Jamir Nazir won a Caribbean regional prize at the Commonwealth Short Story Prize. 7,806 entries. One winner from his region. Days later, online commentators ran his story through AI detection tools and declared it machine-written. Granta's own publisher said the judges may have "awarded a prize to an instance of AI plagiarism." Three detection tools were used. Three different verdicts. This is the new plagiarism charge. Easy to throw. Hard to disprove. Burden of proof falls on the writer. I've been working on this problem: collecting AI tells, reverse-engineering prompts, ghostwriting for people who need to prove their own voice on the page. Here's what I've learned about what actually separates human writing from machine writing. Hint: it's not the em dashes.
The Self That Survives the Layoff
A year ago I wrote about an engineer who lost a $150k job and was driving for DoorDash, living in an RV. Last week, out of nowhere, I looked him up. He's now Head of Engineering at a startup. I felt relieved. Not just for him, but for everyone wondering when their number comes up. Wrote about what his story made me think about: identity, layoffs, and the version of yourself that exists outside the job.
The AI Revolution’s First Casualties: Why Your Entry-Level Job Disappeared
If you're a recent graduate struggling to land that first role, you're not imagining things. A new paper examining millions of American workers reveals something stark: since ChatGPT went mainstream in late 2022, employment for workers aged 22-25 in AI-exposed occupations has plummeted 13% relative to their older colleagues. The traditional career ladder assumed you started at the bottom and climbed up. AI just removed the bottom rungs entirely.
The Great Inversion: How AI Flipped Copyright Inside Out
In 2020, my manager rejected a candidate for plagiarism. In 2024, Anthropic paid $1.5 billion for using pirated books to train Claude, even though a judge ruled the actual training was "fair use."
From SEO to AEO: How to Make Your Brand Appear in AI Search Results
Understanding the fundamental shift from Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to Answer Engine Optimization (AEO).
The Writing Looks ChatGPTish
When people say they can spot AI writing from a mile, what do they actually mean? Excessive em dashes? Short paragraphs? Words like "delve" and "meticulous"? LinkedIn was full of cringe long before ChatGPT. AI didn't invent buzzwords or performative prose. The algorithm simply picked what went viral. We're pretending that before ChatGPT, all writing flowed from pure creativity. As if "On Writing Well" and "The Elements of Style" never existed. We always followed rules. But our inability to follow them perfectly made our writing unique. AI follows rules perfectly. That's the problem. I explore this paradox in this essay.
Forget AI Imitating Us, We Are Imitating AI
Ever feel like LinkedIn posts sound... a bit too perfect these days? Or like certain words are suddenly everywhere? You're not imagining it. I dive into a fascinating and unsettling trend: we might be starting to sound like AI, not the other way around. Drawing on insights from the Max Planck Institute and literary critics, I explore how platforms and AI tools are subtly reshaping our language, making it more uniform and less uniquely human. It's not just about what we write, but how it impacts trust and authenticity in communication.
The Unwritten Self: A Writer’s Identity Crisis in the AI Era
if AI can write, what does a writer become? Our roles have changed from creators to curators overnight. But what if this disruption forces us to redefine our worth, to build identity beyond skills, on foundations AI can't touch?
AI Is Coming for Your Job — And It’s Already Here
I fact-check the cliché: “AI won't replace you, but someone who knows how to use AI will". I argue that AI is not just coming for your job, it’s here already. Exploring how AI is replacing the organizational pyramid, I observe how fresh graduates are at most risk at the moment. But it won’t stop here.
Has GenAI killed the college essay?
I explore if GenAI has killed the college essay. Why are students required to write essays? It’s to assess their ability to think through things, and communicate their perspective in a clear, compelling and organized fashion. I argue that GenAI, by removing the creative struggle from the writing, is capable of deeply affecting how we think.
Musings by Madhav 