Common Forms of AI

March 1, 2024

Screencap from Grammarly's text generator depicting a passage with a prompt to rewrite with a food pun — Grammarly's text generator.

Text generators

Tools that generate text based on user prompts.

Examples: copy.ai, Anyword, Peppertype, Grammarly

Uses: Automate drafting of routine documents like overdue notices or new cardholder welcome messages, draft marketing copy or web page text

Controversies:

» Sports Illustrated was recently criticized for publishing AI-generated product reviews on its website, which it blamed on a company it licensed content from.

» AI-generated travel guides reached top spots in Amazon’s search results, boosted by reviews alleged to be fake.

» AI can hallucinate, or present plausible but false information as if it were true.

Chatbots

Similar to text generators, chatbots respond to user prompts, but they have a greater focus on responding in a conversational format.

Examples: ChatGPT, Bard, HuggingChat

Screencap of ChatGPT — ChatGPT’s screen.

Uses: Respond to basic informational and reference queries, alert users to library resources, generate keywords for research, summarize works, create bibliographies and citations, recommend books

Controversies:

» The Authors Guild filed suit against OpenAI in September 2023, alleging that the company improperly trained ChatGPT using books by the authors it represents.

» Similarly, comedian Sarah Silverman and authors Richard Kadrey and Christopher Golden sued Meta and OpenAI in July 2023, claiming their books were used without permission to train chatbots.

» Many news publishers have blocked webcrawlers from AI companies to prevent them from using current news stories for training.

Image generators

Tools that create pictures in response to user prompts.

Examples: Canva Magic Studio, Craiyon, DALL·E

Uses: Marketing, document design. Improve accessibility by ensuring adequate contrast and legible fonts and generating descriptive text or descriptive audio

Controversies:

Théâtre D’opéra Spatial by Jason M. Allen, an AI-generated art piece — Théâtre D’opéra Spatial
by Jason M. Allen, which won the 2022 Colorado State Fair Fine Arts Competition in the emerging artist division’s digitally manipulated photography category.

» An AI-generated art piece won first place at the 2022 Colorado State Fair Fine Arts Competition in the emerging artist division’s digital arts/digitally manipulated photography category. Artist Jason M. Allen disclosed his use of the AI image generator Midjourney when he entered.

» A UK court ruled in December that a Getty Images lawsuit against Stability AI can proceed. Getty alleges Stability improperly used millions of Getty’s images and their accompanying metadata to train image generators. Getty has filed a similar suit against Stability in the US.

» A January 2023 class-action suit against Stability AI, Midjourney, and DeviantArt alleges unlawful use of copyrighted images to train AI generators. The artists expressed concern that AI art will replace their own work.

Video generators

Tools that can create videos from text or image prompts. Different generators require varying levels of input and offer different levels of customizability.

Examples: Lucas AI Video Creator, Pictory, BHuman

A frame from a video ad for a flower shop created by Lucas AI Video Creator

Uses: Marketing videos, video guides

Controversies:

» Google has decided not to release its video generator, Imagen, to the public over concerns it can produce content that is violent or sexually explicit, and that it can rely on stereotypes or cultural biases. Similarly, Meta is still testing its Make-A-Video service to “reduce the creation of harmful, biased, or misleading content.”

» Deepfake videos that replace one person’s likeness with another are easy to create and use for misinformation, harassment, or fraud.

Tagged Under

The World of AI

How libraries are integrating and navigating this powerful technology

A photo of Moxie, an artificial intelligence robot used at Santa Ana Public Library.

Realizing Potential

Libraries employ (and investigate) artificial intelligence

Latest Library Links

2w

Year-end “best of” lists are a common phenomenon, and many libraries have created lists of staff or patron picks of their favorite reads of the year. See staff picks from Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, Seattle Public Library, Kent (Mich.) District Library, Los Angeles Public Library, New York Public Library, Chicago Public Library, Farmington (Conn.) Libraries, and King County (Wash.) Library System. Seattle Public Library and Kent (Mich.) District Library have also released lists of patron favorites

Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, Dec. 11; Seattle Public Library; Kent (Mich.) District Library, Nov. 20, Dec. 13; Los Angeles Public Library, Dec. 16; New York Public Library, Nov. 26; Chicago Public Library, Nov. 18; Farmington (Conn.) Libraries, Dec. 6; King County (Wash.) Library System; Seattle Times, Dec. 17
2w

The Library of Congress announced 25 additions to the National Film Registry December 17. The new selections date back nearly 130 years and include a diverse group of films, filmmakers, and Hollywood landmarks. The selections range from Annabelle Serpentine Dance, a silent film created to entice audiences at the dawn of cinema in 1895 to the 2010 film The Social Network. Films are selected for their cultural, historic, or aesthetic importance, and this year’s selections bring the number of films in the registry to 900.

Library of Congress, Dec. 17
2w

Douglas Soule writes: “To support some of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ most prominent and controversial K–12 education laws, Florida has agreed to spend millions of dollars on a service it says is a tool for transparency. But free expression advocates warn it could be a vehicle for censorship. In a contract signed this September, the Florida Department of Education agreed to pay up to $15.6 million over four years to Maryland-based education technology company Trinity Education Group. The company has been tapped to develop a ‘statewide, centralized, easily accessible’ system for people to review and even object to instructional materials and library books in Florida school districts.”

Tallahassee Democrat, Dec. 12
2w

Olivia Olander and Jeremy Gorner write: “Starting this year, public libraries in Illinois had a choice: Adopt principles against book banning or give up state grants. [About 40] school districts, many of them in deeply conservative areas of south and central Illinois, appear to have taken the latter option. Administrators at some of those districts acknowledged being concerned about giving up any measure of control on what books are allowed on their schools’ library shelves. Some 700 school districts statewide have regularly applied for state library grant funding in the last two years.”

Chicago Tribune, Dec. 8
3w

Despina Gerasimidou and Maela Rakočević Uvodić write: “Displaced persons are scattered all over the world looking for the safest place for them and their families to settle and when they move to a new country are faced with legal, cultural, educational, and economic challenges, while in need of information, guidance, and support. The new IFLA Guidelines for Libraries Supporting Displaced Persons showcase how libraries can champion their core mission for universal and equitable access to information, ideas, and works of imagination, aiming at social, educational, cultural, democratic, and economic well-being.”

International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, Dec. 16
3w

Rebecca Bryant writes: “In 2021, the University of Calgary Libraries in Alberta launched a multilingual reference chatbot by leveraging a commercial product that combines a large language model with retrieval-augmented generation technology. The chatbot is trained on the library’s own web content, including LibGuides and operating hours, and is accessed from the library’s website. Before launch, the implementation team estimated that the chatbot could answer 14%–24% of reference chat questions, but today the chatbot answers about 50% of all questions with a rating of at least 4/5.”

Hanging Together, Dec. 12
3w

Chase Ollis writes: “On December 16, ALA announced 10 recipients of the 2025 I Love My Librarian Award, nominated by library users for their expertise, dedication, and impact in their communities. Four academic librarians, three public librarians, and three school librarians were selected to receive the 2025 award. ALA received nearly 1,300 nominations from library users across the country. Nominations highlighted librarians’ outstanding service in expanding access to literacy and library services, outreach to their communities, and supporting the needs of the most vulnerable. Each honoree will receive a $5,000 cash prize and complimentary registration and a travel stipend to attend ALA’s LibLearnX conference in Phoenix.”

AL: The Scoop, Dec. 17