You Sent the Message. But Did You Write It?
A field guide to the weird new behaviors of AI-assisted communication.
Last week, I got a message from someone I’ve known for ten years. It was articulate, thoughtful…and definitely not written by him.
It’s one example of what has increasingly unsettled me about the way people interact - myself included - as we all participate in this vast, unprecedented, AI-enhanced communication experiment.
It’s not just the style of communication that’s changed. It’s the sense of authorship. The idea that you can read something and know who wrote it—and whether they meant it—feels like it’s breaking down.
It shows up everywhere - emails, text messages, social media, blog posts, even casual check-ins. A few weeks ago, I opened a message that seemed technically perfect - well-structured, insightful, sophisticated. But I couldn’t tell if the sender had written it, prompted it, pasted it - or even read it. And I wasn’t sure what to respond to, or how.
What part was real?
What part was meant?
Who - or what - was I actually talking to?
That’s when it dawned on me: we don’t have a vocabulary for this.
We’re surrounded by AI-shaped communication—but we’re still talking about it like everything is normal.
So I started writing down the weirdness. And it turned into a glossary.
Here are ten terms offered to help name, diagnose, and spark reflection on the strange new ways we communicate in the age of AI:
1. Chatjacked
Definition:
When a simple, human conversation gets hijacked by AI-enhanced formalism. What starts as a quick Slack message or casual email suddenly turns into a mini white paper.
Hallmarks:
- Tone mismatch: too much structure for the context
- Feels like an AI dropped into a conversation it didn’t understand
- Often shuts down the thread rather than advancing it due to participant overwhelm
Usage:
“We were just trying to pick a time to meet, but then Jamie chatjacked the thread with three paragraphs and a table.”
2. Praste (Derived from ‘prompt’ + ‘paste’)
Definition:
To copy-paste AI output verbatim, without editing, thinking, or even reading it through.
Hallmarks:
- Reads like it came straight from ChatGPT’s first draft
- Off-tone, over-polished, slightly generic
- Often longer than it needs to be, with no trace of the sender’s actual voice
- Unrestrained usage of emojis as bullet point markers
Usage: “You can tell he didn’t write that - straight up prasted from Claude.”
3. Prompt Pong
Definition:
Someone sends you an AI-written message; rather than you respond you paste their message straight into ChatGPT and ask it to write a response - which you send right back (cf. ‘praste’). Can be repeated indefinitely.
Hallmarks:
- Dense language with no clear point
- Response time is suspiciously fast for something so polished
- Conversation has no actual momentum
Usage:
“His update felt totally chatjacked, so I just prompt ponged it back through GPT and hit send.”
4. AI’m a Writer Now (aka Sudden Scribe Syndrome)
Definition:
The sudden transformation of a non-writer into a prolific content creator powered by AI. One day they’re a silent lurker, the next they’re dropping five-part essays on organizational resilience and systems thinking.
Hallmarks:
- Sudden uptick in longform writing from someone who never wrote before
- Personal brand glow-up (LinkedIn, Substack, Notion, Medium)
- Their voice sounds a little too polished for how they normally speak
Usage:
“He used to just forward along article links he found. Now he’s writing 1,200-word think pieces on storytelling and tweeting like Naval Ravikant. Total AI’m a Writer Now moment.”
5. Promptosis
Definition:
A condition marked by compulsive over-prompting—offloading all original thinking to AI instead of developing your own ideas.
Hallmarks:
- Everything starts with “I asked GPT to…”
- Endless lists - all output, no prioritization
- Complete loss of a point of view
- Often manifests via chatjacking or prasting
Usage:
“He didn’t contribute much on his own - just promptosis all the way through the workshop.”
6. Subpromptual Analysis
Definition:
The act of trying to mentally reconstruct the prompt that shaped an AI-generated message. Instead of responding to the message itself, the recipient starts interpreting what tone, goals, or emotional cues were embedded in the original instructions.
Hallmarks:
- You find yourself guessing: Did they ask GPT to sound “warm but professional”?
- You can’t focus on what the message says—you’re focused on what they asked it to say
- You’re not reading the text—you’re analyzing the subprompt
Usage:
“Sorry I took so long to reply – I went down a subpromptual analysis rabbit hole trying to decode what they told ChatGPT.’
7. GPTMI
Definition:
A hyper-personalized AI message that crosses the line from ‘thoughtful’ to ‘creepily all-knowing,’ stuffing in far more personal detail than the relationship warrants.
Hallmarks:
- Mentions old tweets, obscure hobbies, or your pet’s name to prove ‘relevance’
- Drops hyper-specific life-log trivia – ‘hope the knee rehab is going well after your meniscus tear surgery last month’
- References a location-based detail it shouldn’t reasonably know – ‘saw you were at Lake Placid last week – beautiful view!’
Usage:
“The recruiter congratulated me on finishing the Providence half-marathon in 2017. GPTMI alert! How did she even know?”
8. Chatcident
Definition:
When someone slips and pastes the prompt into the chat or email instead of the polished AI output – exposing the wizard behind the curtain.
Hallmarks:
- Leads with something like ‘Rewrite this so it sounds upbeat but still authoritative…’
- Brackets, stage-direction verbs, or placeholder text never meant for public eyes
- Sudden flood of backpedalling messages e.g., ‘Ignore that last bit – LOL!’
Usage:
Tuesday, 9:14 am.
Pat: ‘Here’s the press-release headline: <<Make this sound punchy and visionary, mention sustainability twice>>’
Team Chat erupts…
Alex: ‘Sorry about the chatcident Pat – want to give that another go?”
9. GPTune
Definition:
Like Auto-Tune for writing. GPTune takes someone’s normal idea and smooths it into something that feels more articulate, structured, erudite - but less authentic.
Hallmarks:
- Every sentence flows perfectly
- Feels smart but strangely impersonal; makes everything sound a little too much like a corporate keynote
- Leaves you wondering what was actually meant
Usage:
“She GPTuned all the personality out of her application essay.”
10. Syntherity (Derived from ‘synthetic’ + ‘sincerity’)
Definition:
AI-generated or AI-polished emotional language - apologies, gratitude, vulnerability - that leaves you unmoved.
Hallmarks:
- Feels over-produced: too balanced, polished, too "growth journey"
- Filled with emotional buzzwords or cliches
- Extreme diplomacy; feels like it’s trying to offend no one
Usage:
“That apology was dripping with syntherity – like he asked ChatGPT to play the role of life coach blended with therapist.”
Of course, this glossary is intended to be lighthearted, and none of it is meant to dismiss the value of AI assistance. These tools are powerful. They help us work faster, develop ideas better, and express things we might have struggled to articulate on our own. But they also raise new questions about authorship, sincerity, and what it means to communicate as ourselves.
We’ve entered a strange new phase of communication—where messages might seem clearer and more polished, but intent and meaning are harder to pin down.
These terms won’t fix the weirdness. But they might help you notice it when you feel it. Or at least, make you reflect before you praste your next update or GPTune your next company memo.
This is all interesting, however, I'd suggest, some of these will be abused, mostly by overuse. Some of that overuse will be over diagnosis, incorrectly attributing the behavior described to regular human behavior. But the other form of overuse is probably even more prevalent, of attributing the correct diagnosis, but attributing more harm to the occurrence.
Let's take "AI’m a Writer Now" as an example. Is that really bad if it occurs? I'd say, usually not. But in a jealous defense of their current position of status, the "I've always been a writer" will look down at these new writers, diminishing them for the process, without always having a real argument to attribute to the output. The "nouveau riche" of writers? Even when there's some substance there, some ill-judged sense of superiority is there too.
you saved the best for last