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Oliver Pickup, Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief, Pickup_andWebb
In an era where AI spews out content trained on content trained on content, authentic human voices are the last defence against a downward spiral of mediocrity.
That's why, at Pickup_andWebb, we use AI tools to augment processes to scale content and achieve efficiencies, but never – ever – for writing our thought leadership. Because we know it is paramount to deliver trusted, high-quality articles that humans craft.
Moreover, through gathering expert viewpoints from far afield – and well beyond data lakes and trite opinions on which hungry AI algorithms feed – truly memorable, conversation-starting insights are gleaned.
Besides, the alternative – enlisting AI as the scribe – is lazy, generically bland, and obviously not human. It fails to capture the brand coherency, curiosity, and humanity that elevates content to make it interesting, inspiring, and influential.
As an award-winning technology and business journalist, I've had a front-row seat monitoring AI's development over the last decade. I use AI to be more efficient, with meeting and interview summaries, for instance. The extra time this opens up allows me to spend more time on what I'm best at: writing.
Any FOBO – the fear of becoming obsolete – I might have as a writer is quickly torpedoed because AI-generated writing is inherently average. As it's trained on existing content, it can only regurgitate what's already out there. It's the literary equivalent of painting by numbers – technically correct, sometimes, but soulless.
Consider this chilling prediction from Nina Schick, global authority on AI and author of Deepfakes: "By 2025, 90% of online content will be synthetic-AI generated."
Let that sink in, as Elon Musk might say.
By next year, nine out of ten pieces of content you consume will likely be churned out by machines learning from machines learning from machines. It's an avalanche of average that makes Musk's Twitter-X transformation look like a ripple in the content ocean.
Schick explained the importance of leadership authenticity at an Intuit MailChimp event in London, which I attended earlier this year. "Trust is huge because what you see happening in society, with the exponential rate of change, is a decline in trust in our political and public institutions," she stated. "Decades of research show that trust distils down to
three things. It's integrity, benevolence, and competence."
Integrity. Benevolence. Competence. We keep these words front of mind at Pickup_andWebb.
Authentic thought leadership requires something AI can't replicate: genuine human curiosity. It demands the ability to ask uncomfortable questions, challenge conventional wisdom, and connect seemingly unrelated dots in ways that spark insights and shape innovative thinking.