Artificial intelligence giant Anthropic is in the news for buying, scanning and shredding millions of physical books—including rare, out-of-print editions—after feeding the data to its chatbot as part of its Project Panama. This was done to overcome an earlier violation of piracy laws for which it was fined $1.5 billion.
The destruction of physical volumes is a cause for heartburn among book lovers. Printed titles are prized for their tactile tangibility and deeper reading experience. Books have long been a part of a circularity, being bought, lent, sold, gifted, handed down—changing hands without any decline in value. Therefore, treating it as an exclusive one-time resource has raised concerns among several groups. While a judge in the US has ruled that this is fair use and there is no violation of American law, it is difficult to normalise destruction of books that symbolise the collective legacy of human knowledge.
Language is not merely a mode of communication, but serves as a tool for inclusion or exclusion and is often leveraged to exert authority. Until a few hundred years ago, the main influences on language wafted from across borders or were introduced by migratory populations, including traders, evangelists and conquerors. The rise of the internet has brought in an increased elasticity to spoken and written languages.
While some people may lament the dilution of grammatical norms, the nature of language has always been dynamic. At present, social media has proved to be the biggest game changer, with the emergence of new usages at predictable regularity. The proliferation of various sub-cultures on social media has given rise to in-group slangs which trigger common associations and strengthen bonds within groups. The growth in group size is promoted by algorithms, which target audiences based on specific metrics. This helps adoption and dissemination of words in a broader user base. One instance of this transformation is the word ‘cool’ which has gained mainstream acceptability. Many slang words thus have a placeholder status—till their time arrives.
Purportedly, social media algorithms police the use of language and content on their platforms to meet community standards. This has perpetrated a class of users who proactively analyse the algorithms and find hacks to defy its detection. The result is ‘algospeak’, where a spelling may be tweaked or a new word substituted for a censored one.
An example is the emergence of the word ‘unalive’ to describe a situation of a person ending their life. Social media algorithms classify the topic of suicide as sensitive and restrict related posts. So, coded messaging is used by users to get around algorithms. There have been other versions of coded messages in public space, like the dog-whistle used by political leaders to address ideological groups. A controversial message is couched in ordinary language, but the underlying intent is conveyed to the targeted audience.
Over an average lifetime of, say, 60 years, most of us have been witnessing altered emphasis and a shift in the use of words. To keep pace with the vector of change is an interesting challenge. The best way to do so is to engage with the younger generation, who bring in creativity, humour and irreverence to the use of language. The rise of memes has contributed colourful words and phrases to the lingo of Gen Z and Gen Alpha.
A few months ago, what started as a meme playing on the word ‘cockroach’ burgeoned into a movement. It is interesting to see how the response to an alleged dismissive or even an insulting usage to refer to jobless youth was transformed into a rallying point. Those at the receiving end did not lob an insult back, but bounced, tossed around and repurposed the offensive word to further their cause. It demonstrated the potential of a single word to pivot and bring together groups of people who identify with a common cause.
It is undisputed that AI algorithms on social media contributed to the meme going viral. But the stripping of the original context and grafting it on to angst of students was the strategy of those who lead the movement. Algorithms catalysed the process, but what transpired was the use of human ideas to bring to the forefront real problems. To quote from Adam Aleksic's Algospeak: How Social Media Is Transforming the Future of Language, “Humans are social creatures who adopt words if they have a social purpose”.
The ability to think, discriminate and weigh consequences is as valuable now as it has ever been. And the access to a vast cultural capital of words in numerous languages can facilitate this. Languages grow and evolve with contributions from a wide spectrum of sources. Niche communities, discussion boards, geek-speak, lyrics of songs in various genres, the multi-lingual capabilities of Indians in particular, keep the repository updated.
The destruction of books in the past has never deterred authors or poets in their quest for expression. Of course, AI will also write books now, as it has ingested a humungous number of words. But AI slop is no match for the narrative of youth whose innovations begin with words that may sparkle or sizzle to inscribe their identity. Therefore, even as social media and AI algorithms shape and determine the use of language, the stroke of genius that gives rise to words is still essentially human.
Geetha Ravichandran | Former bureaucrat and author of The Spell of the Rain Tree
(Views are personal)
