January Column 2024

I’m writing this on January 1, 2024, which means it’s already too late to publish it, by the usual standards imposed by the magazine industry.

But we live in a new age of publishing. One in which it’s possible to write a whole book in a day and having it up and selling by the next. Or even just before midnight on the same day.

We can now inflict readers with our overwrought passages with deep meanings. And no one can stop us. Or we can whip up a storyline with a few quiet words entered into ChatGPT (which has now become a more ominous bunch of letters since COVID) and slap together a half-decent (if forgettable) story.