I'd like to point out the irony of that blog post checking all the boxes of LLM-generated text, and I'm surprised I don't really see anyone talking about it here. Did Tim Ferriss (who's supposed to be an author) use a LLM to write this? If he actually writes like that, perhaps the reason why his sales have gone downhill is that people have noticed they don't need to pay to get the same result.
Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
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Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#402Good.
The vast majority of self-help books out there are ghost-written upsales trash.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#403[dead]
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#404Here I had Claude rewrite his post into a 300 word version without all the filler. https://claude.ai/public/artifacts/d49d81d6-7aab-4730-9c3c-4... Which I’m sharing as a meta point…I think self help books are declining because there’s a better way to get the information without all the filler. But filler makes the books thick enough to sell at the airport Also - aren’t LLMs the ultimate choose your own adventure vers…
404 on your link
I think it may be a meta statement on people who summarize with AI on others behalf. The value doesn’t exist and we’re left wondering if the tool user is making a statement, or messed up, or can’t do anything unless claude does it for them.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#405Earlier quoted context omitted.
Kudos for delivering. #1 sounds a lot like stoicism.
Question for you, is my handle orange? I realized my company went stale after a pivot. Just curious if that is reflected on HN. I was recently surprised by a bookface status change :) might need to reach out to say “hey still alive just not in the original form”.
Diff person here. Your handle is not orange, it is grey. I have not seen an orange handle. Grey or green (green for new accounts).
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#406Earlier quoted context omitted.
Hard disagree. I have read lots of books, participated in events and training seminars and had profound results in my life. My marriage is better because of what I learned, I am a better father and leader because of what I learned. And the fact that people sell things as part of that growth journey is how they support their ability to share the lessons and techniques.
Self-help books are so often ridiculued, and that ridicule is often well merited. At the same time there was a self-help book that basically gave me a whole different outlook on life, and cured my depression over night. So I can't deny they have a place and can really help people.
Most of the effective self help advice is personal advice meets trust means relevance at that point in life.
Same book can be ridiculed and appreciated by different people, sometimes even by the same person when they are in different stages of their life (especially if they have less self-awareness).
"You already know whether you are in love or not, you just need to trust this voice."
Depending on where you are in life and who you are as a person, this statement can simultaneously be called a platitude, or a meaningful statement that someone finds allows them to decide what is important in life at that point.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#407Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or youtube. The youtube video essays can still be way too much waffle, but it's at least capped out at about 30 minutes and cost you nothing so you can quit if it's not useful.
Can you imagine the day when an AI/LLM-assisted tool can watch a YouTube video at super speed and then clip X% of the video to show you the best parts? I can see it coming. It might really hurt YouTube revenues. Recently, I had a similar idea when I tried to watch the TV series "SAS: Rogue Heroes". I quit after a few episodes because it was so damn slow. I spent most of each episode skipping pointless dialog and over…
There was a tivo competitor called ReplayTV that would record tv and then replay clipping out commercials.
They got sued out of existence.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#408Couple of other anecdotal data points: 1. Guy I know who is an exec coach says that a chatbot can do a lot of what he does. 2. I am absolutely seeing lots of people asking ChatGPT a question and treating its answer as the truth. So I can well believe that, in an age where you can get a quick answer to anything for free, that the market for books is collapsing. Having said that, I also suspect that many of these self-…
Executive coaches always kind of perplexed me. I’ve tried a few ofer the years and while it was nice to chat with someone smart I found their advice was pretty hit or miss as I read a lot and most of the basic stuff seemed familiar.
So I always wondered how they stayed in business and that they seemed at risk for disruption if anyone cared about their market.
So I guessed that maybe they’re for people who don’t want to spend time finding and reading.
I also was only spending $250/hour so maybe the really good ones cost much more.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#409As an aside, I've been using Claude to search for blog posts from people who went through similar experience to mine. Then use Eleven Readers app which converts the voice to text to listen to it. It's been much better for self therapy vs talking to an LLM.
Re: Has AI already killed self-help nonfiction books?
#4104 hour work weeks is: Draw circle: Set up a highly successful business (prerequisite) Rest of owl: Delegate stuff (what the book says to do). It is pretty useless. Not suprised sales have declined especially since startups probably got harder since when it was written.
Perhaps, but them how do you explain the claimed pattern that sales had been unusually consistent until just recently?
Well, the If Books Could Kill episode about The 4 Hour Workweek came out September 2023... https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-4-hour-workweek/id...