Anti-Robot Uprising

"Operator!!!"

You've all done it. We've screamed into the telephone. Please, for the love of God, get me a real person.

I mean, we've already been forced to pick up the phone and call. Isn't that painful enough?! Now we have to fight with the robot assistant. Do you want me to type in my number or verbally read out the digits? Will you just ignore me anyway and apologize for not "getting that"?

Companies don't even try to make this better. I mean, license the voice of C3PO and at least I would find more enjoyment in the 10-minutes I spent trying to find someone to help me.

I'm sure this whole experience was pretty fascinating when it first came out, but decades later, we just scream to talk to a real person.

This is us with AI in....well, soon.

Why So Cranky About AI?

Actually, I'm not really cranky about AI. In fact, AI has been a huge improvement to my life. Yes, it's probably taken away some of my "jobs", but I never quite liked doing that work anyways.

• You can erase the background of images without hours of using an eraser tool in Photoshop?! Thank you.
• I don't have to spend 15-minutes trying to come up and format podcast descriptions?! It's all yours.
• AI will easily take my grammar-filled blog and clean it up without forcing me to read (and reread) over and over?! You are simply amazing.

I spend more time with AI (mostly ChatGPT) than most humans. I pay for the premium version and have it open on my browser tab nearly 99% of the time. If it's a task that I don't enjoy doing, I often employ the help of ChatGPT. If it's a task I do enjoy doing, well, I often still have ChatGPT tagalong with some suggestions.

I do not dislike AI. I've seen things like AI come and change the industry. I have learned to adapt and join in.

WordPress, Facebook, Canva, and CapCut - You SOBs

I wasn't so kind with the first wave of industry game changers.

When I learned how to code in 1999, you couldn't just willy-nilly push a button and get a new website on the internet. Imagine how annoyed I was when WordPress came along.

Turns out WordPress wasn't so bad. You still needed actual skill and some intelligence to get a blog up and running. Next thing you know, Facebook came on the market and everyone (yes, everyone) could now openly share their opinions on the internet. The WordPress blog that had a slight barrier of entry was invisible.

Oh - how about the countless hours spend learning Adobe Photoshop and Premiere? Canva and CapCut comes on the scene and now everyone's social media posts have quality graphics and short video clips.

Yes, the cranky man has come out. You can tell by the tone of my writing (non-AI assisted) that these tools took more of my job (and influence) than ChatGPT ever did. It sucked, but I learned to adapt.

Today, I exclusively use WordPress for web development. I use Canva more than Photoshop. CapCut is part of our digital toolbox (but I'm still a sucker for Premiere).

Many of these tools have AI enhancements that I've fully adopted. Please, make my life easier. Make the product better. Give me some time back.

Is the Product Better with ChatGPT?

I guess that's the real question. Now that everyone has started to find AI, is the product getting better? Are we soon going to be yelling for an operator? Let's think about this.

A few years ago, maybe 1 out of 50 found ChatGPT and was using it in some capacity. As of July 2025, ChatGPT has 700 million weekly users. That's about 10% of the world's adult population. Take it one step further - about 70% of users in the workplace are using ChatGPT. You gotta believe the majority of that usage is in the marketing department.

It's been proven, once a business finds that the barrier of entry is easy, they will go after this with little to no planning.

"You're telling me that I can create a Facebook and advertise for FREE?!"

"Hold on, there's a free Photoshop tool called Canva and you can just grab templates and put in your own information and pictures?!"

"This can't be real. I can go to this ChatGPT thing and just say 'give me a social media post' and it will spit out an entire post?!"

Yep, this is what happens when everyone can use the tool. Everyone will use the tool - and they don't know how to adjust to make it human.

This is why the social feeds are now filled with the same Canva templates and posts drowning in emojis and em-dashes. And you, if not already, are screaming "operator".

Should We Use ChatGPT for Content Creation?

