There Are No Girls on the Internet - Mia Ballard's novel Shy Girl was cancelled for using AI. You only know half the story

Episode Date: April 8, 2026

You've probably heard about author Mia Ballard. Her debut novel "Shy Girl" has been at the center of a controversy about whether she used AI to help write it. After a New York Times article, her publisher dropped her book. She's since deleted most of her social accounts and gone dark.  This story is much bigger than whether one writer did or didn't use AI. It's about the question of who gets to set the standard in AI and creative work? And more importantly who gets protected, and who gets sacrificed to it? Subscribe to Drey's excellent substack for sharp reporting and open source investigative journalism into tech and power: https://thedreydossier.substack.com  Read / Watch Drey’s reporting on Shy Girl: https://thedreydossier.substack.com/p/the-shy-girl-ai-scandal-is-way-worse Follow Drey on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok: @thedreydossier Read more about the limitations of AI-detection software, and why many of the country's most respected universities have banned it. https://timrequarth.substack.com/p/why-you-shouldnt-trust-ai-detector  Read Thad’s blog post called Shy Girl: The Background to the New York Times Story: https://thefutureofpublishing.com/2026/03/shy-girl-the-background-to-the-new-york-times-story/ Bridget’s SMNTY ep about ShyGirl: What the Shy Girl Conversation Says About AI and Art: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-stuff-mom-never-told-you-21123631/episode/what-the-shy-girl-conversation-says-about-ai-and-art-328745937   Let us know what you think by emailing [e-mail] or leaving a comment on Spotify.  Follow Bridget and TANGOTI on social media!  ||  instagram.com/bridgetmarieindc/ || tiktok.com/@bridgetmarieindc ||  youtube.com/@ThereAreNoGirlsOnTheInternet || bsky.app/profile/tangoti.bsky.social   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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should be very, very concerning. There are No Girls on the Internet as a production of IHeart Radio and Unbossed Creative. I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet. There's a question that I keep coming back to when I think about AI and creative work, and that is, who gets to set the standard, and maybe more importantly, who gets protected by it and who gets sacrificed to it. And to explore that, I want to talk about a story that I think we're all getting kind of wrong. It's about a black woman author, a major publisher, a powerful newspaper, and an AI detection company whose business model depends on all of us believing that their tool is the final word on what counts as human.

And it all starts with a horror novel called Shy Girl by author Mia Ballard. Now, there's a good chance you've heard about this story already. I just talked about it on the podcast stuff Mom never told you. And I only now just realized that I only had about half of the story. Dre of the Dre dossier has been working tirelessly to fill in that other half. I'm Dre of the Dre dossier and I'm thrilled to be here. I think that even of big legacy journalism outlets, you have been doing the most in-depth coverage of a lot of things, but particularly the Mia Ballard, shy girl saga.

What was it that made you want to, that drew you to that story in the first place? Yeah, I mean, I always keep an eye on the AI tech side of things, right? And I found just this interesting convergence of the same day that that story broke, the White House sent over to Congress, the AI action plan, what they wanted Congress to vote on and stuff. And I just found it to be such an interesting dichotomy of like, here is this one story about like what happens to artists if they do or don't use AI. And then here are, you know, here's a plan for the people to be protected, you know, at the top.

And so that kind of is what drew me to initially. But as somebody who works in media and is working, you know, with, I'm working with my agents on a book deal situation on my own. So I've been kind of exploring that, that world a little bit more. And I'm like, wow, this is, this is important. This is a landmark case. It's the first time, correct me if I'm wrong, the first time a Big Five publisher cut ties with an author over suspected AI use. Is that right? Yeah, the first time one of the Big Five, yeah, I mean, that we know of. I mean, as we'll probably get into later on, there's been cases where AI detection tools detect AI use and then you can, you know, submit like proposals or something that combats it and submit inquiries. But it's the first time that, yeah, so publicly, like the same.

same day that that article dropped, they dropped her. So Mia Ballard is a black woman horror author. She self-published a novel called Shy Girl. That novel was acquired by the big publisher, Hachette, though not before some early controversy. The cover art on the self-published version of her novel had been taken from another artist without credit or permission. Hachette, her publishing company, was aware of this, and the image had to be replaced.

Even while the book had good to mixed reviews on Goodreads, earlier this year, readers on social media started to speculate whether or not this book was AI generated. The popular YouTube channel Frankie's shelf made an almost three-hour video called I Think This Is AI Slop that over one million people watched, pointing out what Frankie saw as the hallmarks of AI-generated text. This is when Max Spiro, the founder in C.E. E.O. of Pangram, an AI detection program, tweeted that he had heard about the claims around Shy Girl and decided to run a test of the full text using his proprietary software. He said the result indicated that the book was 78% AI generated. The New York Times published a piece about it on March 19th. The Times also analyzed passages from the novel using two other AI detection tools, GPT Zero and Originality AI. These tools reported

finding recurring patterns characteristic of AI-generated text, things like gaps in logic, excessive use of melodramatic adjectives, and an over-reliance on the rule of three. When the Times reached out to Hachette, Ballard's publisher, the company said they were pulling the book, making Shy Girl the first novel from a major publishing house to be canceled over AI use allegations. So what does the writer Mia Ballard say about all this? Well, not much. She's kept a very low profile since the first allegations started showing up on social media and didn't comment publicly until the New York Times reached out to her for comment. She told them that she did not use AI, but that an acquaintance that she worked with to edit the self-published version

could have used AI to do it. She declined to say more because she said that she's pursuing legal action. So I was prepping an episode about this situation when I encountered Dre's reporting, specifically about the AI detection company at the center of all of it, PANGram. And that is when I realized this whole thing was a lot more complicated than I had first thought. Because the question is not whether or not Mia used AI. I don't know. And honestly, neither do you. Neither does Hichet.

And really, neither does the New York Times. What we do know is that a black woman lost her book deal, based largely on the output of a detection tool, that the person who flagged the story to the Times in the first place says it should be used, quote, only for guidance, not as proof of guilt. But that didn't keep a major publisher, a major newspaper, and the entire internet treating it like an incontravertible truth. So no, the real question to me is not about Mia Ballard

and whether or not she used AI. It's about what the formal process of dealing with these kinds of AI allegations should look like, and whether or not we're comfortable with them, being the precedent. So to truly understand the shy girl situation, we have to tell that whole story. All of these landmark cases are going to serve as the larger outline for how we treat future cases, which is why it's so important that we are so specific about how, who, when, where, and why is involved and what it means, because if there is no formal process in which this goes through, today, someone might think, oh, well, she deserved it, but tomorrow, if it's them or if it's someone else,

And they didn't, you know, that becomes a really messy situation. And so, you know, it's been interesting. It's one of my only videos so far that I've seen on my YouTube channel that's gotten really mixed, you know, in the comments. Like there are people who are very much, I think, black and white on the situation. And so I think that asking for that nuance is something that I'm hoping we can find ways to leverage in conversations like this. It feels to me like we have a little bit of a crisis of trust and authenticity and accountability. And so audiences are understandably, I think, very touchy and very tense about suspected AI use and conversations about, oh, did this person use AI? Because we're in this media landscape where you don't know who to trust.

