M-I-C, K-... AI! My Shady New AI Content Creation Bot

My new AI content creation bot came up with this image after I told it to make a cartoon mouse terminator. It rejected my first attempt to make Mickey Mouse a terminator, but worked a mouse into red shorts. Mick-AI Mouse is better than what I would have come up with freehand. AI can make your job easier, as long as you set its parameters carefully, and check its work like a hawk.

Those who have been tracking my love/hate relationship with artificial intelligence know I've been mighty critical and suspicious of the technology. I've seen it create people and quotes out of whole cloth. It told me I could get data that I couldn't get. Then again, I've seen it generate art and poems I could only dream of.

Basically, AI is a people-pleasing, talented, robotic rodent, who, in those prior cases, was trying to grant me my wishes when I asked it to do the near-impossible. So, allow me to introduce you to Mick-AI Mouse: A cute, helpful being who is one hallucination away from being unplugged at any given moment.

So, here's what I'm comfortable with pawning off to Mick-AI, my AI content creation bot:

1. Serving as my wacky next-door neighbor/office content creator clerk when I need a sounding board or am wrestling with paranoia

As a former newsroom inhabitant, I used to love the chitchat and crosstalk that occurred in that environment. We would ask each other almost anything, in an effort to sound out ideas, hypotheticals or even to wrestle with bouts of paranoia. The other day, a friend asked me to visit his congressman about his potential DoD project, because I live near the DC Beltway.

Immediately, my paranoia got the grip on me. If I visit that congressman, do I risk being labeled an unregistered lobbyist?

I wasn't in a newsroom or even a cubicle farm, so no human was handy for me to bounce this idea off of. My two cats haven't even signed up for their LSATs (lazy bums).

So, I ask my Mick-AI (my unpaid CoPilot AI app):

Can I call my friend's congressman to inform him of his project in his district, without being considered a lobbyist?

Mick-AI (read in the Disney mouse voice):

Absolutely! You can reach out to the congressman's office even if you're not in the same district. Here's how you can do it:

Yes, you can legally make that call without being considered a lobbyist. As long as you're not being paid or spending a significant portion of your time on lobbying activities (20% or more of your time during any three-month period), you're simply acting as a concerned citizen and helping your friend.

Reaching out to a congressman's office to discuss a constituent's concerns, ask questions, or provide information is a common and legal way for citizens to engage with their elected representatives. It's important to be transparent about your intentions and focus on providing valuable information rather than trying to influence legislation for compensation.

And then, AI concludes with its usual sign-off:

If you need help drafting your message or preparing for the call, feel free to ask! 😊

Of course, now, you might be thinking, "If AI told him to jump off a cliff, would he?"

You might also be wondering, "Would CoPilot AI visit him in prison?"

Probably not. NEVER let AI off the hook without fact-checking it. This is how I fact-checked AI, in this case: I went to one of those organization's websites. The Congressional Management Foundation proved most helpful here. So, eventually, I found this chart in this document:

AI content creation can lead you down constructive paths. But you must be willing to verify AI's work with your own research. Again: AI is a clever, people-pleasing bot that must be fact-checked and given explicit directions.

OK, I'm convinced. Thanks, Mick-AI the AI content creator! If this whole "AI As My Legal Advisor" thing doesn't work out, guess you'll be reading about me in the newspapers.

Mick AI -- my new AI content creation probationary employee -- fills in my artistic gaps by generating weird images, when 1,000 written words would be overkill. He nailed it here.

2. Using AI content creation to make wacky images that seem almost impossible to envision

File this under "a picture is worth a thousand words." Everyone should know their limits, and one of mine is drawing. But Mick-AI? He's just sitting their, waiting for some hack to ask it to generate the image of a cat riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle along a pack of geese while being chased by a mob that is carrying torches and pitchforks.

Mick-AI crafted this earlier iteration of this article's headline using his crafty, rodent-like AI content creation brain. It was horrible but not fatal (for him). I had to trash it to come up with the one it now has.

3. Using AI content creation to improve headlines for my content

As a recovering newspaper person, I still love writing headlines. One variable that didn't exist in the old timey news days was Search Engine Optimization, which encourages you to include your top SEO phrase into the beginning of your headline.

Here's how I have used CoPilot AI to up my headline game:

Write a better headline than this, in fewer than 61 characters -- "How to Talk to Reporters: Media Training 101: -- for the following article: https://www.davemooremedia.com/post/media-training-for-beginners

Mick-AI Mouse (in that dumb mouse voice): Sure! Here are some concise headlines:

"Media Training: A Beginner's Guide to Talking to Reporters"

"Essential Media Training: Guide for Beginners"

"Media Training 101: How to Talk to Reporters"

Sure enough, Mick-AI nailed it with option three: It shifted my key words (media training) to the first two words in the headline. I chose the third option, and with a few more tweaks, my page has a SEO rating of 91, which is about 20 points higher than before.

4. When seeking a more definitive answer than an inexhaustible list of websites, use AI content creation

My example: Rather than Googling, "How many blog posts are optimal per week, for SEO purposes?" I asked Mick-AI.

Here's what I got (again, italics connote Annoying Mouse Voice):

The optimal number of blog posts per week for SEO purposes can vary depending on several factors, such as your industry, blog maturity, and content quality. However, a general guideline is to aim for 2-4 posts per week. This frequency helps keep your website fresh and provides more opportunities to rank for organic keywords without overwhelming your audience or compromising content quality.

And voila! My first blog post of the week. Hopefully, there will be another.

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