By James M. Jackson
Is there any hope for human authors? AI can now generate decent blog posts (as good as most of my first drafts), craft marketing materials (better than I can), and take a brand concept and create images for all occasions (much faster than I can). Some people—I refuse to call them authors—use AI to create entire novels and series. Their philosophy resembles that of spammers: throw enough stuff out there, and even if the hit ratio is very low, it becomes profitable. It’s unsettling to watch machines do in seconds what takes us hours.
Worse for human authors, other humans can’t
much tell the difference, despite their belief they know how to tell if
something is AI-written. As far back as 2024, a Penn State[i]
study found humans could only correctly identify AI-generated text 53% of the
time. Random guessing gets you to 50%. AI creation has continued to improve. More
recently, the International AI Safety Report 2026 reported that “In one
study, participants misidentified AI-generated text as human-written 77% of the
time. In another study of audio deepfakes, listeners mistook AI-generated
voices for real speakers 80% of the time.”[ii]
That’s depressing, but it’s also
clarifying.
I first encountered a version of this
concept in John Naisbitt’s 1982 Megatrends, which I read in 1983. He
called it high tech, high touch. In short, he proposed that the more technology
surrounds us, the more we need genuine human connection to retain our humanity.
His pitch was to save humanity; mine is to save our individual sanity and sell
a few books.
What I refer to as high-touch strategy is the
opposite of scaling (taking something that works at a small scale and ramping
it up to a larger scale). It’s choosing a handwritten note over an email blast.
The rambling video reel of real life as-it-happens over the polished press
release or book trailer. The personal reply that takes minutes over the autoresponder
that takes only the time necessary to set it up once.
Let me be clear—I’m not anti-technology. And
I’m not against newsletter email blasts and other forms of one-to-many
communication. Those skills are the blocking and tackling of a modern writer’s
strategy. Fail, and your quarterback’s sacked, or his pass intercepted for a
touchdown. Okay, so maybe the football analogy isn’t perfect—what do you want
from a guy who played soccer back when dinosaurs roamed the world? Fail, and no
one knows you exist.
What does high-touch look like?
By inviting readers into your process, you
share the struggle—something AI cannot do, because even if AI’s zeros and ones do
struggle, it’s over so fast there’s nothing to see.
This suggestion does not change the
dynamic of one talking/sharing to many. It changes what you are sharing.
The vulnerability factor
The next level is to be open with your
audience about your vulnerability. AI can mimic vulnerability—I could have
asked Claude or ChatGPT to write a “vulnerable” post about writer’s block, and
it would be decent. But there’s a difference between performed vulnerability
and the real thing. Readers can feel it.
When you share your actual doubt about
whether anyone will care about your next book, when you admit you’re terrified
of bad reviews, (or in my case—no reviews), when you talk about the rejection
that still stings from five years ago, that’s data no algorithm has access to.
That’s your lived experience, and it’s the one thing that can’t be replicated
or scaled.
The feedback loop
You don’t post on social media, send
newsletters, or write blogs for no reason. Implicitly—or better yet, explicitly—you
ask for feedback. You want readers to click like/love/care/be angry, to provide
comments, to agree or disagree. Better, you invite them to do exactly that.
And the high-touch approach after they do respond
is how you create your personal response, the one that invites a conversation. Reply
to reader emails with an individual response that clearly shows you read their
comments and appreciate their time in contacting you. Remember that Jessica
from Ohio told you her husband was about to have the same operation as you just
had and later ask how his recovery is going. You are forming relationships with
those readers who want them—not all do, and that’s okay.
The time investment paradox
The counterintuitive part? High-touch
takes more time in an era that’s obsessed with saving time. While AI promises
to help us do more with less, high-touch asks us to do less, but more
intentionally.
You can’t automate remembering someone’s
story. Or efficiently handwrite notes to readers. You can’t scale genuine
curiosity about the person.
But that’s precisely why it works. In
choosing to spend your limited time on individual readers, you’re sending an
unmistakable signal: you matter to me. Not as a sale, not as an engagement
metric, but as a human being I’m genuinely glad to connect with.
And right now, that might be what readers
are hungry for.
That’s all you can control, but if you do
it consistently, over time, you might see something special occur. Your readers
create a networked community in which you, the author, are no longer the hub.
The community, not the audience
All along, this high-touch approach has
created a gradual shift from broadcasting to conversing. From building an
audience to fostering a community. AI excels at the former—it can generate
content for audiences all day long. But community? That requires showing up,
remembering, caring, and investing in relationships over time. And encouraging
our readers to relate to each other.
It’s messy. It’s inefficient. It doesn’t
scale—until it does. One day you notice on your Facebook or Instagram feed that
two of your readers, who know each other only through you, have connected.
Will this strategy work? Stay tuned, and
we’ll find out together. It’s possible technology in general and AI in
particular may drown my voice. But if it happens, it won’t be without me
fighting back, choosing to be seen: as high-touch in a high-tech world.
I’d love to hear what you think of
my ideas and suggestions. Authors, how are you handling this issue? Readers,
what are you enjoying with your favorite authors? [And God willing
and the crick don’t rise, I’ll read and reply to every comment.]
* * *
James M. Jackson writes justice-driven thrillers with brains and bite, including the Niki Undercover Thriller trilogy and the Seamus McCree series. To learn more information about Jim and his books, check out his website, https://jamesmjackson.com. You can sign up for his newsletter (and get a novella and two free short stories featuring his protagonists).
[i]
Penn State research: https://www.psu.edu/news/information-sciences-and-technology/story/qa-increasing-difficulty-detecting-ai-versus-human
[ii]
International AI Safety Report 2026, p.45 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2602.21012
[1]
Penn State research: https://www.psu.edu/news/information-sciences-and-technology/story/qa-increasing-difficulty-detecting-ai-versus-human
[1]
International AI Safety Report 2026, p.45 https://arxiv.org/pdf/2602.21012
