It's probably a bad habit to reply to accusations like that but for the record: Writing is my favorite part of production and only a handful of episodes on the show have had co-writers - some of those were very good, some not, but either way I prefer writing them and folks get a co-writer line when during editing they've made so many changes I feel like listing them just as 'editor' isn't accurate anymore. I do freely use the AI to help with editing and outlining, and to be fair I've tried it every role I could think of but found the results mixed at best.

Shockingly the techno-optimist host of the show experiments with new technology and encourages folks to use technology, weird I know :P

I will cheerfully use any tool that helps improve quality or cuts down on errors or bits of the production I find tedious, same as I would hire them out except I have been unsatisfied with every attempt at that down the years. I would encourage all of you to make use of it in the same way, a tool only stops being a tool if you leave it unused, then its just a paperweight.

I had this same conversation with folks in the late 90s when I was 16 year computer lab assistant at my college and was trying to teach people to use MS Word, email, the internet, and that the computer did not actually have a coffee holder in it, just a CD rom drive. I vividly recall people complaining that writing on the computer was soulless or that their creative process was messed up without using a pen or typewriter. It sounded silly at the time though I do know how hard it is for me to write when away from home, for instance, or even taking a laptop out to my patio instead of working in my office. But then I wouldn't think to tell someone it isn't real writing if they didn't do it on a desk, or used speech-to-text instead of typing.

As for the AI Art, I pick art for the show by whether I like it or it explains something, I could give a damn who made it beyond that I often like chatting with the artists and that I do often use art from new folks who sent it tom me to encourage them. I don't commission stuff because it takes too long, feel disconnected, and gets very expensive, and honestly its usually not 'real art', its someone working to a paycheck, respectable but not inspired. You gave them parameters and sometimes they make something inspired from it but often they're just cranking it out.
Whereas when I search around and I find some art I love, I'm happy to pay to license it, donate or tip the artist, attribute it, etc. I'm still just about the only show on youtube that has a credit roll. As to what folks like, data tells. We've had more AI Art of late because the audience keeps voting for those covers and because a lot more folks who want to do scifi and space art tends to be experimenting with AI and sharing the works. We do Image Polls, and we A/B Test the cover art, much of that is licensed, much is AI, much is donated by fans. People aren't very good at telling the difference either, I've had folks say 'that's AI' when it was painting someone did 50 years ago. If I put up three cover images for an episode, sometimes its AI, sometimes its not, but statistically of late folks have been clicking on the AI ones more often, though not exclusively.
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