Call it the Triple Crown, Trifecta, or any other phrase associated with things coming in threes, but the week ends with the third big story from Amazon in a single week. And it’s also about a new feature. This time that feature is “Ask This Book.” For the moment it’s only available in the US, but there will clearly be momentum toward rolling it out more widely.
ALLi News Editor Dan Holloway
Ask This Book sits alongside Story So Far, a feature in a similar vein to the recaps feature recently announced by Spotify. Story So Far, which I am fairly sure I have already reported on and is not new, provides readers a summary of, you guessed it, the story so far. Ask This Book is more of a Cliff Notes. It allows readers to highlight a passage of text and gain insights into, for example, the motivations of characters in that scene.
A Familiar AI Flashpoint
Ask This Book has caused a big old ding-dong (technical term, especially at Christmas) across writers’ communities. The reason it has done so is one you can probably guess. It uses generative AI.
But writers’ problems with the feature are more than the generic use of AI. They are around transparency. Amazon has not responded to many comments. The always-excellent Victoria Strauss has some interesting reports of this stonewalling of questions about the use of AI in her Writer Beware post. This stands in contrast, of course, to the very open approach of Spotify of late, in response to similar concerns, when it launches new AI features.
No Opt-Out for Rights Holders
The second area of concern is that rights holders cannot opt out of this program. As Amazon puts it, “To ensure a consistent reading experience, the feature is always on, and there is no option for authors or publishers to opt titles out.”
It remains to be seen how Amazon will respond to the vocal and widespread criticism of this lack of an opt-out, but for now the furor doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.
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