AI Losers

The Culture We Deserve · Apr 23, 2026 · 2h 1m

The New York Times recently cut ties with a freelancer after it was revealed he had used AI to assist in the writing of a book review. What is the source of the scandal -- that an underpaid worker uses technology to help him meet a deadline, or that your publication uses such a predictable structure in the work it puts out that AI can easily mimic the formula? The outrage that typically greets any use of AI comes out of a fear that maybe we don't need humans to write our book reviews, our movie scripts, our military propaganda at all. When filmmaker Steven Soderbergh announced he'd be using…