What Larry, the Hairy Canary Can Teach Us About ChatGPT’s Ability to Generate Unique Content

OpenAI’s ChatGPT bot has been generating a lot of buzz. But can it generate unique content, over, and over, and over again? To find out, we created a fictional character named Larry, the Hairy Canary and asked ChatGPT to write a poem… and then another poem. And then another.

Over the course of our tests from a few different accounts, Larry’s personality went through some changes. But to OpenAI’s credit, every poem about our ornithological wonder was unique.

Just for fun, we also used OpenAI’s Dall-E image generator to create an AI generated version of Larry based on each poem. Let’s review the many poetic worlds of Larry:

Larry, the Hairy Contrary Canary

Larry, the Hairy Canary,
Was a bird quite contrary,
He had feathers bright and bold,
But his demeanor was cold.

Larry liked to sing and hop,
But he always seemed to stop,
When others tried to join in,
He'd give a sharp, harsh din.

But deep down, Larry was kind,
He just had a troubled mind,
He longed for friendship and cheer,
But fear held him back, year after year.

One day, a kind soul came by,
And Larry gave a hopeful try,
To make a friend and have some fun,
The Hairy Canary's journey had begun.

Now Larry sings with joy and glee,
He's no longer lonely, you see,
He's found his place in the world,
And his song has become a twirl.

Larry, the Hairy Canary,
Is no longer contrary,
He's found his voice and his song,
And he sings it loud and long.

Larry, the Hairy Canary: Merry hairdresser

Larry the Hairy Canary,
A bird so bright and merry.
His feathers gleamed with golden hue,
A sight so fresh and new.

He sang with voice so sweet and pure,
A melody that could allure.
He chirped and tweeted through the day,
Bringing joy in every way.

But Larry was more than just a bird,
He was a hairdresser, it was what he preferred.
He snipped and styled with such finesse,
His customers all felt their best.

So if you're in need of a trim or cut,
Larry's the one, he'll have you feeling up.
With a song and a snip, he'll have you looking grand,
Larry the Hairy Canary, a bird that's truly grand.

Larry with Feathers Bright and Bold

Larry was a canary with feathers bright and bold
His coat was fluffy, a sight to behold
He sang with glee and danced on his perch
His spirit was high and he loved to search

For seeds and treats, he'd hop and he'd bound
His energy never seemed to run aground
He was a happy bird, full of cheer
Larry, the Hairy Canary, was always sincere

His song was sweet and he sang with delight
He brought joy to all, day and night
He fluttered his wings and took to the air
Larry, the Hairy Canary, was truly a rare

He was a dear friend, always at your side
Loyal and true, he was a joy to abide
So let us raise a glass to Larry, the Hairy Canary
We are so lucky to have him, he's truly extraordinary

Larry Brings Happiness All Year

Larry the Hairy Canary,
A feathered friend so fine and hairy,
He's got feathers bright and bold,
A sight to behold, a story to be told.

With a voice as sweet as honey,
Larry sings a song so funny,
He flutters and he flies,
Up in the skies, reaching for the sky.

Larry's a bird of cheer and glee,
Bringing joy to you and me,
He's a happy little guy,
Who loves to fly and sing and sigh.

So let's all give a cheer,
For Larry the Hairy Canary,
He's a bird of joy and cheer,
Bringing happiness all year.

Wild Larry

Larry, the Hairy Canary,
Was a bird of rare variety.
With feathers bright and bold,
He was a sight to behold.

He sang with a voice so sweet,
It was a joy to hear him tweet.
His melodies filled the air,
Bringing joy and cheer everywhere.

But Larry was more than just a singer,
He was a bird of great distinction.
His feathers were long and shaggy,
Like a canary gone wild and crazy.

He flew through the sky with grace,
Leaving a trail of beauty in his place.
Larry, the Hairy Canary,
Was a bird of extraordinary glory.

What We Learned from Larry

This fun experiment gives a window into the writing prowess of ChatGPT’s ability to draft unique content around a fictional character.

Wordcount
The word count was inconsistent with each poem having between 99 and 146 words.

Themes
We were impressed with the diversity in themes even though there was some repetition. For example, the “bright and bold” line appears in all but one of the poems. Larry bringing “cheer” was another repeated theme. But Larry’s character showed some interesting developments throughout the series. He starts out as being “contrary” then “merry” and a hairdresser. In the last poem, our former hairdresser’s appearance is a little disheveled, described as “shaggy” and like a canary that had gone “wild and crazy.”

The ability to generate different versions of a character that doesn’t exist in the real world, existing literature, or fictional pop culture is very impressive.

This experiment did show that, at least for a short poem, it is capable of generating unique content around the same question.

Over the next few months, we will be running a lot of tests on AI language libraries and chatbots to see how it performs around legal topics.

Can ChatGPT generate unique content around the same inquiry?

Yes. This experiment proves it.

However, don’t use AI-generated content on your website.

This is very important. Experimenting with these new tools can be a fun learning exercise but don’t use any of the content that is generated as standalone copy on your website. In April of 2022, Google’s John Mueller spoke about how the search engine sees AI generated content:

“Currently it’s all against the webmaster guidelines. So from our point of view, if we were to run across something like that, if the webspam team were to see it, they would see it as spam.”

- John Mueller, Google Senior Search Analyst / Search Relations

How Google will see content that is credited by AI platforms (like the poems we published about Larry) is a mystery. Will their webspam team see our article and take action against this page? Are they scrubbing the hundreds of thousands of articles published by various journalists that are experimenting with ChatGPT and writing about the results? For the sake of this article, hopefully not!

But using AI content as your own without acknowledgment of the source or human involvement is an unnecessary risk to take until there is further guidance from Google. Unique or not, if you're aiming for SEO success with your content, keep the humans typing.