Cult Value
If a chatbot writes your novel, did you really complete NaNoWriMo? And other questions about what we might lose when we delegate or automate meaningful work...
Read the post below or listen on the What Works podcast.
Last week, the organization that supports National Novel Writing Month released a statement on using artificial intelligence during the annual event. Read generously, NaNoWriMo said that it supported a writer's choice to use or not use AI in the process of writing their novel. Read more cynically, NaNoWriMo used social justice language to assert that disparaging the use of AI tools, like the one made by a sponsor, was classist and ableist.
The backlash to this statement came fast and furious.
NaNoWriMo was at once raising legitimate concerns about gatekeeping language and excluding marginalized voices while ignoring how their stated ‘position’ did nothing to address the harm that AI companies have already inflicted on marginalized communities and language.
Was NaNoWriMo's statement offensive or hateful? No. As writer Sarah Gailey put it, it was silly. An unforced error. She continued, "To say 'we will not take one of two positions, but we will say that one of those positions is classist and ableist' is not the deft rhetorical maneuver that NaNoWriMo seems to think it is." There was no pressing need to make a statement about artificial intelligence. If they wanted to say something, they could have simply asserted that they support writers' ability to use whatever tools they find useful (which is essentially what they've edited their ‘position’ to).
After the onslaught of posts explaining all the reasons that opposing AI was neither classist nor ableist, most of the posts turned into memes and jokes about the idea that one might have ChatGPT do your daily word count so that you could claim to have finished NaNoWriMo. I could get into all of the reasons that the boosters of artificial intelligence are actually perpetuating classism, ableism, and racism—not to mention environmental degradation—and I might eventually. But I'm actually more interested in the jokes.
More on that in a bit.
But first, apparently Strava surrogates are a thing?
Strava is a popular activity-tracking tool for runners, cyclists, and triathletes. I use Strava to monitor my training volume, keep track of races I've run, and find new routes when traveling.
While my activity is publicly viewable in the feed, I don't use the ‘social’ features that are part of its appeal. When you post an activity to Strava, your followers can give you kudos (i.e., likes) or leave comments. For example, if you've just run a big race or posted a new PR, you might receive a rush of kudos—the same as when posting a milestone on any social platform. It's this social approval that allegedly motivates some Strava athletes to hire a surrogate to run a race for them.
This side hustle first seems to have emerged in Indonesia, where there's also been an uptick in running generally, according to Channel News Asia. Following CNA's story, Women's Health spotlighted an American TikToker claiming to be a 'Strava mule.' I can't tell whether that video is satirical or not—and neither can people in the comments.1
Most likely, this story is completely blown out of proportion. Aside from the original CNA piece, all the reporting on this 'trend' amounts to a clickbait game of telephone. But just like with the NaNoWriMo story, the potential for this happening at any scale is plausible enough. At the very least, the social and technological conditions exist to make people believe it might be true.
Cult Value versus Exhibition Value
In 1935, cultural theorist Walter Benjamin penned one of his most influential essays, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction." In it, he examines how our relationship to art has changed (and is changing) as the tools we use to create and view it change. One aspect of that change is the shift from art created for 'cult value' to art created for 'exhibition value.'
When art is created for cult value, its meaning is realized through its connection to deeply held beliefs. In this way, the art’s meaning is private—even when displayed or used in the open. It's meant for a particular group—the cult—and whether anyone else finds value in it is inconsequential. ‘Cult’ doesn’t refer to a Jim Jones, Heaven’s Gate, or NXIVM situation; it’s a generic term for any belief-based group.
On the other hand, art created for exhibition value finds its meaning in the public sphere. The artist may or may not have intended a deeper meaning or message. Regardless, the artwork has value merely in the experience of its display. For Benjamin, exhibition value especially applies to photography and filmmaking, but it isn't dependent on the medium.
This might be a stretch, but I invite you to consider NaNoWriMo and Strava as containers for a form of performance art—novel writing and running respectively.
Novel writing and running both have private meanings as works of performance art.
They'd have value for the artist regardless of whether anyone ever witnessed the performance. As internet communities, they both create environments in which the private value of a performance is colored by others in the 'cult.' One might join a NaNoWriMo writing group so that they can share the experience with others who are working toward the same goal. One might participate in a Strava Challenge for a similar reason.
However, NaNoWriMo and Strava also exist within a larger sociocultural environment. In that sociocultural environment, exhibition value rules—pics or it didn't happen. More than a decade into the social media era, many of us understand the value of activities in relation to the response they'll garner once posted. Mundane and trivial aspects of life take on exhibition value in the form of attention and social capital.
