Vocal Spring 2024 Updates

It's been too long since our last update, but we've been working hard behind the scenes based on your feedback from Discord chats and Creator Chat sessions, and we've got some exciting new updates to share with you.

First, let's talk about AI content on Vocal...

While it's been mind-blowing to watch the rapid advancements of AI and LLMs, we understand the implications it has for you, our creators, and our platform. We've spent the last few months internally ideating and conversing on how to best address this rapidly evolving technology and its impact on our community.

On one hand, AI is giving more people access to improve their writing, which we think is great. That aligns with our ethos of championing great storytelling. On the other hand, instead of AI being used as a tool to brainstorm and help kickstart ideas that a person can evolve, it has been used by some to circumvent the creative process entirely.

Recognizing the need to uphold the values of our community, we started exploring ways of identifying AI-generated content. We've tested a bunch of third-party tools (IE Copyleaks) that the community suggested, and they have been helpful in identifying unlabelled AI content. Unfortunately, they are very expensive at scale and because they are nascent, they produce too many false positives.

So we started to build our own AI detection system, built on open source and our internal machine learning models. We've been testing these tools in our moderation process over the last few months, and while they are not perfect, they are evolving and continuing to improve. We truly appreciate your patience and support as we continue to improve them.

Our goal is to provide a transparent user experience for our community and to maintain the authenticity of your content on Vocal. That's why we are rolling out a new AI-generated disclosure label on stories over the next few days. These labels will transparently show AI-generated content on stories and story cards.

Additionally, on the story submission screen, you will see the option to label your story as AI-generated. (You'll also see a new label for Content Warnings, but we'll get to that below...)

If you used AI to help generate your story, please disclose it. Stories that are published without this label and are found to be AI-generated will be subject to removal after internal review.

We understand the gravity of this issue for our community, and we want to assure you that we are fully committed to addressing it with the utmost seriousness.

We've also updated our Report Story feature to include a new option for flagging AI-generated content that is not disclosed. If you see a story that hasn't been correctly labeled, please use this feature to report it (shoutout to Judey Kalchik).

AI can be a helpful tool for creators, but we never want it to deceive our audience. We hope that this commitment to transparency and disclosure will help maintain the integrity of this amazing community we've built together.

We've also pushed some minor changes based on your feedback...

Updated Content Warnings: We've streamlined the Content Warning process. Now, when you submit your story for review, you can simply check a box to indicate if your story contains sensitive content. This eliminates the need for tagging stories with "Content Warning." All previously tagged stories will automatically transition to this updated feature next week, and there is no action required on your end. Just like with AI-generated labels, we reserve the right to apply the Content Warning flag to any content that we determine falls into this category.

Story Links Open in a New Window: External links in your stories will now open in new windows. Shoutout to Stephen A. Roddewig for suggesting this feature in a previous Creator Chat.

X / Twitter Auth: We've removed X / Twitter authentication due to changes in their API policies. If you need assistance logging into your account, please reach out to Customer Support.

Creators We’re Loving: Based on your feedback, we've updated our 'Creators We're Loving' algorithm to ensure we are showcasing more active creators.

What’s Next?

Redesigned Homepage: We are working on a complete redesign of the homepage. This update will change the way you engage with content from your favorite creators you are subscribed to.

Enhanced Bookmarking Feature: We're introducing a new bookmarking feature that will allow you to save and organize content more efficiently.

Exclusive Content Offerings: We are developing new functionalities that will enable creators to offer exclusive content to their paid subscribers.

We value your feedback as we continue to grow and improve, so please share your thoughts and ideas in the comments, Creator Chat, and Discord—your input might just inspire our next product update.