Bristol Books AI Policy for Authors, Contributors and Illustrators

At Bristol Books our purpose is to publish books of real value and invest in genuine and original content. As a community-interest-company we exist to share knowledge, stories and perspectives about the people, history and culture of our community.

Our policy is to publish original work from authors, contributors and illustrators that hasn’t been created by Generative-AI (including text and images). Although we do accept the use of AI tools (like ChatGPT) for the purposes of conducting preliminary research, brainstorming, copy editing, indexing and for editing and enhancing images, we don’t believe in publishing Generative-AI books. The key difference is between using AI as an assistive tool versus using AI as a generative tool.

Using AI as a generative tool, to generate content for publication (even if edited or rewritten) creates issues around authorship, originality and integrity. In order to maintain trust with our readers Bristol Books believe in publishing content that reflects the genuine voice and expertise of our authors, illustrators and content providers.

Here’s a summary of our policy:

Using AI tools:

✓ AI tools can be used for research and brainstorming purposes

✓ AI tools can be used for editing text but should be used within a private AI system

✓ AI tools can be used to edit or enhance images, as long as the images being edited are your own originals

✓ You must disclose use of AI tools

Using AI as a generative tool:

✗ You may not use Generative-AI models to create content (including text or images)

✗ You may not input your work, or sections of your work, to any publicly accessible AI system