"Environments are not passive wrappings, but are, rather, active processes,
which are invisible. The groundrules, pervasive structure, and
overall patterns of environments elude easy perception."
— Marshall McLuhan, The Medium is the Massage
Yes, it's absurd to pay someone to run and post to Strava for you. Yes, it totally defeats the point to ask ChatGPT to fulfill your daily NaNoWriMo word count. But we get caught up in the somewhat panicked irony of it all precisely because there's something true contained in it. The product of the performance, be it a photograph, a Google Doc, a video, or a red route on a map, has more value in the social capital market than the original performance has. The performance creates a commodity, an object of attention. And in an environment where attention and commodities are fetishized, the product of the performance is immensely valuable.
So that, at least in part, explains the motivation for essentially saying you did something you did not do and the willingness to believe that someone might perpetrate that lie. I think it also explains why real or feigned, serious or satirical outrage about these trespasses can be so seductive.
Where else might this occur?
As I thought about the connection between the NaNoWriMo 'controversy' and the Strava surrogate 'panic,' I began to ask myself what other activities mimic this pattern without generating the same backlash. As I so often do, I landed on the de-socialization of social media, by which I mean how little social media activity is social. Instead, the focus of much social media activity is broadcast communication: How can I get my message out to as many people as possible?
To this end, there are plenty of opportunities to learn how to create and schedule a whole month of social media posts so that you don't have to waste time on a platform at all. There are social media agencies that will create for you, post for you, and even respond to comments as you. Plenty of apps will help you turn longer-form content into short-form content or visual content so that all you have to do is smash the 'go' button—social media content handled.
No shade to anyone who teaches these techniques or offers these services! My critique is directed toward the environment rather than any individual or business.
For many small business owners and creators, handing over these tasks to someone or something else is a dream scenario. I get it. It can be time-consuming, emotionally draining, and, frankly, a complete waste of energy. But when I think about hiring someone to make Instagram content or write email newsletters or post to LinkedIn, I can't help but think that it's not as far removed from hiring a Strava surrogate or using ChatGPT to write your novel as we might like.
When I think about hiring someone to make Instagram content or write email newsletters or post to LinkedIn, I can't help but think that it's not as far removed from hiring a Strava surrogate or using ChatGPT to write your novel as we might like.
We perceive the exhibition value of these social media activities as the point.
We post because getting other people to pay attention to us is valuable. But I believe that, at their most potent, social media have incredible cult value. Just as the value in a run is found in the time one is on the road, the value of time spent engaged with social media is found in creating, sharing, and socializing. We fetishize the products of our time spent on social media, but the real value, such that there is any amidst enshittification, are the patterns, ideas, and inspiration you pick up engaging with others who are engaging with you.
With AI-generated NaNoWriMo novels and faux Strava runs, we know what's lost. We understand the unique value of the ritual in writing your daily 1500 words or running five miles. Even if those are things you have zero interest in, you can undoubtedly see the value in those activities. Therefore, getting someone or something else to do it for you just so you can say you did it is blatantly absurd.
But when it comes to the slightly more nuanced things, the things that don't have obvious intrinsic value, it's harder to identify what's lost. However, that doesn't mean nothing is lost or that what is lost is inconsequential. So many of the tasks we're eager to delegate or automate have cult value.
In a recent essay on AI for The New Yorker, Ted Chiang mused on what it is about art that makes AI incapable of producing it. His thesis is that art requires intentional decision-making, which is something AI cannot do outside of science fiction stories. It's the inefficiency of being 'in process' that allows the artist to express themselves.
Each tiny decision is a valuable ritual, a necessary experience from which the art can emerge.
The more we delegate or automate, the fewer decisions we make. The less we learn from being 'in process.' Whether it's social media, client services, email management, an afternoon run, or that novel you want to write, we lose something when we turn the decision-making over to someone else. Sometimes, that's a good trade-off. You might be building a company brand and need a marketing director. You might deal with debilitating anxiety and need someone to screen incoming emails for you (by you, I mean me). What's lost is far less than what's gained.
But when we accept those losses without thinking, perhaps without realizing they've even occurred, we risk losing something even greater and more valuable: relevancy, empathy, meaning, and wonder.
And I think those values are worth working for.
Incidentally, this reminds me of a great TikTok by
on why satire is being taken seriously in the social media age.
Yes! Art is not meant to be efficient. Writing is art. Or it can be. To me, automating it too much removes it from the realm of art into...? I don't know, but it's not interesting