The first AI programs

The earliest successful AI program was written in 1951 by Christopher Strachey, later
director of the Programming Research Group at the University of Oxford.
Strachey’s checkers (draughts) program ran on the Ferranti Mark I computer at
the University of Manchester, England. By the summer of 1952 this program could play
a complete game of checkers at a reasonable speed.

Information about the earliest successful demonstration of machine learning was

published in 1952. Shopper, written by Anthony Oettinger at the University of
Cambridge, ran on the EDSAC computer. Shopper’s simulated world was a mall of eight
shops. When instructed to purchase an item, Shopper would search for it, visiting shops
at random until the item was found. While searching, Shopper would memorize a few of
the items stocked in each shop visited (just as a human shopper might). The next time
Shopper was sent out for the same item, or for some other item that it had already
located, it would go to the right shop straight away. This simple form of learning, as is
pointed out in the introductory section What is intelligence?, is called rote learning.

The first AI program to run in the United States also was a checkers program, written in
1952 by Arthur Samuel for the prototype of the IBM 701. Samuel took over the essentials
of Strachey’s checkers program and over a period of years considerably extended it. In
1955 he added features that enabled the program to learn from experience. Samuel
included mechanisms for both rote learning and generalization, enhancements that
eventually led to his program’s winning one game against a former
Connecticut checkers champion in 1962.

https://www.britannica.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/Expert-systems

Artificial intelligence continues to change many of the technologies around us,

as well as some areas that, only a few years ago, were considered ‘people
only’. This includes writing. Who could foresee that the WordCheck program
of 1980 for the Commodore VIC-20 computer would evolve into AI writing
software which would compose entire articles?  

For marketers, the moral of the story is clear – AI is here to stay, so get on
board as AI-powered writing assistants become increasingly capable.
The Traditional Landscape of AI Writer Software

AI creative writing assistants have their origin in the spell checkers used by PC
owners in the early 1980s. They soon became part of word processing
packages like WordPerfect, and were then an integrated feature of entire
platforms, beginning with Apple’s Mac OS.

At approximately the same time, artificial intelligence broke new literary

ground with the publication of The Policeman’s Beard is Half Constructed, the
first book written by a computer program. However, it took until 2007 for AI to
be applied to online writing as StatSheet created content related to sports
statistics. Then, in 2009, the Grammarly writing assistant entered the scene.

The New World of AI Writing Assistants

Since that time, AI platforms have developed the capacity for imitating how
people actually write. By filling in a few parameters, such as URL, product type,
or keywords, marketers can use AI writing assistants to build practically any
sort of copy. This includes ad spots, CTAs, social media posts, landing and
product pages, email texts, and complete blogs.

Moreover, AI writers will create text according to the rules of the channel. For
instance, Instagram captions use different formats and character restrictions
compared to Google Ads. An AI writer will therefore build different copy
versions for each according to these limits.  

But just writing is not enough. Different types of people like to read certain
types of copy. A busy executive prefers bullet points, whereas a casual
shopper will be attracted to a story format.
It is also true that successful copywriting is not a random event. Over the
decades, numerous approaches have been developed to create writing styles
that are more appealing to certain audiences. A classic form of this method is
copywriting formulas, like PAS and AIDA, which build a piece of copy
according to certain psychological principles that maximize the chance of
conversion.

The leading AI writers enable the marketer to employ all of these concepts by
merely clicking on a button. With the same basic settings, AI writing platforms
will generate multiple forms of copy within minutes.   

The Missing Ingredient

Despite their highly productive capabilities, virtually every AI writing assistant

on the market today is missing something essential. The greatest copywriters
of all time somehow knew what type of messaging would be most attractive
for consumers of a certain product. With most AI copy generators, this
knowledge is only gained after exhaustive testing of many message variants.
But busy marketers don’t have the time to test, rewrite, and retest.

That’s why Anyword has developed a proprietary technology for assessing the
conversion potential of copy before the audience sees it. The Predictive
Performance Score assigns a numerical grade to each piece of text created by
the Anyword platform. By posting the version with the highest score,
marketers will maximize the chance of conversion. Even better, Anyword can
automate this process with its Continuous Optimization feature.  

What Will the Future Bring?

Over the next few years, we can expect the best AI writing assistants to
become even better at their job.

As processing abilities improve, AI will be able to use more data sets on which
to base their creations and use that facility to understand emotion. This will
allow AI generated marketing texts to evoke feelings in the consumer, a vital
step for enabling branding and purchasing.

Similarly, AI is becoming more capable at understanding the nuances of text.

For instance, Anyword can now generate copy that appeals to females, or
children, or people who prefer bullet points. In the future, AI writing assistants
will be able to mimic the exact style of a certain writer. But of course, David
Ogilvy’s copywriting brilliance lives on!

AI is also having an impact on SEO marketing. The decline in organic search

results  reflects the fact that search engines are being modified to present
more paid results. To counter this, AI rapidly composes copy which integrates
back links that leads to the marketer’s main site. These links are essential
because they are a main component in search engine rankings. Whereas the
use of human copywriters for this task is labor-intensive, AI writing assistants
can produce a constant flow of link-loaded content, 24 hours a day.

But what happens when the algorithm changes (as it  frequently does)?
Considering what is at stake, it is likely that AI writing assistants will rapidly
adapt to whatever occurs. Platform users will therefore be able to continue
producing content without much disruption. This is as opposed to a human
writing staff, which would need to integrate the new rules into their content
production.   
Lastly, the capabilities of AI writers should expand enormously. At present, for
instance, Anyword uses the most current language model, which is the GPT 3.
The next version, GPT 4, is due for implementation in a few years, and it will be
revolutionary. To get an idea of this change – GPT 3 uses 175 billion
parameters, whereas GPT 4 will use 500 times that number.

Time to Get Onboard

Back in the 1980s, a VIC-20 computer cost about $900 (in 2021 terms), people
programmed it by hand (that’s right, no operating system). Not that many
people bought it. But nowadays, most homes have multiple computing
devices. They have become indispensable.

The same will be true of AI writers. Companies which have already realized
their abilities will create a market where not having this technology will be a
definite competitive disadvantage. They will also be the first to enjoy new
feature rollouts. Be part of the next generation of savvy marketers with
Anyword’s AI-powered writing platform. Get started now with our 7-day free
trial. 

https://anyword.com/blog/history-of-ai-writers/