So I don't think audiences who are responding in a certain kind of way about AI are wrong. They're right. We do have that. But exactly as you said to your point, the only conversation can't just be. this writer used AI, they suck, get them out of here, make an example of them, don't ask any questions of like the structural issues at play. Yeah, and like multiple things can be true at the same time, right? And I think that the biggest, my biggest point in this is that, like, yes, absolutely,

if you feel, you know, to your point, if you feel as though your trust was, was broken with this kind of writing, I absolutely agree. But it's in the same way we have like the FDA, right? Or we have these systems in place so that you don't have to worry about each individual piece of chicken you're buying from the store as being, you know, not having seminala, not you have these processes in place to make sure that you, the individual, aren't on a constant on edge trust. Oh, what happened?

Does this person use AI? Do they not? Does this chicken have salmonilla and it does it not? You trust in the environment and the government that has created this structure that says, here are all the tests we do to make sure that you, the individual, can breathe easy, knowing that you're buying chicken. It's not going to hurt you. And that's kind of what my point has been is that companies like Hichette,

should have, for the multi-billions of dollars that they make every year, should have a system in place. They went through months of editing this scroll's book. And if a goodreads was able to clock it within a few minutes, you have to think that an editor was able to. So then that brings up the question, well, who is held responsible when something like that is found? Absolutely, you know, if the author did wrong, that is on the author. But then that's a conversation that they should have, could have had and made the decision whether they want to go forward or not. rather than leaving now on this public display of, you know, letting the internet attack her from all corners.

And then you look at other people who similarly have been caught using AI, but then within a weekend it gets fixed. Like it just brings up the question, who is this really going to serve if we don't have those structures in place? It can't be me, a ballard's fault, just the same way it can't be always each individual artist's fault. We have to find a way that the system is going to work through this. Let's take a quick break.

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But according to McElroy's own blog post, he is not just a consultant. He says that he worked closely with the Times for over a month, answering their questions, even negotiating his own credit before that piece even ran. In his blog post called Shy Girl, the background to the New York Times story, he laments the fact that the Times didn't give him more credit for his role conceptualizing this piece. He writes, I brought the story to the paper and was assured that I would be credited as the source. That didn't happen. I've not had any follow-up queries. Why would I have? My role in the

story was apparently unimportant. And he's kind of right because if you've just read the Times piece, he's only quoted as an independent publishing consultant sounding the alarm. He is not identified as the person who brought the scoop to the Times or the person who worked with them over weeks to develop it. The Times does disclose, very briefly, that McElroy first learned about Shy Girl from an employee at Pancram. What they don't tell you is that employee at Pankram is a sales representative. Her job is to sell the exact product the Times later used as evidence in that same article. And the Times never disclosed that McElroy had a pre-existing professional relationship with Pangram CEO. The same company whose 78% figure sits at

the heart of the Times' own reporting. So the two sources the Times leaned on the most were not independent of each other. They were very much connected to each other and to this story long before they ever came to the paper. When I was doing my initial sort of podcast run through of what happened, I did not feel like I had a clear read on the role that the New York Times played in all of this. And in their, one of their initial pieces, the Times, they wrote, quote, the Times also analyzed passages from the novel using several AI detection tools and found recurring patterns characteristic of AI generated texts like gaps in logic, excessive use of melodramatic adjectives, and the over-reliance on the rule of three.

And so when I read that, I thought, okay, well, I guess the New York Times did their own investigation and they feel confident in saying they think this was AI generated, fine. The Times did not really do a very good job of explaining. just how this story came to be the players involved. And when I learned that from your reporting, I was like, I don't feel like we're being told the real story. It changes everything. It totally does.

And to act as though it doesn't, or it's like, well, it doesn't matter. She's still admitted to using AI. Absolutely. But does this, is this not worrisome to anybody? Because if we ignore this level of it, then we are doing the lobbying for tech pros for them, because that's essentially what this felt like it appeared to be to me.

You described this chain that starts with a Pangram sales employee who runs through a consultant with professional ties to Pangram and then ends with a scan produced by that same company, Pangram. Do I have that right? Yes, yeah. Thad McElroy or McElroy, I'm not sure I've pronounced the last name, but he was the one who brought this story as we come to find out through his own essay to the Times. He was the one who had gotten a call from Pangram. And this is according to him in his very in-depth essay, which is something that we can get into in a minute. But he got a call from this sales executive, this account executive, and was like they talked about it.

He brought the story to the Times. And, yeah, the Times quoted, you know, McCallroy goes on and email to me and in his own essay of how he ran it through these other checkers and all that. The one that is linked in his or in the New York Times story is the one to that pangram. Pangram X tweets or X, whatever you want to call it, X post. And so it's just a little curious how, you know, it goes from this, you know, got 2,000 views, like seven likes or something like that on X. And then now it's the centerpiece of this story, this company. Max Spiro, who calls himself an AI slop janitor on Twitter,

is the founder and chief executive of Pangram. He said he'd heard about the controversy back in January and that he ran his own test of the full text of the book. Just as a side note, according to the screenshot of his findings, it looks like he used a pirated copy of Shygirl from a website called Oceans of PDFs, a notoriously sketchy website that offers free downloads of copyrighted e-books in PDF. Mack said that his scan indicated the book was 78% AI generated. He tweeted his findings saying, I'm very confident that this is largely AI generated or very heavily AI assisted. That was back in January.

His post honestly did not get a lot of traction. Until Thad McElroy, that friend of his, stepped in and packaged the entire thing for the Times with Pancram's AI detection services at the heart of it. Drago's on to point out how none of this backstory made it into the New York Times article. The dots between Sparrow's original post on X and the huge, splashy, viral media story that ended a young black author's career remained unconnected in that article. So you were able to recreate this one from his public public blog post describing it. And I will say in the blog post, I would describe it as almost kind of salty that he was not given more credit.

