Here is how you can earn some of the easiest money you will ever make.
Ihave a special secret for you. It’s a way for you to make some easy money, some of the easiest money you will ever earn. Lots of money. It’s honest, although maybe not so ethical.
So why do I sit here, less than 12 hours before this newsletter is posted, writing now in a marginally profitable newsletter when such an unbelievable opportunity to make gobs of easy money is right before my face? I mean RIGHT THERE! Am I a fool to ignore this opportunity just because I happen to believe that I should devote my life as a writer to help the world, not exploit it?
Yes, indeed, if I put my morals aside, then maybe I am a fool! There’s a part of me that wants to say to myself, “You idiot. You are so old-fashioned! Are you just going to stand by and whine about morals and ethics while others far less talented than you earn millions churning out questionably accurate articles and even books?
Sad to say, I don’t know if being honest even matters anymore. That’s a long story. Sometimes I wish that this newsletter was more about writing, journalism and publishing, so I could explore this topic in more depth.
OK. How you can get rich easily and quickly
First, two recent news headlines, both from Amazon, prompted today’s essay. The first one was early last week about how Amazon would now limit self-published authors from posting more than three Kindle books a day on its platform. The second one was posted yesterday (Saturday). It read, “Authors shocked to find A.I. [artificial intelligence] ripoffs of their books being sold on Amazon.”
For those of you unfamiliar with publishing on Amazon: Anyone can publish a Kindle book. You write the book, come up with a cover (good, bad, ugly), set a price and upload the text file to the Kindle website. Within hours, the book will be live, and for months or years to come you will receive a generous share of the money from each sale.
A.I. makes this possible
So here is how you start: It’s probably no surprise to you that using a free artificial intelligence (A.I.) service like ChatGPT is what makes this possible.
First, you need to come up with a subject. Let’s say you want to call your book “How to live full-time in an RV for $1,000 a month.” Here is how even someone with horrible writing skills using A.I. can begin earning money as a Kindle author.
- Borrow or buy a few books on full-time RVing. Copy about ten chapter titles, tweaking them slightly to use as guides for chapters in your own book.
- Go to ChatGPT.com to create your article. Write a short description of each chapter, one at a time. Your instructions for the first chapter might be like this: “Write a 1200 word introductory chapter of a book about full-time RVing on this topic: ‘How to get started as a full-time RVer with a strict budget of $1,000 a month.’” Click the “generate” button. Within a minute, the chapter will be finished. Place this in a new word processing file and call it “Introduction” or “Chapter One.”
- Do the same with all your other chapters.
- Put all the chapters in one text file in the proper order. If you are familiar with the topic, go through the copy and tweak as necessary, correcting any misinformation. In a few hours, you should have the book ready to go. If you don’t know the subject matter well, or even at all, don’t even bother with that step if you have absolutely no morals. “The hell with the reader if something is wrong.” But, far better, hire someone to take a spin through the copy to correct at least obvious mistakes. This needn’t cost you much, if anything.
- Design a cover or have someone else do it. Many YouTube videos will show you how to do this.
- Set up an account at Amazon. Follow instructions about how to upload the book and then upload it.
- Provide banking information so you can be paid.
That’s it. Personally, I could easily create two books a day. Oh, on that first chapter above in #2, here is exactly what ChatGPT spit out upon my request, not a word changed, and in less than 30 seconds. I suspect you will be stunned at how well this is written.
So if you wrote one book a day, and made only a conservative $1 or so a day from each, that would be around $1,000 every month. Continue cranking out new titles day after day and you could easily soon have a six-figure income. I suspect something will be done before long to control this hurricane of potential misinformation. So hop on fast while the going is good.
Finally, I am not telling you all this to encourage you to write books by cheating. What I hope to do here is to alert you that this sort of thing is happening, not just with books but articles on websites. That’s a huge thorn to us at RVtravel.com who are forced, more every day, to compete with swarms of unethical publishers who don’t care a bit about providing good information, only about getting rich.
##RVT1124
I do publish my novels on Amazon. Recently, all of my books were taken off the “sell” list by blocking access to my readers who could not press “Buy Now.” I was alerted to this by a friend and fan attempting to buy my latest book. Upon investigation, I found that my books could be “reactivated” if I checked a box next to a new statement on my publishing agreement that indeed the content was original and not generated using AI. I don’t know if this will curtail the “cheaters” but it is at least an attempt by Amazon.
When I saw your headline, it reminded me of something else I used to see in the classified ads section of magazines and comic books.
Make money at home! Send a SASE (self-addressed stamped envelope [another bygone phrase]) and $1.00 for complete instructions. A letter would arrive with the following message, “Thank you for the dollar – this is how I make money at home.”
Thank you, Chuck! Thank you for not selling out, for this article, AND for RV Travel. 🙂
I remember seeing “2001, A Space Odyssey” in 1968 when it came out. Basically the story is about space travel with a computer running everything while the crew is in a state of suspended animation. I thought “wow; what a fantastic story” and now it’s a reality. Very scary though that computers are starting to run the world.
Chuck, we know that this an important topic to you and as such, your insight into the greater issue of AI could hold much value to your readers. We all know that measurable damages from journalistic malpractice are real in 2023 and in fact date back to the Nation’s founding and the absolutism of the 1st ammendment.
IYO, does an AI article, written to deceive and advance a predetermined but false outcome, and causes measurable damages, have 1st ammendment protections? Can damages be sought and awarded from the publisher or the producer? When a case for damages is in front if SCOTUS, who prevails and why? As a journalist/publisher, your opinion in a future piece would be invaluable. TY.
