No ratings yet.Source: Shahi, S. (2024, May 1). How to balance human Creativity and Generative AI in product Marketing. Innovation & Tech Today. https://innotechtoday.com/how-to-balance-human-creativity-and-generative-ai-in-product-marketing/
Just like you, as a student in 2025, it is probably not surprising that I use genAI tools, such as ChatGPT, almost every day. What has been almost stigmatized in university settings in late 2022, now is an open discussion and a core part of learning and student life. Personally, I use ChatGPT regularly for school work which, I believe, is pretty similar to what my fellow students do. Just to mention a few instances: brainstorming for projects, cleaning up messy notes into structured study summaries, getting quick explanations for terms I don’t fully get, and even asking it to “grade” my drafts against the rubric so I know what to fix. One of my favourite practice, tho, is to feed the lecture notes to ChatGPT and ask for a 10-15 minute podcast of the key takeaways and learning goals. I listen to this during my walk to school and feel like I’ve revised without sitting behind my laptop. It’s fast, helpful, and honestly makes me feel on top of things when I’m at the lecture.
I also use GenAI outside of school. For example, when my parents visited me, I asked it to plan a simple Netherlands tourist route for city trips so they could see the highlights without me stressing over the details. Another instance is that on random weeknights, I’ll throw in three or four ingredients I have at home and get a quick dinner idea that actually works. This saves me a lot of time and money usually, and I also get to try new recipes. However, after our guest lecture on GenAI tools, it really hit me that there are tons of other options out there, but I keep defaulting to ChatGPT. It has really became my comfort zone when it comes to using AI.
But here are some contradictory feelings. I’ve started noticing a reflex: the moment I hit a tough problem, I want to ask the bot before I even try. When I do that too often, my brain feels a bit “sleepy”. Like I’m outsourcing or giving away the hard, creative part. Funnily enough, when I otherwise force myself to work without it, a different feeling kicks in: what if I’m falling behind because everyone else is using AI and shipping better, faster? That AI “FOMO” is real, especially when our standards are also rising with the AI-powered solutions. Anyone else feel that?
As a last thought, sometimes I think about kids, the next generation, who’ll never remember school without GenAI. Lucky them? Maybe. I’m half jealous of the time they’ll save and half protective of the slow, messy struggle that taught me to think. What do we want their first reflex to be: ask or attempt?
How Generative AI Became My Job-Search Partner.
9
October
2025
No ratings yet.
I first started using GenAI tools for internship search during my bachelor’s studies, mainly to save time when preparing applications. What began as a small shortcut quickly turned into something much more valuable. Over time, I learned to use AI not only for writing but for analysing vacancies, identifying missing skills, and tailoring my applications to what employers were really looking for. I often asked it to highlight key competencies and keywords that could make my CV or motivation letter stand out. Combined with insights from HR professionals and career influencers I follow online, I developed a method that feels strategic and personalised, where AI acts as a sparring partner rather than a content generator.
GenAI also became part of my preparation for interviews and assessments. I’ve used it to simulate common behavioural and technical interview questions, structure my answers, and gain feedback on how clearly my reasoning comes across. When preparing for the TestGorilla assessment, I applied the same study habits I used for university exams by asking ChatGPT to create logical reasoning and situational judgment exercises and to explain how recruiters might evaluate responses. It made me feel more confident, structured, and aware of my performance.
Looking back, I’d say GenAI has become a real career companion by helping me work smarter, reflect more deeply, and stay organised throughout the job-search process. However, this experience changed how I view AI in the recruitment process. While it saves time and helps formulate ideas clearly, it doesn’t remove the need to put effort into each application. The outcome still depends on how well I can express my own story, experiences, and motivation. AI can refine my words, but it can’t replace authenticity or individuality. In the end, standing out still comes from the human touch behind the screen. Do you think AI will ever fully understand what makes a candidate truly unique?
An Ocean of Insecurity: My Experience with GenAI
28
September
2025
5/5 (1)
“The Birds Don’t Sing, They Screech In Pain”
Dear reader,
I invite you to read a collection of my thoughts and meditations, all relating to my own use of GenAI. The tone of this article is definitely different from my previous one, and I apologise in advance for that. With all that being said, I still hope that some of you may relate to what is written here today.
Foundations of Fear
I would be lying if I said that the past few years were not a complete nightmare for me. My lifelong aspirations of being a creative had never felt so threatened.
First it was the rise of image generators like Midjourney, which generate images while being trained on millions of artists’ stolen works (Goetze, 2024). It was an injustice which I had witnessed firsthand. I was scared, and it felt like something that I wanted to do for years was suddenly taken away from me.
But hey, maybe it would only be visual arts right? They would surely never come for music and video…
It was a truly naïve moment for me, as later other programs would arise that would be able to generate both music and video. Now did I particularly like or find merit in what was generated? No absolutely not, most of the music made on programs like Suno sounded abhorrent. Videos made by Stable Diffusion lacked any of the vision which someone like Denis Villeneuve could have. But that was my opinion, the general public seemed to think otherwise.
In any case, I was not too happy with the emergence of GenAI.
A Puppet on A String
Because of the views that I had previously held, it would come to no-one’s surprise that when I actually seriously had to use GenAI I was practically forced to.
I remember that day very clearly. It was during my second year at Erasmus in my BA bachelor. We had a course on Entrepreneurship, and had to use these resources to help us make a business. It seemed innocent enough, right? But I couldn’t help but feel horrible with every prompt I was typing.
I will be the first to say that when it comes to group work, I have no intention of pulling my group down because of my disdain towards GenAI. I understand that many students use it, and I will not push back. These are just the values that I hold.