He talks about how he works with a reporter. I mean, it's like, I don't want to like, I'm being, I'm being very generous. We'll link to the post and people can decide for themselves. He opens with it and closes with it. Yes. And he's like, I worked with these journalists for months on this story. At time and time again, they told me that like I would be credited as a source and like it would make clear that this is a story that I had a big hand in. And he basically is like, oh, next time I do a story like this, I'm going to put it on my own website because it's not worth it to go through the times and all of that. It's just really hard for me to not read that post and be like, this was somebody who was trying to make a name for themselves by,

he specifically says he doesn't want to ambush this writer, but by, I'm ambushing them. I guess that's how, that's my opinion. I feel like it is an ambush. He said throughout his blog, he did not, he wanted to have a conversation with Mia, but he did not want to go through Hachette, which was the only way he could reach out to Mia,

because he didn't want to tip Hichette off to the story that he was writing, which by different. kind of feels like an ambush. But yeah, and so he, you know, he said to me within the email as well that he's like, well, I do hope that you'll give me a chance to comment and said before you write any allegations, I'm like, oh, like this email that I'm sending right now is your chance to comment. Yet, this is what you do. It's about, you know, as journalistic integrity, at least the way that I see it is it's not

your role to have post-publication debate management, but it's your role to give pre-publication, you know, contact to give them a chance. to speak. So he did not extend the same thing to Mia Ballard, it seems. Despite saying that he worked with the Times for over a month to build this story, Fat McElroy never once reached out to Mia Ballard. And according to Mia herself, the New York Times didn't contact her until the same day that their story about her ran. McElroy addressed this in his blog post, writing that he would have liked to interview Mia, but that going through Hachette would have tipped them off and compromised the scoop.

So he made a choice, and the choice was the story over giving Mia any kind of chance to respond to these allegations. But what makes this reasoning hard for me to swallow is that when Dre reached out to McElroy for comment on her own reporting, he asked Dre to give him a heads up before making any allegations so that he could respond. A courtesy he apparently felt entitled to for himself, but did not think that Mia Ballard deserved. When I found out from your video, you were in touch with Mia. And when I found out from that video that the first time the New York Times reached out to her, she says was the day that the New York Times article went live, my jaw was dropped. I was, I cannot even fathom it. Right?

So like with McElroy, if he is like, well, I don't want to reach out to his chat because I don't want to tip them off on the story. I don't love it, but okay. The New York Times, they know better. They know better than to the same day that your story is going, or they should. They should know better than to... You have to think, like, so they, so one of two things either happened then,

either the New York Times did not get in contact once with Hichette until the day of their publishing, which would be weird to spend five weeks on a case that what Hichet did not get any heads up on, or they did reach out to Hichette earlier than publication did. and Hachette and then gave them some heads up where they were able to do a few things here and there

with the contract to then the day that it drops that Mia is taken by surprise. All of a sudden the contract is ready to be dropped. Lawyers are ready to fight it if there's any push. So one of two things happened and either way, it's kind of bullshit for Mia. Like that sucks whether she used AI or she didn't use AI that this is an ambush of an artist

who did not get a chance to defend herself. And then the goal of somebody to then later on in their blog say, you know, and Hushet, I think, her, you know, threw Mia under the bus and, you know, did not give her a chance to defend herself. Nobody in this story, I apparently am the only one that got in contact with her. So it's like, this is kind of crazy. Yeah, and something else I found really telling about McElroy's explanation of what happened

here is when he says, well, Mia, it's almost like, who is Mia Ballard? She doesn't really have a social media presence. I was able to find one kind of like sketchy website for an old book that doesn't work anymore, basically blaming her for not having a big digital footprint and making herself more difficult, according to him, to get in contact with. But then you were able to get in contact with her just fine. Well, yeah, and also think about it.

He wrote his blog post, you know, maybe a few days after the New York Times article came out, she pulled down her social accounts because the hate she was getting, I'm sure, was across the board. Like, you have this brand new, like, author who is new to this, is going to get attacked from every corner and does not have the protection of this industry that said, we will help you and protect you through this. And so, like, I don't know how you can blame somebody like that for not being reachable. Of course, she's scared and does not want to be reached.

And, you know, yeah, I just think that it's, it is pretty crazy. And Mia was very willing to chat with me. Obviously, I will let her, she's going through her own stuff. But she, you know, my biggest thing was that, like, how are you doing, you know, because the opening of what she said to the Times was that her mental health has never been lower. And, you know, she's now left to the wolves. And Heshet gets to walk away saying,

we are just so, we love our artists. We're artists friendly and we always want to be. And so that's why we did this. To me, this could not be a clearer distinction of how you feel about artists. Yeah. And it took this situation for one individual writer to be thrown to the wolves, as you say,

for Heshet to come out and say, well, here is our expanded statement on AI. And part of me is thinking in 2026, like, it's wild to me that it took this situation for them to even put out a clarified statement about where they stand with AI. And that, I think, really speaks to your point of, like, industries and big moneyed companies, private companies that make tons and tons of money and publishing is their thing, is their business.

They are falling short. And that it is individual writers, whether they use AI or not, who are absorbing the impact of that. And it's where the conversation starts and always stops. And it's the same logic running all the way up to the federal level, which was, I think my bigger point in all of it that I hope gets across is that the White House framework that landed on Congress's desk, the same day that the New York Times published on March 30, March 19.

And, you know, the facts that that same week, the shy girl's story broke, recommend, you know, the AI training on copyright material be not treated as infringement, which is what part of that Congress framework was, and that no federal, you know, regulatory lobby or body be created and that the states be blocked if they try to create any of their own AI protections. I mean, all of it does is show that the artist is always going to be the one held responsible. And, you know, to be quite frank, in my opinion, whether an artist is a good writer, a bad writer, uses AI or doesn't use AI. I have my own.

standard for which authors I read. And that is totally up to me in the same way. It's totally up to anybody else. But my standard for buying a published book is going to be probably similar to that of other people. So that says, okay, we need to then turn to, you know, the people who are making the chicken and say, why is there salmon in this chicken? That's not good. Your whole corporation makes too much money for the San Manila to be in this chicken. Yes. I'm so glad that you keep bringing it back to that federal legislation because I think that shows that we're just having the wrong conversation and that something is very wrong here in terms of who is expected to absorb the blowback when it comes to this kind of thing. And also, like you, I just can't accept that nobody got

to the point where they thought something is up here. The fact that it didn't take long for this book to get clocked as may perhaps parts of it being generated by AI on Goodreads and YouTube and Reddit I just, I don't, I don't buy that this is the first that the publishing company heard of it. Just as though I don't buy that the first time the New York Times reached out to either of them was the day of. I think Hachette probably, it seems to me, it appears that they probably would have gotten a heads up. And yeah, it, like Mia is just one cautionary tale of that bad process. More after a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guide, not quite.

Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends, me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffee. to Bob Odenkirk, to David Letterman, help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an acapella band with their between songs banter. The worst singer in the group? The worst?

Yeah. Me. Is there anything to the idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. The group. The yard birds, right? That's the name. The Harvard Yard.

