Boycott NaNoWriMo
I have deleted my NaNoWriMo account and will never participate in their official event ever again, even if they reverse course on this issue.
For those who don’t know, NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, which is held in November) has officially stated that they do not condemn the usage of Generative AI. This is a slap in the face to all writers everywhere.
The second paragraph and last paragraph are what’s critical. I’ve removed some content in the middle where they were defined “ableism” and “classism” for some weird reason, so if you want to read the whole article, you can do so on their zendesk site.
What this means is that the organization behind this once-loved novel writing event is perfectly fine with you generating 50,000 words of AI garbage to win their contest. NaNoWriMo was supposed to support and encourage the creative writing community. Instead, they have just thrown it all away.
Moreover, we should not forget last years other fiasco, with allegations of child grooming activity on their forums. If true, then that is even more egregious than this AI kerfuffle, and is reason enough to kick NaNoWriMo to the gutter where it belongs.
As writers, we must make our feelings clear on this matter. Don’t just boycott NaNoWriMo this year. Delete your account. It is time for us to walk away.
