STOP IT’S BEEN MONTHS. MONTHS!

Because it was trained on pirated work—including freely accessible online writing (like fanfic, academic texts)—ChatGPT picked up patterns and quirks native to human writing.

Including (sigh) the em dash.

There are other victims here (RIP tapestry and delve 🫠), but the appropriation of the em dash—a punctuation mark beloved by writers everywhere—feels especially personal.

A kind of low-grade panic is ensuing. Writers who once memed their own em dash overuse—the greatest punctuation mark ever to grace the control-freak’s lexicon, frankly—are suddenly backing away to avoid accusations.

No. More. We have centuries of dash-abusing writers behind us. We will not sit quietly while AI repurposes our beloved stilted aside—or the just-one-more clarification the sentence demands—or the dramatic pause your comma could never—etc.

You don’t write like AI—AI writes like you.

Defend the em dash.

(Feel free to download/share/stick it where it matters!)

Hey all! Did you know that you can format your comments on AO3 using HTML?

Wanna italicize a word? put this code around it: <em>your words here</em>

Want to make a word bold? This is the code for that: <strong>your words here</strong>

Want to add a span line? Just a simple <hr> will make one appear.

Want to insert a gif into your comment? It’s as simple as adding this piece of code: <img src=“https://whatever the url of the gif image is here”>

Need to make your font bigger or smaller? Try any of these around your text. H1 will be the biggest and H6 the smallest but they’ll all change the size of what would be the normal comment text: <h1>your words here</h1> <h2>your words here</h2> <h3>your words here</h3> <h4>your words here</h4> <h5>your words here</h5> <h6>your words here</h6>

You can even indent a quote from the fic by using the “blockquote” code around it: <blockquote>their words here</blockquote>

Now go! Fancy up all your comments! 

Scratch, you can't run from the call of dad. Caine is actively sprinting at you

Also, the temptation to name this au Raising Caine- asefsdfaw

Opening up isnt an easy task !!