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However, recent advances in generative AI have created a booming market of tools that promise to take on more than just “reading”. The app BookAI.chat lets users “chat” with a text. Shortform has an AI extension that can break down blogs, articles, emails or YouTube lectures into digestible snapshots.
What’s the problem?
The increasing use of AI in book summaries has set off alarm bells for authors and advocacy groups.
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Australian Society of Authors (ASA) chief executive Lucy Hayward notes the technology is already reshaping the market, not only because of the ease and speed at which summaries can now be generated, but also because of “the risks it poses to the integrity of publishing”.
“Where AI technology is being used, there is also a question of fairness,” Hayward said. “We know many of these tools have been developed on the un-permitted, un-remunerated use of authors’ work.”
She warns the consequences extend beyond questions of ethics. If readers increasingly turn to AI-generated summaries instead of buying books, authors could face real financial harm. Blinkist, for example, offers subscribers thousands of summaries it has already done.
“The impact upon authors’ livelihoods will be particularly deleterious if AI technology can then be used to dilute their sales,” Hayward said.
“An adjacent example might be in news media, with AI summaries on Google leading to a significant drop in traffic to news sites.”
Surely it’s not all bad?
While the rapid take-up of AI might suggest students are simply outsourcing reading, Corbin said the reality is more complicated.
For many university students, the appeal of AI summarisers comes down to personal circumstance – mature-age students are often balancing family, caring duties and full-time work, while younger students are juggling part-time jobs alongside study.
Student Tarushi Nanwani says the apps are not to replace reading completely but are helpful when she is super busy. Credit: Steven Siewert
“A lot of students might be in a position where they struggle to be able to get through all their readings,” Corbin said.
“So one use we’re seeing of AI is as a triage. They use the [summary] as an overview of the topic and then decide where to spend their time and energy reading.”
It’s also driving what Corbin calls “hybrid reading practices”, where AI is used alongside, rather than in place of, traditional study.
“Using AI as a map, a conceptual guide, or even an interactive dictionary is a way students can overcome barriers to engaging with knowledge in certain disciplines,” he said.
For Nanwani, that means using the AI function on the note-taking website Notion, to supplement her own notes.
“It’s so nice for organising or even condensing my notes before exams,” she said. “It even helps create roadmaps for my computer science classes, which is really useful.
“Obviously it can’t replace the reading completely, and I personally don’t use it to do that.”
What is being lost?
While generative AI can help students overcome barriers, relying too heavily on summaries risks weakening the very skills university is meant to build — close reading, critical analysis and personal interpretation.
Corbin said accuracy is another concern. Productivity claims assume these technologies can reliably distil a text into its “essentials”. But what an algorithm decides is important may not match what a lecturer wants students to grasp.
“The issue is that what the AI thinks is valuable is what it summarises. If it takes a 30-page article and turns it into 300 words, it’s making a judgement call. Something is always left out,” he said.
Readers looking for a quick book summary can also fall victim to these flaws. Generative AI is known to produce “hallucinations” or inaccuracies, Corbin said.
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“It’s vital that there is human oversight in any kind of publishing, to mitigate the risks of misinformation.”
Death of reading
Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) show 44 per cent of adults have low or very low literacy, and figures from Australia Reads reveal more than one in four didn’t read a single book in the past year.
Participation in recreational reading is also lowest among Generation Z, with only 11.2 per cent picking up a book for pleasure, according to a report from ABS.
That’s why, Corbin said, it’s important for educators to remind students what reading can offer.
“The future of what’s lost is hard for students to grasp, because they don’t know what they’re missing,” he said.
Ashley Chew has found herself returning to reading books so she can enjoy every aspect of the work. Credit: Max Mason-Hubers
“We need to talk more directly to students about why reading matters, about what’s in a text that only they can take from it, rather than treating it like an objective thing that is somehow accessible via AI.”
Returning to reading
But there are promising signs. In 2023, a UK poll found BookTok (book content on TikTok) was influencing reading habits, with two thirds saying it had helped them develop a love of reading.
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Final-year UNSW student Ashley Chew is among those returning to books – but she says it’s only a recent thing.
“I’m a newer reader,” the 22-year-old social work and criminology student admits.
“I got into reading in the last six months as uni is coming to an end, and I’m trying to be more intentional with my time.”
These days she’s working through reading memoirs and literary fiction. It’s a revival of a love she had as a child, when she devoured novels from the public library each week, before the pressure of high school and university turned reading into “a chore”.
Chew said she has never leaned on AI to get through reading fiction.
“I think the beauty of reading is you get lost in the details,” she said. “You go on that journey with the plot. If you miss a few things, that’s okay, that’s part of the experience. I’ve never wanted AI to just give me summaries.”
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