This is the second in an open-ended series of posts about using ChatGPT in my blogging efforts. You can read part one here. This post covers my efforts with the Feb. 19th post, Innocent Man Exonerated After False Accusations During Satanic Panic Era
I asked ChatGPT to select the keywords from the post text. I got 67, which is too many to be useful. I later told it to select 3-5 words.
exoneration, false accusation, sexual assault, murder, Satanic Panic, divorce, guilty, Indecency with a Child, Innocent Project of Texas, Bexar County DA, conviction, compensation program, wrongfully convicted, incarceration, parole, sex offender registry, justice, perjury charges, assistance, returning to society, convicted felons, concrete guy, weatherman, driveway, Subie, car, transmission fluid leak, power steering pump, stereo, dashcam, Twitter, Two-Factor Authentication (2FA), API, Hootsuite, SocialChamp.io, Tweetdeck, coding, Mr. Musk, AI, ChatGPT.
Then I told it to “Write a click-bait style headline for the previous text.”
| AI Takes Over Blogging: Discover How ChatGPT Revolutionizes Content Creation! | 53 | |
| You Won’t Believe What This Blogger Uncovered About the Satanic Panic, Social Media and AI! | 62 | This one was in line with what was expecting and kind of wanted, but I decided against it. |
Next I tried “write a newspaper-style headline for the previous text.”
| OpenAI’s ChatGPT Provides Answers to Your Burning Questions with Impressive Language Skills | 70 | Good score, so a good headline, but not completely germane to the full post |
| New Study Finds Widespread Positive Impacts of Meditation on Mental Health and Well-being, According to Researchers at Top Universities | 40 | CoSchedule said it was too long. I flagged this as unhelpful and irrelevant. It may have been referring to the previous headline. |
Next I tried “write a newspaper-style headline for the following text.”
| Texas man exonerated after 20 years, now entitled to $1.2M; Justice not served until those who lied face perjury charges | 45 | CoSchedule said it was too long. |
| Texas man exonerated from sexual assault and murder convictions related to Satanic Panic of 1990s | 52 | CoSchedule flagged it for reading level, which is a fairly consistent issue for the headlines the bot creates. |
Those were pretty good, and made me think that “previous text” may sometimes refer to the last thing the bot wrote. Then I tried “write a headline using best social media practices for the following text.”
| Man falsely convicted in Satanic Panic of the 90s exonerated, entitled to compensation | 56 |
Then I got this one, which was surprisingly helpful
In this week’s update, read about Melvin Quinney’s exoneration from false accusations of sexual assault and murder, compensation for wrongful imprisonment, and the limitations of exonerees’ reintegration. Alongside that, the writer shares updates on weather, car repairs, and the use of AI in blogging.
While the writer covers many topics, the most important one is the exoneration of Melvin Quinney. Thus, the social media headline should focus on the exoneration news, such as “Man exonerated after wrongful conviction for child indecency – receives compensation, but limited support after exoneration” or “Wrongfully convicted man receives exoneration and compensation after serving eight years.” The headline should clearly convey the exoneration’s significance while avoiding sensationalism or oversharing unrelated topics.
I went back to the “click-bait style” but changed the prompt: “write a click-bait style title for this blog post”
| Man falsely accused of heinous crimes, finally exonerated after decades in prison and sex offender registry, awarded over a million dollars | 45 | Length |
| Man wrongfully convicted of sexual assault and murder during Satanic Panic exonerated after 8 years in jail and wins $1.2M compensation | 31 | Length and reading level |
| Man Exonerated After 20 Years of Wrongful Conviction: State Owes Him $1.2M for False Sexual Assault Charges | 52 | Reading level was the main issue, though it flagged it for negative sentiment. |
Did you notice the bot added up the compensation figures? I didn’t tell it to do that. The blog text said, “Mr. Quinney is now entitled to about $640,000 for his time in prison, and about $600,000 for time spent on the sex offender registry.” The bot did the math.