But they're open. Do you have a name? We're open. Since you guys are middle-aged, one erection. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Humor me. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again.

More Americans listen to podcasts than ad-supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business. Think IHart. Streaming, radio, and podcasting. Call 844-844-I-Hart to get started.

That's 844-8-4-I-Hart. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast Point Game is about defining the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs. without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what. He's the smartest player to ever play the game.

His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall.

And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis is our offense. And when IT's friends stopped by, like Quentin Richardson, we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nash would get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court, licking his fingers why he got the ball. Like, after you go through a training camp with that, IZAD,

you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up and down the court, and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva, actress, mother, lover, and a Gen X woman walking through life one hot flash and hormonal crying jag at a time. You ladies know what I mean.

I'll bet you a parameda apostle chin here you do. So let's talk about it. Join me on my new podcast. How hard can it be with the Adamania Riva where I call on my GenX squads from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate Midlife's most fantastic BS. All of a sudden I'd had

hanginess happening on my own. I was like, what the hell is that? I was married when I had her so I didn't even consider how empty that nest was going to be. Mood swings, night sweats, fupas, sex drive. Wait, what sex? Dating at 45.

How hard can it be? How can it be? How can't be? That one's kind of hard now? Well, that's lighting. They say we can't polish a turd, but we're sure going to try. So let's get blunt with laughs, tears, or tears of laughter, and dive into it, unfiltered and unbothered and ask,

how hard can it be? I cannot believe I'm about to say this out loud in public. Listen to how hard can it be with the Anna Maria Riva, as part of my Cultura Podcast Network available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, everyone. I'm Cheryl Stray, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I'm excited to share that I have a new podcast called Mind Over Mountain. In each episode, I interview athletes, adventurers, and adrenaline seekers

to discuss the inner landscapes and life experiences that informed and inspired their extraordinary feats. I also bring a bit of advice into the mix. So we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. Do you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to pull out what you already have inside. We're coming into this world, fighting for our lives. All I'm going to do is pull out what you already got inside. We're there to support and celebrate each other.

And that's not like your story versus my story. You're going to walk up and over that dang mountain. You're not just going to put your mind over it. Yep, yep, exactly. And if I can't walk up and over it, I'm going to go through it. Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get right back into it. Mia may be the first person that we know about losing a book deal with one of the big publishers because of AI allegations.

But she is far from the first person to face allegations like this. Because, believe it or not, that McElroy, that consultant that brought the allegations about Mia using AI to the times in the first place, also faced allegations of AI youth in his own book. About eight months before any of this happened, Thad McElroy published a book called The AI Revolution in Book Publishing. Ingram, the biggest book distributor in the country, flagged it and pulled it from distribution after their automated AI detection filters identified it as AI generated. But after Thad McElroy posted about the issue on LinkedIn, within hours, a senior Ingram executive personally respond and offered to look into it. And by Monday, his book was back.

The normal appeals process at Ingram takes up to 14 business days, and according to authors who have been through it, can stretch to months. But Thad McElroy got it resolved over a weekend because somebody with power knew his name. He even publicly said at the time that he worried how many other authors might find themselves in a similar situation and whether or not our current systems were robust enough to protect them. Yet, eight months later, he put a debut Black woman author in exactly that same position. And unfortunately for her, I guess nobody with the right kind of power knew her name to step in. You look at somebody like, you know, the person who wrote the blog, Thad McCallroy, who had the same thing happened to him in 2024, wrote a book about AI,

in publishing and the people, the company that took that book out, they classified his as being AI written. And he got his fix in a weekend. One of the publishers or executives over at the company reached out and they were able to find, you know, some way over the course of a two-day weekend to get it back on shelves by Monday, which I think speaks volumes. When I was watching your video over the weekend, that was the revelation that floored me. And I'm I was planning an episode where I was like, oh, like, Dray's reporting on this has been so great. I'll cite Dray's reporting. At that point of your video, I paused and I was like, I'm actually emailing Jare to come on the podcast because I was so floored.

Yeah. The facts that he was able to just like post on LinkedIn, I think it was Ingram, like getting an Ingram, yeah, getting an Ingram executive to be like, we'll handle this. I think that really says it all. And you frame this as kind of one rule for important people. And then one rule for everybody else. If you're important enough, the head of a book distributor will personally handle this in a couple of days that it'll be no problem. If you're someone deemed not important enough, perhaps because you're a black woman like Mia Ballard, it's a completely different set of rules. And I'm curious, how do you see this as a structural disparity working in publishing?

I think the race element of it plays a huge part. And, you know, some of the pushback I think I've gotten from some people in my comment section was like, oh, well, you know, excusing AI writing as being okay is, you know, does nothing to do with her race. And I just think, you know, in my opinion, first of all, we're not even having a discussion about whether this is okay or not to use AI. It's just about who absorbs the, you know, at the end of the day, who absorbs the fault of it. And I think that, you know, the publishing, the new publishing standards said the same thing. And I think how can you not at least ask the question. of what played a role in this when, you know, a 50-some-year-old white guy has the same thing happened to him and it gets fixed over a weekend. I think you have to ask yourself, you know, if this tool was the thing, Pan Graham, as being one of the reasons that the, the Hachette lets let me go, then you have to ask, well, what is this, what is this tool trained on? What are its biases? Because time and time again, there are academic studies that prove that There are so many racial biases in those AI detection tools and so forth.

So, yeah, I think that they're, I think it's worth publicly questioning what is in place to protect authors who are either, you know, people of color or just new and emerging and, you know, get, and really be clear about what the structural bias there is. Because if it's made by, and if it's made by a tech bro, it's going to have some. Now, Max Spiro told the New York Times that Pangram has a false positive rate around 1 and 10,000. But independent research tells a very different story about AI detection tools broadly. No AI detection tool exceeds 85% accuracy across all models, and accuracy drops below 50% for mixed or edited content, which is exactly what an edited book would be. Even Thad McElroy himself has written that these scores are not verdicts,

and that they should not be used alone in high-stakes decisions. A standard that it seems to me he helped set and then ignored. These tools are also unreliable in a specific direction. Research has shown that they disproportionately flagged text written by non-native speakers as AI generated, with one Stanford study showing an average false positive rate of 61.3% for non-native speakers. Because they're trained on standard American or British English, anything outside of these norms is obviously more likely to get flagged. Now, I don't know if Mia Ballard is a non-native English speaker, she might not be,

so I don't know exactly how her writing registered against those biases. But what I do know is that a tool with documented racial and linguistic blind spots was used as the primary evidence to end a black woman's writing career. And she was not really given an opportunity to meaning. defend herself. So regardless of whether she did or did not use AI to write this book, I have a big problem with that process. And I do not think that this should be the standard for what that process looks like. I think the Times spoke to a computer scientist and professor at Stony Brook University about Pancram and he was like, well, it can make mistakes. And he didn't work at Pancram, but he was like,

I use this to determine whether things or not are AI generated or not. It can make mistakes, but I still stand by it. And I think it's important to note that I, in my opinion, and I'm no computer scientist, but calling it mistakes isn't right. The real way to put that is like it has been shown to be biased. It's biased against non-native speakers of anybody that wasn't, that anybody who did not, who writes or speaks outside of a very specific. training data that it was trained on that we know is biased.