Or, perhaps Randall Brink could take this topic on…. this seems to be right in his wheelhouse, given that his writings typically have a foundation that relies on a constitutional purity for the deeper or the subsurface issues in many of his topic choices. Plus, he writes incredibly and without fear.
Chuck do not be discouraged, I have followed your website and writings for many years and will continue until you are to old to write or I’m to old to read. I appreciate your honesty and the efforts of your other writers and yourself to give helpful advice on many different subjects. Lead on my friend you have one of the best programs going in these troubled times.
Don Waggoner
I pasted the same info into the free version of ChatGPT and got a different article that was very similar (maybe better) to many general interest magazine articles. It had a lot of useful info for those considering full-timing.
I don’t know how this will play out but I’d try to come up with a plan to somehow add more value to my writing. This situation has occurred many times in the past with buggy whips, AM radio, town criers, etc.
Thank you for the AI description, I had no idea how it was done n why people are so upset about it. This explains perfectly about the Hollywood writers biggest complaint. How tho, would I know a book was AI written? Being a computer in assuming it can pull info anywhere off the net to write its book. For traveling I do buy Kindle/Amazon books instead of the real thing. I would hate to help support “that” author.
What I wish for you, your family and staff is for RV Travel to search out and find a way to use AI and Amazon and it’s ilk to accomplish your goals. AI is a tool and like most others can be used to build and support as well as tear apart and make weaker. You are in the minority but it is a huge minority!
Keep the faith!
You can also use AI to create the cover. And to make even more money, use AI to generate YouTube videos. That’s far more lucrative than KDP.
Also, for some context, the unethical behavior you’re describing is as old as the written word. What is different is how the recent release of free AI tools has democratized and accelerated this type of content generation.
Generated garbage YouTube videos in particular have been around for a long time. The voices were robotic. Now they are quite realistic. And more dangerous.
Read The Coming Wave by Mustafa Selemany. You will have an expertly informed understanding of the true dangers and rewards of AI.
Admire you sharing your passion for ethics, individual creativity, and honest hard work in writing/journalism, Chuck.
Yes, I completely agree with you Bob. Keep it up, Chuck, and we will continue to read all that RV Travel has to offer
Some people might think AI isn’t relevant to RVing, but I say it’s totally relevant. I’ve never seen a group of people crave information more than us RV folks, and that probably makes us extra ripe targets for misinformation. Thank goodness we still have sources like this available, with good honest people writing good honest articles on a generous “pay if you can” basis. If you need to post educating articles about the pitfalls of AI to keep your business model relevant, I say post away Chuck.
Sad. It’s not just self help books. Have you looked at the fiction. I found one series, that may have started with a real book. But each “book” that followed was more and more formulaic. Then I found out that she had published nearly a hundred books in a year. And none of them really finished. Were “to be continued”. Now I look for books that are on physical paper. The library has lots of them.
Chuck, try not to twist your shoulder as you pat yourself on the back for you high level of ethics. We’re all aware of what you do and why you do it. And your readers appreciate it. No need for repetitive self-congratulatory articles.
The message needs to be repeated, John S. That’s the only way new eyes will see it, not just the group of RVers already following this man and his dream of ethical reporting and accurate advice and information.
John S, any one article we run will only be read by a fraction of our total readership of more than 100,000 readers. And, of course, A.I. and how we communicate is changing with every passing day. And so I keep talking about this subject. With all due respect, it gives me great pleasure to continue to inform people who know nothing or very little about A.I. what is going on. If you want to take those efforts away by minimizing them, then that’s the way it is these days, tear into anything you do not understand. That’s how you make money on the internet. Negative sells. Positive, well. . . not so much.
I understand. Keep it up.
“I don’t know if being honest even matters anymore.”
It does if you like sleeping at night.
Throughout my 40+ years of working, I’ve seen countless opportunities to make vast amounts of money if only I could have swept my sense of ethics aside.
Instead, I sleep comfortably at night.
Isn’t that the truth!!!
Capitalism 👍
Predatory Capitalism 👎
And no to all you Socialists, Capitalism is not Predatory by definition. It raises everyone, as has been proven FACT for 10,000 years. Trade your neighbor a rear quarter of your hard fought mammoth kill for some of her fire….. Capitalism=win/win.
bartering is not capitalism
Bartering is the very essence of capitalism.
Barter was a way to get what you want without using money. it was a way to exchange goods for other goods or services.
Capitalism used money instead of trade. Capitalism was a economic and political system in which a trade and industry was controlled by private ownership for profit, hence, capital.
Trade IS capitalism. Capitalism is not money or a system. It’s the recognition of natural forces that exist between people and entities as they exchange goods and services for their own mutual interests. Money is a creation of governments to erase friction from transaction to make capitalism more efficient.|
What you are describing is Karl Marx original description.
Well written??? I would slap anyone writing like that! Too much flowery language, too many adverbs and adjectives imparting too little message. Stupid robot.
Paul B. Yeah, that’s right. But a computer algorithm wrote that better than 95% of humans could.
THANK YOU for this incredibly eye-opening piece Chuck! I’m not going to start churning out AI books either, but I’m sure going to be on the lookout for this automated BS when shopping for literature. AND while browsing websites…
How to get rich quick. I thought you were going to say go on to a game show or a show like survivor. My bad.
I was thinking it would start with, “First, get a million dollars and then…..”
“morals and ethics” always matter. One day we will meet out maker.
yep
Just stay the course your moral compass points. Behind you all the way. Thanks.