Some of you may have noticed that there was a Notes Between Us post published by AI Writer earlier this week. For the uninitiated, AI Writer is one of the many, new, “AI Text Generator[s].” It sits among other text generators, such as Wordtune, Sassbook, Jasper.ai, and many others1.
For those of you who have not looked into this, there are companies out there claiming to have created the AI smart enough to generate blog posts, articles, e-mails, and the like. Some make more outlandish claims than others. However, none are truly AI. They are merely commercialized machine learning algorithms. Is AI Writer true AI?
For this post, let’s dive into AI Writer – the process, how well it works, some initial thoughts, and more.
Using AI Writer
Using AI Writer was an actual breeze. First, go to ai-writer.com. Next, click the “START FREE TRIAL” button on the top right-hand side of the webpage. If you already have an account, simply “Sign In.”
Once you complete the sign-up process or log-in, you’ll be taken to the main AI Writer user page. This page is pretty interesting. On the left-hand side, you’ll see tabs. The tabs allow the user to navigate to various webpages within AI Writer. The default page is “Research & Write.”2 This is the section used to create the post for AI Writer on NBU. Other areas include “Text Rewording,”3 “SEO Editor,”4 and “Subtopic Discover.”5
Notice how there is also an encircled question mark next to each of these tabs? If you let your cursor hover over the icon, AI Writer’s webpage describes each of these sections. To find out more about each section, please see the corresponding footnote.
Honestly, AI Writer appears to have a robust offering. Heck, Text Rewording may one day give Grammarly and ProWritingAid a run for their money. And, who doesn’t like a good SEO Editor?
For this article, I only tested Research & Write.
The User Experience
On this webpage, users are greeted with the all too familiar unified bar. The unified bar requires users to input the title of the article the user wants written (in English), and is unfortunately limited to 125 characters. To the right of the search bar, users will notice a green “Write article” button. Under the green button, users can set a word limit for AI Writer generated articles. The maximum word count for free trial users is 500 words. Paid subscribers (more below) are allowed up to 1,200 words.
There are a few interesting tidbits placed above the unified bar. At the very top of the webpage users will notice the name of the AI text generator, the minimize tabs icon, the webpage location, “Project” title, estimated time remaining for AI Writer to generate the write up, notices icon, and user log out button.
Most interestingly, though, is what is just below the top of the main webpage. For us free users, AI Writer provides an indication of how many days and credits are left for the free trial. One may suspect paid users are also told how many credits they have available.
So, now that everyone is on the same page for using the website, let’s move on to how AI Writer actually works.
Process
As stated above, the main eye catcher of the webpage is the unified search bar6. In this bar, users (is that an appropriate term?) provide a title. Then, the user merely clicks the “Write article” button.
After that, AI Writer works its magic. Within 5 minutes, AI Writer will generate an article based on the provided title. A word of caution, though – simple titles create better results than complex or sophisticated titles7.
Once the AI Writer completes drafting the article, users will see the article populate in the area below the unified bar–in the “Your articles” section. In this section, AI Writer provides users the total number of articles generated, the number of articles completed, the number of articles pending, and more. Note, each article may be deleted, downloaded, or opened into a workspace8. The drafts are downloadable in TXT format.
That’s really it. Yes, using the workspace feature, users can edit the AI Writer draft. But, if users wanted to spend time writing something, they would have done that from the get-go.
Cost
Arguably, the most important aspect of using these types of writing aids is the cost. AI Writer has multiple subscription plans available. And users can decide whether they want to pay monthly or annually. Screen captures and rates are below9. AI Writer provides 2 months free for annual subscribers.
 Figure 7: Monthly pricing as of Aug. 25, 2022 |  Figure 8: Annual price as of Aug. 25, 2022 |
One of the more confusing terms used by AI Writer is “Computing Units.” Computing units are “consumed upon usage of [AI Writer’s] infrastructure.”10 Each Research & Write submission takes a single Consumption Unit11. An important thing to remember about Consumption Units is
“You buy access for a given time period, not CUs. CUs are used to track upper usage boundaries for different subscription tiers. They do not carry over from month to month!”12
Before jumping feet first into a subscription with AI Writer, it may be beneficial to utilize the free trial. The free trial provides enough access for users to learn whether they want to throw some duckies towards AI Writer. Also, the free trial allows users to learn the limitations of the software.
Initial Thoughts
Machine learning is an interesting bag. On one hand, for those not in the know, machine learning is the future of software under the sexy catchall name of AI. On the other hand, for those cynics out there, machine learning is the promise of something not yet delivered.
AI Writer has the capacity to help busy content creators draft longer write ups. With its accessible interface, easy to follow directions, and (depending on budget) low cost, AI Writer may be the first draft generator of one’s dreams. But, it’s not really for everyone.
In my next post, I’ll provide a breakdown of what I liked about AI Writer’s drafts, what I didn’t like, and how I feel after going through the process.
As always, if you want to chat more about this topic, please feel free to reach out!
Notes:
1. Please forgive me for this, but… Wordtune? Is it related to iTunes? Sassbook? As opposed to a Facebook? Jasper? Wait, let me Ask Jeeves.
2. This tab “[l]ets[s] the AI draft a new article from scratch.”
3. This tab should be used “[i]f you have a text and want it rewritten with other words.”
4. This tab allows for a “[f]reform text editor with built-in SEO optimization.”
5. This tab “find[s] plenty of subtopics to write about.”
6. See Figure 3.
7. More on this in my next post.
8. Id.
9. Images taken on Aug. 25, 2022.
10. https://panel.ai-writer.com/aiwauth/subscriptionssite/get_new/
11. Id.
12. Id.
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Notes Between Us (NBU) is a blog about conversations and topics of interest to the writers. The writers are expressing their personal opinions solely. The essays represent their personal beliefs and not that of their workplaces or any organization they are associated with.