And so also look at look at the report and what it flags too. Like it flags literally like as small as something that's like an apostrophe T and like a word that comes after it. Like from what I just saw, it seems unrealistic. Somebody made a point in my comments like, I want to bring up to really quick that said, you know, these tools, these AI tools are trained on us. So they're trained on our verbiage and our repetition of the way we speak. And then what?

It's going to lean heavily in its weights more one way or the other. And then this thing is going to say, oh, this is bad because this looks like it was AI generated based off of the training material is still us at the end of the day. So it's such a mind fuck. Like. Yeah, I saw a, there was a op-ed in the times by an author whose name I'm blanking where she said the issue was not that I write like AI. AI writes like me. AI writes like us. Exactly.

And I think it's just like I think that the dignity of the author. author, somebody like Mia, if Mia was a more established author, somebody who, you know, had some more pull in the industry, they would have treated that conversation very differently than Mia finding out the same time the rest of the world that her contract is dissolved. They would not treat that McElroy that way. They would not treat, you know, a number of authors that way, but they're going to treat Mia. And so I just think, yeah, it's worth taking into consideration every angle of this because we need to be very clear if what we're asking and what I'm asking for is a framework of what actually needs to be a standard, you know,

cross the industry, then we have to be very clear about what that standard is and isn't. And, you know, those are hard conversations to have, but I think that they're important. Yes. And McElroy himself says that these detection reports should only be used, quote, only for guidance, not as proof of guilt. But in this case, his own scan and these scans, that was the only proof that we have. Like, that was the only, If you could even call it proof, like that's what this entire conversation is built on. And then Mia, you know, said, well, you know, she admitted to a person or, you know, an editor who came in at some point and used it. And who knows if that's true or not? It could be one of those things that somebody was like, oh, God, I'm scared now.

Like, let's just put it on somebody else. Or it could have happened. It could. I don't know. But I think that most importantly, the fact that, yeah, that this, you know, op-ed by the New York Times was, seems to be the catalyst of that, you know, or it was, you know, maybe they saw some of the pushback in Hachette, meaning in the Reddit threads and in some of these videos like from Frankie and whatnot, they could have said, oh, this is getting bad press. Now, we need a reason to drop it. Like, there's too many unknowns that they aren't forthcoming about what their internal process was that to me says, well, I have a lot of distrust in Hichet because if they're going to rely on, let's say they saw Frankie, you know, Frankie Shelf's video and on top of that, the Pancram video or whatever,

It just makes me wonder, well, what is your standard then, Hachet? Because you clearly, you're not willing to back up what you said. This is a good book. We want it under our name. We're going to start selling copies. Like, you didn't even come to bat for the fact that you, you know, Pan Graham used a stolen copy of a writer's book. Here you are in court with Google and Open AI and all these other companies fighting for your artists because you love artists. And one of your artists is now being, this is being waged against her.

And I would have a lot more respect for a company who says, hey, we'll talk about that. But first of all, where did you get that book and copy of the book? Because you didn't buy it from us. And that's our author's work. So you owe her money for that. Like, that's somebody who protects their artists and then has enough dignity and respect for them to have a conversation, you know, between them to say, like, here's what we can and can't do for you. But like, the way that this unfolded just makes me really scared for future authors. Yeah. It is pretty ironic to be having this conversation about the youth. of AI and creative work. And then I think it was Max in his initial tweet or post on X about this in the screenshot of the version of Shy Girl that he

used for the scan. It's very clear that it's a pirated copy. In the headline itself. Yeah. Whether people are like, oh, I don't like these AI scanners, but like, you know, Mia's still in the wrong. Like, right, but like right now when we keep saying like, okay, but this is just throw it away. We don't

like the AI scanners. I'm focused on hating me. I'm like, you're doing some lobbying for this guy. who is literally stealing copies of books and trying to make PR campaigns out of them. Like, that sucks. Like, and yeah, it is is very ironic. And I would think that Hichet being in these lawsuits would want to also, you know, go after every one of the people who, you know, come in between an author and their work. But apparently it seems as though it's only the, you know, high prize, like big profile,

you know, tech accountability. And then when it comes to the individual authors like Mia Ballard, I guess she's just one of the few that has to, you know, absorb that impact. More after a quick break. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guide. Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Jim Gaffigan

to Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel, help an Acapella band with their between songs banter. There's the worst singer in the group. The worst? Yeah.

Me. Is there anything to the idea? idea that because you're from Harvard, you only got in because your parents made a huge donation. The group. The yard birds, right? That's the name.

The Harvard Yardt. They're open. Do you have a name suggestion? We're open. Since you guys are middle-aged, one erection. Listen to humor me with Robert Smygel and friends on the I-Heart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

You're the name. I need some jokes to make me seem funny. Run a business and not thinking about podcasting, think again. More Americans listen to podcasts than ads supported streaming music from Spotify and Pandora. And as the number one podcaster, IHearts twice as large as the next two combined. So whatever your customers listen to, they'll hear your message. Plus, only IHeart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio. Think podcasting can help your business.

Think IHart, streaming, radio, and podcasting. Let us show you at IHart. Advertvertising.com. That's iHeartadvertising.com. What's up, fam? It's Isaiah Thomas. And I'm C.J. Toledano, and our podcast, Point Game is about defying the odds. Like LeBron heading into the playoffs without Luca and Austin Reed. And finding ways to win no matter what.

He's the smartest player to ever play the game. His IQ is at a level that we've never seen before. And he knows. Without Luca and Austin Reeves, I got to manipulate the game. We get a player's perspective on the challenges of the playoffs. I think Joker's going to be a game. exhausted this series because when they don't have Rudy in the lineup, he has to really guard guys like Nas Reid. He has to guard Julius Randall. And then he has to give us everything he gives us on the night-to-night basis on offense. And when IT's friends stop by, like Quentin Richardson,

we dive into some playoff history too. Steve Nash will get that thing. That man, hell get the flying. He running up the court licking his fingers why he got the bar like, after you go through a training camp with that, Isaiah, you figure it out real quick. Get your ass up. Get your ass up. and down the court and you're going to get the ball. So listen to Point Game on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, everyone. I'm Cheryl Strayed, author of

Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I'm excited to share that I have a new podcast called Mind Over Mountain. In each episode, I interview athletes, adventurers, and adrenaline seekers to discuss the inner landscapes and life experiences that informed and inspired

their extraordinary feats. I also bring a bit of advice into the mix so we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. Do you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to pull out what you already have inside. We're coming into this world fighting for our lives. All I'm going to do is pull out what you already got inside. We're there to support and celebrate each other. And that's not like your story versus my story. You're going to walk up and over that dang mountain. You're not just going to put your mind over it. Yep, yep, exactly. And if I can't walk up and over it, I'm going to go through it.

Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Deanna Maria Riva, actress, mother, lover, and a Gen X woman walking through life one hot flash and hormonal crying jag at a time. You ladies know what I mean. I'll bet you a paramedoenipausal chin here you do. So let's talk about it. Join me on my new podcast. How hard can it be with Deanna Maria Riva, where I call on my GenX squads from Ohio to Hollywood as we navigate midlife's most fantastic BS. All of a sudden, I'd had hanginess happening on my own.

I was like, what the hell is that? I was married when I had her, so I didn't even consider how empty that nest was going to be. Mood swings, night sweats, fupas, sex drive. Wait, what sex? Dating at 45. How can it be getting naked at 50 with a new guy? That one's kind of hard. Well, that's lighting.

They say we can't polish a turd, but we're sure going to try. So let's get blunt with laughs, tears, or tears of laughter. And dive into it, unfiltered and unbothered and ask, how hard can it be? I cannot believe I'm about to say this out loud in public. Listen to How Hard Can It Be with Diana Maria Riva as part of My Cultura podcast network available on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get right back into it. I know this is a little bit different because I think that he has a completely different publishing model and all of that. But when I was researching initially the Mia Ballard situation, it was around the same time that that memoirist James Frey was doing press for his newest book.

And like, you might remember he wrote a memoir called A Million Little Pieces. That memoir was debunked. He went on Oprah like many, many years ago. And Oprah was like, why did you write a memoir full of lies? Well, he has a new book out. And at times, he has talked about how he has used AI and his writing. He's given inconsistent statements, but I was just struck by the fact that he was, you know, I think it was, I'm forgetting the outlet that called him this, but it was like, the bad boy of right, the literary bad boy is back, right? He was getting like very glowing praise for his work. And none of the sort of like, like, like scrutiny about whether or not this work was AI generated, even after he published. publicly talked about the way that he uses AI in his creative writing.

And it just was interesting to me, who gets a witch hunt and who doesn't? It's not about race or women that we are making it about. We're making it about something completely separate. This is about AI integrity, right? And it's just not lost on me that the first person that we know of to lose a book deal with a big publisher is a black woman. It's just like that there are so few of us in publishing in general. were already underrepresented, that can't be a coincidence. Yeah, it's worth examining, and I'll keep saying that.

And, you know, I think that there's a difference in making something the center of the story and making it something that, again, like, this story has a lot of things we need to hold at once, which makes it a very difficult conversation. But the more difficult a conversation is the more important it probably is to have. And that is one facet of it. And as a white woman looking at this, you know, I, I, can say, I can look at this and say, I wonder if I would have had the same experience that me I had. I wonder if Hachette would have reached out to me beforehand or I have agents. I wonder

if they would have, you know, because I have agents protecting me, like they would have reached out to them. Like there are so many different ways that this could, again, could have been handled and wasn't. And yeah, it just felt like something that is worth bringing up because it's always, it feels like people of color, communities of color that whenever we have a new set of rules, a lack of rules, you know, law and for whatever it is, it always gets tested there first. And then the first fall guys are always end up being, I mean, you look at the syphilis experiments, right? I mean, like any of them, like it's always people of color because their voices matter a little bit less than everybody else's.

And then we look back on it 20 years later and we're like, oh, that sucks how that happened. We never can let that happen again until it comes time for it. And then it's like, well, no, this is about this, not about that. Like, it's about a lot of things. I got the sense from your reporting that the major players who pitch this story and, you know, got it to the times, that they had been sniffing around the internet for a book with allegations around being AI generated to get press for this company and this AI detection software. And then they found one in Shy Girl. Is that also your sense? You know, I won't speculate too much on that, but what I will say is when I, like, I'm looking at Pangram's website right now, and I'm looking at how you have these huge universities, like the University of Maryland and Stony Brook University using Pangram. And you have these, you know, I think it's worth stating that there is definitely, you've got the chat GPT zeros who are, you know, originality AI, you know, Robert A.A.I, whatever all of these. They're all in a, in this year is going to, is a huge tech. like, you know, you either win or you lose, like make it or break it type year.

This is a company who I see that has a lot to lose if they are not seen as the standard. And especially with all the competition out there, if you type in just AI check or whatever, or the GBT zero is like one of the first ones that comes up. And so I think that there's a high competition for products to get in that spot. And that's all I'll say about that is it shows a false positive rate that has no third party, like, you know, looking at if that's true or not, even if, like, giving them the benefit of the doubt, what was it one in 10,000, is that giving a false positive? I mean, I'm looking at the Nia Ballard's shy girl report, and there is more than, like, a couple hundred points in that

that are not, that were flagged as AI and clearly not. But, you know, I think that they have a lot more to lose if they don't get ahead in this. And I think that it, it sure seems like it worked out in their favor, doesn't it? It sure does. Pangram's website features testimonials from individual customers who are affiliated with Stony Brook University and University of Maryland. But as far as I can tell, neither of those universities have an official contract with Pangram.

Stony Brook uses an AI detection tool called Turn It In, which is popular among many universities. However, many large universities have actually banned faculty and staff from using AI detection tools, specifically because of the problems with accuracy and false positives that Dray is describing. The list of universities that have turned away from AI detection tools includes MIT, Yale, NYU, Berkeley, Georgetown, Vanderbilt, Northwestern, and many, many others. U.T. Austin has gone even further and strictly prohibited all third-party AI detection software for evaluating any student work.

