiding spam is becoming increasingly difficult.

All written content, including emails, sentences, paragraphs, and comments, is composed entirely by me, without AI-generated text substitutions.

Why am I telling you this now?

Given the increasing prevalence of AI tools, some may question the authenticity of anyone’s writing. That's why I wanted to address this matter directly, offer assurances, and explain my unconventional path to writing.

I had no formal writing training. After finishing high school, it was cricket, cricket, and more cricket. First as a player, then coach, and now, coach/commentator/writer

I enjoy writing; why else would you invest the time and effort?

On the flip-side, I don't always enjoy quips that poke fun at me, "Obviously you are using AI to help write your columns." It’s understandable given my path to this, still, it does kick you in the guts.

Often, the jibes comes from people I know, and I understand they are, in the main, joking around. Still, I wanted to make clear my position on this. Hopefully, this does.

Experienced writers are like gnarly cricketers; it's hard to get help/advice from them. The only two pieces I have managed to glean both hold true:

“Read more than you write and write as often as possible.” This is what I intend to do.

If anything changes in the future, I'll update at this address:

Have a great day, and thank you for supporting me.

Nick