I enjoy my writing like I do my food, succulent and dripping with intrigue; a non-perfect experimentation of the chef’s beliefs in what good food should be.
Precise, perfect writing bores me, for the most part because it tells me absolutely nothing about the person that wrote it. An inconsistent ordering of words, a slightly gaited cadence in tone, or a hunger for adjectives give me insights into the writer’s mood, temperament, and perhaps even the location where they penned their words—or rather put finger-to-key.
Beach writing has an un-rushed, flow to it, written with a pacing and depth of description of someone whose mind has been slowed down enough for them to include frivolity; a far cry from the pained metronomic prose of an inner-city writer, chasing deadlines, money, or that elusive new publishing deal. However you look at it, it is this pursuit of individualism in writing that truly entices. Consider poetry, where multi-dimensional stories are told, each reader getting a different experience depending on what mindset they consume it from.
By looking at the construction of poetry, you gain insight into which era the writer hails from, while their chosen topics allude to their age and cultural influences. Examine the rhythm and tempo of the poetry, and you may find hints of their level of formal training. These are loose guidelines, but they suffice when applied liberally, taking time to enjoy the poem from every angle rather than straining to understand it.
Efficiency and perfection—the death of creative writing.
This is my viewpoint, a highly biased one I’ll freely admit, as I have no desire to pursue either route.
We read so much these days we forget to cherish the words we’re reading, and write so much we forget to enjoy the words we’re writing.
This is no one person’s fault, but a collective shift driven by the shifting social norms and—as with most disruptive changes—by technological advancement. Interestingly enough, books have been gaining in popularity, partly due to the proliferation of audiobooks, but also due to the pervasive influence of the BookTok era, fuelling the rise of indie romance publishing.
Alas, that’s not my main concern, let’s talk about the medium itself. Words have always been part of creation, from the very act in Genesis 1:1, to the complex textual structures that form the backbone of any software we use today.
Even as I type these words, a coded dance negotiates its predisposed function to produce the outcome my fingers command. A pencil passively does the same, subject to the writer’s will, creating whatever the hand commands like an obedient servant.
I’ve personally always preferred using a keyboard to write. At one time I even used my BlackBerry mobile device to write articles; the pocket-sized QWERTY keyboard giving an acceptable precision of output, while the hand-held form factor gifted me the freedom of location—it was truly an editor’s dream. Fast-forward to the touchscreen era, it was time to head back to my desk, it once again becoming my writing sanctuary, a place words and I feel free to argue, discuss, negotiate on page, and where we come to a mutual agreement of completion—well, most of the time anyway.
But when it comes to publishing tech it was the widening remit of the blockchain that really caught my attention, particularly its ability to immutably store data. In some ways, it’s the perfect copyright lawyer. Artificial Intelligence (AI) has given us the ability to create and replicate at will and, predictably in line with the nature of fallen man, bad actors will try to take centre stage.
Not if the blockchain, and its passionate builders, have anything to say about it.
With blockchain technology, for the first time I saw the possibility of truly achieving Orchestral Intelligence. After all, what purpose does it serve the author to create mind-bending, emotion stimulating prose if there is no way to prove that they did in fact create it? Such is the current speed of plagiarism that, born today, C. S. Lewis’ work would have been cloned and leveraged before Lucy had a chance to discover the famed magical wardrobe. I jest somewhat, but there is an element of truth, something that the immutable transparent blockchain can help to solve, by providing a database of fact.
Imagine one day reading a post on X and it being able to tell you instantly if it is an original post, or merely a clone, simply by using the text’s onchain record. Worst case scenario, at least it would make plagiarisers have to work a bit harder, modifying copy on a granular level to achieve perceived “originality”.
I would define Orchestral Intelligence as,
A symphonic combination of mediums—human and technological—to create something greater than the sum of its individual parts.
And you know what, I think we’re nearly there. The author creates, the AI corroborates, and the chain validates; it’s the perfect triumvirate.
In truth, the very purpose of this piece itself is to serve as an on-chain testament to Orchestral Intelligence in motion; a meandering piece of text, wholly composed by man, linguistically tested by AI and stored immutably on chain.
My views will hereby be timestamped ad infinitum, stored for any future generation that read or write on-chain to discover, and no doubt, microscopically dissect. For me, this posterity is a more than worthwhile reward.