And faculty are warned that even if they purchase such a lot of research such a lot of research. tools with their personal money, they can be held personally liable for damages to students if those students are falsely accused. You put it well that, let's just be clear, Pangram's business model depends on publishers believing that their AI detection and that AI detection in general is reliable and is consequential. And so setting aside the question of whether or not this specific author Mia used AI or not, I do think we should be asking about this incentive structure that is profiting from understandable AI panic and that company is also supplying the evidence in these high profile AI cases where someone who doesn't have a lot of structural protection

can lose everything. And the New York Times didn't even disclose that they have an existing relationship with McElroy or McHallory's existing relationship with Pancram. I mean, I'm on Pancram's website and they have a whole subsection for publishing media, for universities, for law firm. So they in each one of these facets for recruiters, they need to have a certain level of trust in that and seeing all the talk online on these Reddit threads that were arguably the first AI catchers of people who were like, this seems like AI, they thought, oh, great, here is a chance to do that. And the New York Times, you know, did not state at all, like they have a preexisting relationship with McAllroy. They made him seem like this independent third party. McHallroy did not

state his, you know, relationship with Max Barrow, which he'd known for you. and that the first he had heard of this story, like it was from them until he wrote his block like there were so many people that you have to ask what the reason behind this was. And regardless of how you feel about Mia Ballard, her writing or whether or not she's AI, the facts that media and tech are working this closely together should be very, very concerning to everybody, especially after the fact that Sam Holman just bought a media company. And so like tech is going after media for this reason. like this is how they're going to get more of the market.

And so if we could just for a second chill on Mia Ballard and pivot over to these guys and say, what the hell are you doing? Like that would be great. I personally would just love that. And I always make this point on the show that the standard that we give and the leeway that we give tech companies and the tech pros and tech leaders that run them is absurd. If other industries or other companies tried this, we would have something to say about it. If a pharmaceutical company, if their sales rep brought a story to a journalist at the Times, and that story relied entirely on that same company's product as its key piece of evidence,

we would call that what it is, a conflict of interest. Yeah, don't worry. McCallory will put it through GPT Zero, though, too. So it's like, it's kind of like having an independent third party investigator. Yeah, and the fact that the New York Times didn't, you have to assume they didn't either look closely at the X post, or they just did and they didn't care. But the fact that it said Oceans of PDF, but you don't even have to click on the report, it says Oceans of PDF right under the name. And Oceans of PDF was one of the terms, I think, flagged over 2,000 times in the report

as being AI generated. Like, you have to ask what was their reason for publishing the story? You know, and that's where I get into the question and not an allegation, but the question of they have no reason to publish this other than did they get in touch with Hachette and Hachette's like, there's too much chatter going on about this book being AI. I don't know if we're going to really see a profit on it like we thought, hey, New York Times, it would be great if we had a, like, you have to ask.

Like, and that's where my brain immediately goes, and I hope that that's false. And I would hope that Hachette would be more honest if, you know, about whether or not authors are hitting a mark or not. But yeah, it just seems like there's a lot of people who had a lot to gain from, from this story. And the New York Times still, this day has not come forward with any additions, anything. Yeah, I mean, that was going to be one of my questions is, why do you think that nobody in

this chain applied, I think the sort of like basic baseline standard of at least saying like, hey, we have XYZ relationship with Pancryam. We have XYZ relationship with McElroy. Do you think it's just a system where media and tech are kind of locked in together? They both have a lot to lose. So they're just sort of not applying what we would think of as like basic standards? You know, I don't know. And I can only speculate, you know, on it. I'll say that I would, the only reason I would think you wouldn't do that is because this is not about you or what you're publishing. This is about somebody else you're publishing on behalf of.

And that's all I can think of is because if I were a journalist with my name on a story, I would think that I would want as much information to be as accurate or to disclose as much of that as possible. Because if I wanted to have a real conversation about this, then that's what we should be having a real conversation about. And it just doesn't seem like that was the intention of this article. I don't know what the intention of this article was, but it does make me curious about why it was written. Yeah. And the thing that you come back to a lot in your video that really stuck with me is it's really asking the question of who, gets to set the standard and who is just expected to play by that standard that someone has set, right? Like it does seem to be like there is one set of rules being established for one group of

people and then a completely other set of rules being established for others. And it's just up to you to know who you are and what set of rules that you're meant to to abide by. Yeah. I mean, I think that, you know, I've, I get a lot of messages nowadays. I don't think McCallory McElroy is very happy with my article. But I think that the facts that I was asked to give them more decency than anybody else was given in this story about checking in to make sure that nobody's name was drug through the mud, speaks volumes as to what the expectations are from people who are used to having one set of treatment in this industry versus others who just have to deal with the results that we're given. and like nobody, nobody gets to question it. Well, Dray, he's a white guy. Like, of course you would want to give him this courtesy.

I mean, it's not enough that I gave the courtesy of just clarifying, you know, his own story. But God forbid I use his own words in my investigation. Yeah, it is one of those things that's infuriated as just a woman. Like, it's infuriating how people want to talk over, you know, factual evidence because of what standard they're used to in this industry. And then on top of that, I can't imagine like being a woman of color where it's like, not only are we going to talk over you, but we're going to completely drag your name through the mud and you don't get a chance to respond. Here's our reaching out to you as the New York Times. The article publishes in one hour have good luck.

Yeah. I cannot imagine the way that the way that I would come for these people is beyond. And whether Mia does or doesn't is totally after her. Like it can be a very expensive process to go against companies like this. But she, you know, she knows very well that at the very least she would have me behind her in that and that sucks. Yeah, I've been following the reaction, just the public like comments and stuff on your videos on this. And a lot of people accuse you of like caping for me, being like, no, no, I like, and it's, and I guess my question is why do you, it's clear to me that you're not saying it's okay or it's good that Mia used AI. It's clear to me that you're not saying, you know, AI in writing is good. Why do you think it's so hard for people to focus on the process,

the larger kind of systemic questions that you are raising rather than this black and white, did Mia use AI or not conversation? I think because it asks people to look beyond one truth at the same time. And I think that it's really, it feels better to us and it feels more resolved to say, bad guy, good guy, end of story. And as we know that that's in life, just not true in general. But like, especially with a story like this, people who do things that we don't agree with and are bad, like, you know, her taking the, you know, another artist's painting for the cover of her book, that that's bad. You know, and a lot of some of the people that you mentioned, they brought that up.

up as well as like she's got a history of stealing like that I can agree with as bad but in the same way that somebody you know tried for theft doesn't always deserve the death penalty like that's it's it's the same kind of conversation where it's like could this standard have been higher from she could have left her book self-published and we could have all chosen whether we want to support that kind of person or not whether we want to buy the book but now that hashet pulled it off shelf started remarking stuff. She can't put that book back out as herself anymore. Like, Hachet's name is attached with.

