There was a forum on Artificial Intelligence (AI) held recently at the Blackbox Theater of the Cultural Center of the Philippines in celebration of the 2023 PEN Philippines Congress. It was a discussion about how AI affects writers—literary and commercial—as well as students.

Academic professionals lament the fact that more students are increasingly turning to AI for help with their school requirements. This is impossible to police, one panelist said. It takes away the integrity of the work and encourages laziness, mediocrity, and inaccuracy.

Many literary writers don’t find AI useful, aside from some assistance with copyediting and general research.

The biggest impact is felt by the commercial writers, those who rely on the craft for their livelihood. In fact, there are clients who have already replaced human talents in favor of robots as they are able to work faster and are, in fact, much cheaper to maintain. These clients don’t discriminate too much about quality—as AI outputs are usually lacking in some aspects when compared with human creation. Aside from that, their needs are basic, tasks that can be done by AI and don’t require the human touch. Job displacement, nonetheless, is a very real threat.

Aside from the preparation and adjustment that creatives have to do to remain relevant and in demand, the government and civil society organizations have a big role to play in ensuring that technology helps more than disrupts.

For its part, the government needs to delve deeper and more seriously into the issues surrounding AI so it can develop and implement policies and guidelines for all stakeholders. It was brought up during the forum that regulation of this gray space may not be totally possible at this time as countries outside of the Philippines are similarly struggling to make sense of things. However, this does not mean that those who are in a position to make a difference should be paralyzed into inaction.

Take, for instance, the case of the striking members of the Writers Guild of America (WGA). Aside from the basic issues of better pay and better working conditions, one of their demands was the limitation on the use of AI in tasks that might take opportunities away from them. In the absence of a strong alliance in our country, the workers are not prepared to address the same issue should this blow up on local shores. Writers’ guilds, associations, and coalitions, therefore, need to be empowered and supported by the government, the creators themselves, and the industry in general.

A final word: Creatives must get their act together and strengthen their rank so they can defend each other and protect their livelihood. The rise of AI is inevitable, it is better to prepare for it instead of getting stuck in the old ways. As Darwin said, it is not the strongest or the most intelligent that survives, but the one most adaptable to change.