Gone are the days where you can't use AI and continue to keep up. Not to date myself, but remember the steroid era in Major League Baseball? If everyone was on the juice hitting home runs, the other players felt obligated to keep up. Unlike MLB, no one is going to tell other brands to stop using AI and producing slop on the internet.

But...we, the consumers, will start policing.

How many of you have already scanned right past the small business post that starts with a star emoji?

Have you skipped reading an blog that starts "In todays ever changing landscape..."?

Are you no longer impressed by social graphics on Facebook? Sometimes pointing and saying "I've seen that Canva template!"

It's no longer impressive and no longer worth reading. The AI content is being ignored and soon will actually cause a negative reaction.

How many of you have stumbled upon the AI generated TikTok or YouTube videos? Full AI voice reading a Wikipedia article with AI generated images. Would you choose this over a similar video produced by a human creator? Probably not.

Studies show that YouTube thumbnails with peoples faces perform better than generic graphics. The same will be said with content that we know was produced by a human vs. one created by AI. Over time, all users (not just the dorky guys like me) will start to notice the trends of lazy AI creation. We will not be fooled. We will ignore and finally brand your business as someone who doesn't value our intelligence or want to have a real conversation with us.

But it's not that hard to adjust. You can use AI to make your life easier AND still be human.

Let's Get Rid of the Easy Giveaways

If you aren't going to really deep dive into prompt engineering, at least understand some of the dead giveaways that make something look AI.

Em Dash

Stop it right now. I don't care if you've used Em Dashes in all of your writing before, AI has taken them, given them a horrible reputation, and they are dead to you forever. This guy — is used in nearly every other sentence with AI content. Just remove the em dash and that will make everything less AI written.

Introductory Sentence

I don't know if I have ever opened a sentence or paragraph with "In today's [adjective] world", but AI sure loves to.

Three is the Magic Number

If you have a list, ChatGPT will make it the default three. Sure, you can ask for more or less, but nearly every time you need to make a list, it's three.

Generic Stereotypical Humor

Not everyone is trying to be witty in their posts, but if you are, be prepared for the worst jokes. Anytime. I write something for a Disney post, here comes the Churro joke. Web Design...of course I'm at a Starbucks working. And if this was ChatGPT writing, we would throw in a third example - but guess what? We don't need one.

Emojis (or Icons as I call them in my prompts)

It was slightly impressive at one point in time when users put emojis in their social content. It took time and effort. It wasn't overly used and only the "special" creators were doing it. Now, anyone that gives a prompt to create a social post gets bombarded with emojis. One or two in a post can be useful. Every line - not so much.

Lack of Real Life Examples

Most writers tend to tell stories or at minimum give some personal example. AI writing tends to be overly technical and lack a personal touch.

Fixing the Problem

Don't stop using ChatGPT. Stop blindly posting without adding your thoughts.

You can do this by being more descriptive with your initial prompts. Give your opinions in the prompt, tell AI that you don't want em dashes, and remove all icons.

Better yet, take what ChatGPT has created and alter it to your style. There's nothing wrong with saying "create a social post about X" and then looking at the post for inspiration. Type it up in your own words and you still saved time. Maybe not as efficient as just copying and pasting, but users will recognize that it is real and you will be rewarded.

Our major problem is that most people won't do this extra work. That's bad for the overall condition of social platforms and blogs, but could be great for you.

Imagine the next time you are forced to call a national company and an actual person picks up right away - instead of the robo-answering-bot. No need to scream "operator" or "human" into the phone. Imagine how much better that experience would be AND how much better you will like that company.

You can be this company.

In today's ever changing world... (yes, I'm snarky), you can be the company that doesn't fall into the trap of doing what is easy. You can still be efficient and smart - but not lazy and robotic. People are going to start to revolt and you want to be on the human side. Don't let AI be your voice. Be the actual operator that answers the call and resolves the problem.

Start today. I already hear the people screaming "operator" on Facebook.