AI Learning Hub › Events › Past events › Creating a Personalized AI Writing Partner
Past session · 31 October 2025
A writing partner is a set of standing instructions plus a small library of your own work, so the feedback you get is about your writing rather than writing in general. This is the do-it-yourself version of the workshop: why you would build one, what to be careful about, and the five steps.
This was accurate when presented. The tools discussed and their interfaces may have changed since, and what is free on which plan changes most often of all.
Several platforms let you save a set of standing instructions that behaves like a small custom AI. ChatGPT has custom GPTs and Claude has Projects, but both of those need a paid account. The session used Gemini Gems, which are available at no cost to anyone with a Google Workspace account — which is why the walkthrough is reproducible for everybody.
A partner you have configured is available whenever you are, and it reads a long document far faster than a person can. It is not a substitute for a human reader; it is something you can use at eleven at night on a draft nobody else has time for.
Collect a representative sample of your own previous writing — the work you would want new drafts to resemble.
Run those samples through a few different models and have each produce a checklist of the recurring problems and things to watch for.
Collect those checklists together with any other feedback documents or style guidance you rely on.
Decide what the partner is for: the scope of feedback you want, and the form you want it in.
Attach the knowledge base, paste in the instructions, then test it on a draft you already have opinions about.
Open the slides and follow along; the explanations are in the speaker notes.
For the speaker notes, use the three-dot menu in the player and choose Open speaker notes.
Privacy and confidentiality. Check how a tool treats your data before you upload your own writing to it — and remember that a writing sample can be as sensitive as anything else you handle. If you would not want it on the front page of the newspaper, do not upload it.
Questions? Bring them to the AI Curiosity Corner, or email library@law.stanford.edu. All past sessions are in the archive.