And so, I fell into the trap that many students do: I kept on using ChatGPT, DeepSeek etc. I used it to summarise my articles, but never really to brainstorm on my own. Sometimes, I used it to see what grade I would get for an assignment, though the accuracy varied. In the Digital Business course that we followed in year 3, we had to write an entire Essay with AI.
I’ll be the first to say that I did not enjoy the process and I find that AI cannot write in the same way that I do. Even when I had fed the AI with essays and other writings of mine in the past it just really couldn’t compare. I do not know if I was just lucky or uncritical, but I do know that my grade for the essay that I wrote myself was higher than the AI-written one.
Still, I often ask myself if we are entering an era where critical cognitive skills are being eroded due to the overreliance on AI (Zhai et al., 2024). How are we going to move forward when we are unable to detect misinformation and just accept everything that a machine gives us?
Moreover, how am I supposed to not feel guilt for using such a technology? It is not only actively consuming major amounts of energy, but also causing me and my peers to have a harder time in the future job market due to entry-level positions declining (Jockims, 2025).
A Deal with The Devil
For a time, I became quite apathetic to it all as a bachelor’s in business tends to do that to you. So I decided to use GenAI for personal reasons too.
My first experience with this was when I used an AI beauty app to get rid of some acne on my forehead. My partner wanted to post a picture of me in a cat café on their story, but there was some visible acne on my forehead. I then had the “brilliant” idea to use an app to get rid of the Acne, and hey it worked. We were both happy, I got to look good, and they got to post.
I then tried to incorporate GenAI into my writing as my apathy had reached the point of “If you can’t beat them, join them”.
I wrote down lines, and tried to continue sharing ideas with ChatGPT. But still something was missing.
It wasn’t really the story that I wanted to tell. The story I wanted to tell was a lot softer, and more human. It was laced with quiet moments and thoughtful conversations about characters living in a Cyberpunk world. (Ironic I know)
What ChatGPT gave me was…closer to a Marvel movie or a rip-off of Blade Runner. It was instant gratification, and a story with no substance. Why would it be one? It was a story that no human had bothered to write before. Just an amalgamation of the average.
Don’t Let AI Steal Your Daydream
I obviously do not know all of you, but I do urge you to think more critically about your GenAI use and the impact you have by using it.
I know for myself that by using it, I am actively contributing to injustice. Every prompt and sentence will make the models better and with the massive network effects that platforms like ChatGPT have experienced, this trend will continue.
To be able to forgive myself, I first had to admit that what I did wasn’t aligned with my values.
Not all is lost though, as the section’s title suggests we should still be hopeful. When it comes to art, humans still tend to prefer human made art, when they know that something is made by AI according to Millet et al. (2023). They later also say that preserving art is important as it is one of the last beacons of human uniqueness.
I feel like this sentiment extends beyond just art though. All of your ideas are worth something and is part of what makes you human. I have also noticed that in the age of hyper-polished, well, ,everything (movies, music & artwork). I’ve become more drawn to the rawness and imperfection which can be found in a lot of older works. I remember not being able to listen to In Utero by Nirvana for a long time, but now I find myself appreciating the album’s rough edges.
I do not intend to say that I have a moral high ground. In fact, I am also extremely flawed. All of the times that I used GenAI on my own accord was to cope with some form of insecurity that I had. My appearance. my writing ability and even my grades. It was an instant fix for a problem, but it did not fix the underlying issues.
As a subtle form of rebellion, I decided to teach myself guitar. Yes, the process is hard but also gratifying. If I ever want to get on stage, I’ll have to work for it. There’s no instant fix. But that’s the thing, you can’t instantly become Kurt Cobain. It takes hours, days, years of hard work. And you know what? I find that to be beautiful.
I hope that we can take back some form of power. That we can live in a world where we are allowed to have and chase our daydreams. A world where our ideas do not serve as a means for profit to some megacorporation. I hope that I made you think about how our actions are impacting the people around us. I ask you not to be a revolutionary, but I do ask you to contribute to a world that is fairer towards all.
To you, dear reader, I ask the following questions: Do you think that I am overreacting or do you harbour similar feelings? Did your fears around GenAI cause you to change major life plans you had? (I know that it caused me to choose this master!) And finally, are you willing to sacrifice the instant gratification of AI in order to preserve our sense of being human?
References: Goetze, T. S. (2024). AI Art is Theft: Labour, Extraction, and Exploitation: Or, On the Dangers of Stochastic Pollocks. 2022 ACM Conference On Fairness, Accountability, And Transparency, 89, 186–196. https://doi.org/10.1145/3630106.3658898
Jockims, T. L. (2025, 7 september). AI is not just ending entry-level jobs. It’s the end of the career ladder as we know it. CNBC. https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/07/ai-entry-level-jobs-hiring-careers.html
Millet, K., Buehler, F., Du, G., & Kokkoris, M. D. (2023). Defending humankind: Anthropocentric bias in the appreciation of AI art. Computers in Human Behavior, 143, 107707. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2023.107707
Zhai, C., Wibowo, S., & Li, L. D. (2024). The effects of over-reliance on AI dialogue systems on students’ cognitive abilities: a systematic review. Smart Learning Environments, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s40561-024-00316-7
Though I didn’t use it, I find these ones important too, they deal with the environmental aspects: De Vries, A. (2023). The growing energy footprint of artificial intelligence. Joule, 7(10), 2191–2194. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.joule.2023.09.004
Shukla, N. (2025, 19 augustus). Generative AI Is Exhausting the Power Grid. Earth.Org. https://earth.org/generative-ai-is-exhausting-the-power-grid/
Author: Ian Parabirsing
A lover of music, good coffee and cats. I'm a MSC student at RSM studying Business Information Management. In my blog posts I'll be attempting to write about how technology impacts the consumers and society at large.
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