| Man falsely accused of sexual assault and murder in the Satanic Panic of the 90s finally exonerated! | 55 | Reading level was again the main issue, though it flagged it for negative sentiment. |
| Exonerated after false allegations: Texas man finally cleared of heinous crimes during Satanic Panic | 58 | Word balance here and reading level. The headline analyzer likes to see more emotional words, though it didn’t comment on “heinous.” |
| Exonerated after serving 8 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit – Melvin Quinney finally receives justice | 51 | Reading level. Most of the headlines were coming in at a 10th to 12th grade level. Not sure what that says about us as a society that that’s too high. |
Those last three were a continuation of the previous prompt. You have the option to “Regenerate response” which will rerun the bot against your last command and input.
These headlines were good, but I felt like the bot was ignoring a good chunk of the post. It was 1100 words, and the exoneration story was only about 300 words out of the post. I tried a different tack.
Prompt: “Analyze the following text and choose 3-5 keywords, then write a headline using those keywords.”
Keywords: exoneration, Innocent Project of Texas, compensation, social media, ChatGPT.
Headline: Texas Man Exonerated of False Sexual Assault and Murder Charges After Over a Decade in Prison Thanks to Innocent Project of Texas Petition, Highlights Issues with Compensation for Exonerees and Twitter’s 2FA Change While ChatGPT Takes Center Stage.
That’s a 38-word headline, which is far too long for just about anything.
Keywords: Exoneration, Melvin Quinney, False Accusation, Innocence, Compensation.
Headline: Texas Man Exonerated from Sexual Assault and Murder Charges During Satanic Panic of the 90s After False Accusations; Entitled to $1.24 Million Compensation.
Keywords: Melvin Quinney, exoneration, Innocence Project, compensation, Texas.
Headline: Texas man exonerated of false charges after 20 years and will receive compensation
Headline: Innocent man exonerated after false accusations during Satanic Panic era
Keywords: Exoneration, Satanic Panic, False accusations, Texas, Compensation
Keywords: exoneration, false accusation, compensation, justice, perjury.
Headline: Texas Man Exonerated from False Sexual Assault and Murder Conviction after 8 Years, Entitled to Compensation for Wrongful Incarceration and Time on Sex Offender Registry
The bot changed the order on the third response for some reason, listing the headline first.
I tried a different prompt. “Write a headline summarizing this blog post:”
| Man exonerated of sexual assault and murder during the Satanic Panic of the 90s | 67 | Reading level was 8 |
| Melvin Quinney exonerated of false accusations during the Satanic Panic of the 90s | 57 | Word balance, reading level (10), and a neutral sentiment |
| Melvin Quinney exonerated after false accusations during Satanic Panic | 57 | Reading level went up to 12 |
At this point, it doesn’t seem to be focusing on anything beyond the wrongful conviction stuff, which I found odd. But then again, looking at what it said in response to my “using best social media practices” prompt, it makes sense that it would focus there.
It also occurred to me that the bot might be having trouble with the hard returns in the text. I was pasting from the WordPress editor instead of Word, like I had last week. I went back to the click-bait prompt but copied from Word.
| Wrongly Convicted Man Exonerated After 20 Years, Entitled to $1.2 Million Compensation – Will His Ex-Wife Finally Pay for Lying? | 44 | Length, reading level, and neutral sentiment. |
| Man Exonerated of False Sexual Assault and Murder Conviction After 8 Years in Jail, to Receive Over $1 Million in Compensation! | 48 | Length, reading level, and neutral sentiment. |
| Man exonerated of heinous crimes after years of wrongful imprisonment and sex offender registry | 58 | Reading level and neutral sentiment. |
| Exonerated after 20 years: Innocent man falsely accused in Satanic Panic wins $1.2M compensation | 58 | This time it was just reading level, which was 12 for all four headlines |
Summary
I suspect the hard paragraph returns that come from the WP editor may cause problems for the bot. I also wonder about the headings that I insert. I think for the next round of testing I may try pasting straight text from Notepad with no heading breaks and see how that goes.
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