The Future of Ghostwriting in the Digital Age

Ghostwriting once seemed like a mysterious, behind-the-scenes business with nameless writers inventing copy that other people would get credit for.

Who were those writers? Nobody knew and nobody seemed to want to know, even though ghostwriting has produced everything from celebrity memoirs to political speeches.

Now, however, ghostwriters seem to be fast disappearing into the digital mist because of new technologies.

Some of the newest AI writing software can produce text that is almost indistinguishable from the work of human ghostwriters. Thanks to advances in AI, automated essay mills using GPT-4 and other AI models can produce readable, contextually sound text.

This raises questions. Are ghostwriters obsolete? Has the production of content generated by AI already reached a rate and scale no human can hope to rival?

Sentiment analysis, narrative story generation, and machines purporting to write human-sounding essays and articles now make up a thriving area of research on new applications. This research is achieving some success.

For example, human raters cannot reliably differentiate essays from GPT-4 and humans responding to GPT-4-generated articles. This proficiency results from the volume of examples AI computer systems can access from big datasets. These machines can quickly ‘read’ millions of news articles and scholarly treatises and grasp some of the intricacies of what connects them on an empirical level.

All of this may seem like a nightmare for people trying to make their living as a ghostwriter. There is, however, a silver lining.

A Silver Lining for Ghostwriters

While ghostwriters may feel threatened by the advances in AI technology, there is luckily another way for ghostwriters to view these advances—simply as new tools that can help them create higher quality content in less time.

While many still balk at the idea, the truth is that these tools can help with the entire writing process, from generating ideas to suggesting sentence structures to producing instant corrections to grammar and style.

As strange as this sounds, AI’s greatest strength—processing large bodies of text swiftly— is also its great weakness. While it does its automated job at amazing speeds, it is currently unable to truly understand and capture the complexities of human experience and feeling as a human writer can.

AI vs. Human Ghostwriters

The biggest difference between AI writing and human writing is that AI is constrained to work within the scope of its programming and data. It can produce content based on patterns or information it has encountered, but it cannot invent a unique new approach or extrapolate a pattern creatively.

Neither can an AI algorithm adapt and revise copy in response to ongoing discussions with a client. It cannot ask questions, dig deeper into topics, or respond dynamically to shifting client inclinations (including emotions) while writing.

Ghostwriters can question, probe, and follow subtle and not-so-subtle cues that help them capture the emotional nuances of a client’s story. Their empathy and intuition are crucial to producing a story that is human first, engaging, and sincerely personal.

It is here, where intelligence and creativity come together, that a human ghostwriter really shines. Writing an autobiography or memoir is not just about recounting incidents, but about building a narrative that readers can touch and feel.

Real-World Examples

There are plenty of popular and acclaimed autobiographies and memoirs that only made their powerful impacts thanks to the careful work of human ghostwriters. These writers stood by their principles, rewrote parts of manuscripts when necessary, and showed that human perspective and empathy cannot be replaced.

Here are a few examples:

Becoming by Michelle Obama

One of the most successful memoirs of recent years, Becoming (2018) by Michelle Obama was co-written by a human ghostwriter. Becoming is a deeply personal account of Michelle Obama’s early life, career, and years as First Lady of the United States.

Various aspects of its content could well have been produced by an AI, but it is the voice and emotional feel of the book, rather than its empirical accuracy, that truly engages readers. The human ghostwriter caught Michelle Obama’s voice and helped her draw book buyers into her life story, and the results speak for themselves.

Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs (2011) is as well-researched and as highly personal as a biography can get. When Isaacson tells us about Jobs’s sexual escapades and tangled love life, anger management issues, mercurial moods, hunger for privacy, and human frailty, we know he immersed himself in Jobs’s life. This is no mere record of reported conversations.

There’s no AI algorithm that could have navigated through the complex mazes of Jobs’s personality and relationships. It would never have grasped the nuances of reporting on these emotional aspects of a life.

Open by Andre Agassi

Andre Agassi’s Open (2009) is another fine example, ghostwritten (with J R Moehringer) under Agassi’s name. Few can dispute Open’s honesty, depth or impact, drawing from Agassi’s raw experience of learning to be professional on and off the tennis court.

The book enthralls readers through Moehringer’s use of Agassi’s authentic voice and revelation of his emotions. AI can’t falsify that.

The Ongoing Need for Human Ghostwriters

Instead of seeing AI as an enemy, ghostwriters can be more productive when they see it as a sidekick that supplements human capabilities to add speed and effectiveness.

AI can scan, read, and summarize vast quantities of information without missing any important details.

AI can help with preliminary outlines, too, by identifying consistent patterns of structure in similar works, and then proposing an outline for a document. This gives the ghostwriter a stronger starting position from which to exercise creativity.

AI can also help generate preliminary drafts by assembling suitable material from existing sources, using information provided by a ghostwriter. This, too, can be a huge time-saver, making a quick turnaround possible.

Furthermore, AI can simplify the editing process by reviewing a draft for grammar and style. Grammatical mistakes can be flagged and corrected, and stylistic recommendations provided. With these drudgeries off their backs, ghostwriters are free to spend more time on plot development and making sure their writing conveys the client’s voice and intent.

While AI can help with many steps in the writing process, another area where it still lags behind the human ghostwriter significantly is confidentiality. A ghostwriter is often privy to information of a deeply private nature; the client is putting their story in the writer’s hands. The very act of seeking someone else to write one’s story is an act of faith and allowing oneself to be vulnerable.

A human ghostwriter can be counted on to respect a confidentiality agreement and not expose details shared in an interview. They will protect private information, use it only for the purpose of developing the client’s story, and ensure that it will stays between the client and ghostwriter.

A human ghostwriter can tell a client’s story truthfully while respecting the client’s wishes. They do this by adhering to the principles of narrative truthfulness while maintaining respect for the client’s voice and preserving the client’s reputation and personal integrity.

By contrast, while AI can feast on big data, it does not have a ghostwriter’s moral compass or ethical responsibility. Clients might question revealing their sensitive material to an AI after witnessing the kinds of data breaches that have become commonplace.

Ghostwriters, though, can reassure clients that their stories will be treated with the utmost care and confidentiality, plus a human touch.

The Future Landscape of Ghostwriting

Looking forward, it is realistic to assume that the future of ghostwriting will increasingly blend technology and human skills. As AI handles more of the mundane aspects of writing, human ghostwriters will have additional time to focus on adding the nuance, emotion, and humanity that AI cannot.

Ghostwriters will continue to translate human experiences into stories that connect to audiences, infusing them with human voices that touch readers’ emotions. This mix of artificial proficiency and humanity can raise ghostwriting to a new level of excellence.

To avoid becoming obsolete, ghostwriters must actively work to stay up to date with the latest forms of AI as they become available. A habit of lifelong learning can keep them abreast of new technological developments and innovations, enabling them to continue producing quality work.

Additionally, as the market grows for hybrid projects where ghostwriters modify first attempts by AI, they must keep growing their skills for adding empathy and emotional connection.

Embracing the Future

The future of ghostwriting is not one of machines writing our stories, but of balancing technological progress and human ingenuity.