There's going to be all these legal issues if she does. So it feels as though, like, yeah, that they ruined something that we could have used our own money to vote on. But now they want also for us to use our own money to vote on and also not have them be a part of the equation when that should have been the case. Yeah, I think it's just, I think people find it much easier to hold one truth, you know, as the main, you know, here's a villain, here's not. it sucks because I would encourage people to learn to hold both of those because one day

it's not going to be so black and white with you. And I would hope that you would give, you know, I would hope that other people give you somebody that they don't know that you are innocent until proven guilty rather than guilty until proven innocent kind of mentality. Because I think that once we switch to that, we get into a really dark place as a country. You know, I don't have to like the idea that an author might use. use AI for their book. But that does it, but I'm not going to let that personal feeling then have me cheerleading a bunch of tech bros who got together to essentially try to manufacture credibility for their

AI detection tool that they benefit from that we already know is probably biased. They've done it in a really shady way that has been totally untransparent. Like, you don't have to like a. or be cheerleading the use of AI in writing to be like, well, I don't have to sign up for that. Yeah, or to have like, you know, I personally don't like, I think it's distasteful for a CEO of a company who he calls himself, I think, on X, the garbage man of AI Slop or like the janitor of AI Slop. To, to post, you know, publicly on somebody else's post talking about AI use to then like public, you know, this report that's like, hey, here's what we found. Like, to me, that's distasteful. Whether it's legal or not is beyond me. but I think that it speaks to this larger issue of the White House does not want to defend

the people who are on the side of this retaliation from tech companies. It's going to be on the tech company's side. And that is a really big problem for me. And why I think more than anything, if we really love artists and we really care about artists the way we say we do, we need to be standing up for what their rights are, a right to being, you know, innocent until proven guilty, all of those things. And whether you personally think she's guilty or not, based off of what you've read, based off what you've seen, that is your right,

but she has the right to not have this happen the way that it did. And I, that's, that's, yeah, my core thesis here, because, like, I didn't read the book. I've seen the passages that people have put out. And, like, maybe they are AI, maybe they aren't. But that is, like, the least of my worries in this conversation. What do you think this entire saga tells us about how prepared or perhaps unprepared major publishers are,

when it comes to actually investigating these accusations rather than just reacting to them. I think it tells us that our country is woefully unprepared for AI at all without any regulations or guardrails. And I think it shows that are on a legislative level, because we have at this administration saying that we want states not to be able to have laws, we want everybody to have to just go by what the federal, you know, open, you know, it's an open market. anybody who wants to do anything can. I think it speaks to beyond publishers. It speaks to, you know, filmmaking. It speaks to any artistic endeavor. It speaks to employment in general. We don't have a standard for how HR, a lot of HR is the first to get automated in these companies. And HR is like, you know, we've seen the stories from Amazon where they go through resumes and they automatically, if somebody's a woman, they assume less experience than if somebody's a man.

Like it speaks to as a country, how willfully unprepared for this we are. And until we actively, fight back. It's going to be the people at the bottom of this food chain that we've created in this country that are going to be the ones who reap these results. And then one day it's going to happen to the wrong person, the wrong person who has money and establishment and whatever, that then we change the rule. And I'm just trying to get ahead of that before we how many other people have to lose careers before we come to that conclusion, you know? I walked away from reading your piece and watching your video feeling like, as you say, like our window for regulation in a meaningful way is kind of quickly closing.

Are you worried about this? Like, are you worried that we're going to do nothing? And then we're just going to be left with this like horrible system? Yeah, I'm worried that we're, it's the same rules of war, right? Where it's like, well, in times of war, we allow for anything on behalf of national security to happen and we'll clean it up later. And I'm worried that that is exactly what we're doing with AI where it's like, let's cut the red tape. let's do anything that we need to do now and whatever happens, we'll clean it up later. And like cleaning things up later always takes longer.

It always affects more people and it worries me immensely. And I, I, for one time in our country's history, if we could not, you know, rely on janitors of AI slop and we could, you know, worry about the people who are constructing these buildings or, you know, the people who are putting out these pieces of meat to get ahead of all this illness. this is about to come our way, that, yeah, that makes me very worried, which is why I think being loud about this is important and why podcasts like yours who want to talk about this is really important because a lot of people aren't willing to have this conversation because it is very difficult. And it makes, it asks a lot of questions of yourself and of a government who is not prepared to answer it, but that doesn't mean we should be any quieter about it. Here, here. You know, one of my last questions for you is you don't have a newsroom.

We don't have a consulting firm. You are one person putting things together on substack and on YouTube. Yet, by far and away, you are doing the most in-depth reporting, following of threads, turning this into like a real tech accountability story. Why do you think it, like, where is everybody else? How did you get ahead of this? And how are you just as one person doing this kind of deep dive reporting that institutions should be doing that have more resources than you but are not doing? Well, I think what we want out of it, I think, differs from me from institutional media.

I don't have to answer to anybody but me and my audience. And yeah, I mean, look, every generation needs a good dossier, which is why the dray dossier exists. But as somebody who's worked in media, you know, I used to work in Hollywood and then has worked on the tech startup side for a little bit. I've seen a lot of different angles of how people talk about this stuff. And tech accountability is more than just, you know, taking Sam Altman to court. It's on every level of every person who this affects, we treat that story with the gravity that it deserves. And, you know, when stories like this get out, I can see very quickly, you know, the internet can take an angle and spin it very fast, which is we make room for that conversation.

But it's more of my, the dray dossier is meant to make room for the conversation that brings it to this federal level because it's, the end of the day, until that changes, everything that comes is the waterfall after that is going to be tainted in the same way. It is the dam that's broken that we have to rebuild in order to fix any of this. And so I'm just going to try to keep bringing that conversation up there where I can. And in the meantime, we're all allowed to have our own opinions about it. But just remember that it is this executive branch that until something changes there, everybody else is going to have like a firing squad at them. And we have to change that. Where can folks follow the dray dossier, probably one substack on YouTube, all the places?

Just as you said, on substack, on YouTube, it's free to subscribe, always will be. And yeah, I'm also trying to be better about uploading to Spotify, but like, don't really love being on Spotify. So go to YouTube and substack to find me. And yeah, I'm on Instagram, Dre dossier, it's the same across the board, TikTok, wherever you can. And I'll keep reporting on this stuff. And I'm working on currently a case for protecting our health care and our data that goes into that health care right now against the current Department of Defense use of it. So please follow along if you would like to keep an eye on all of that. Come back and talk about that anytime you're always really at this very important intersection of tech and power and policy and culture.

So important. Any final thoughts you'd like to leave folks with? If it bothers you that race is brought into this as a conversation, I would say ask yourself where that comes from and do internal work there. And then maybe we can all have this larger conversation with it. That is the only thing I'll leave with. I think that's a great place to leave it. Drey, thank you so much for being here. I cannot tell you how much I appreciate you and your work.

Thank you, Bridget. Listen, it's only because of you that voices like mine get amplified. So thank you. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi? You can reach us at hello at tangoody.com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangoody.com. There are no girls on the internet was created by me, Bridget Todd. It's a production of IHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative.

Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tarry Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Amato is our contributing producer. I'm your host, Bridget Todd. If you want to help us grow, write and review us on Apple Podcasts. For more podcasts from IHeartRadio, check out the IHeart Radio. app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite.

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