This is the 206th Fundraising Writing Newsletter. If you find value here, please tell a fundraising friend. (Your fundraising friend can ​subscribe here for free.)​

Wednesday, October 14, 2026

Hi Reader,

Brett here:

I think most of us who write regular newsletters like this one secretly imagine that if they miss an issue, their readers will be like:

When really, it's probably more like:

Anyway, yeah, Julie and I have been MIA in this space for a minute. It's because we've just listed our house for sale. Meanwhile it's fundraising season with plenty of good fundraising writing work to do, thankfully!

So yeah, a lot going on at the moment:

The other day, it dawned upon us that we'd need to find a real estate agent.

Time for research. We met with an agent and liked her. She gave us an agreement to look over and perhaps sign.

So:

We asked AI: got 1155 words. Our attorney: "This looks good and is standard."

We consulted the top two AIs available right now.

The first was ChatGPT 6 Astra (Max).

It reviewed the realtor agreement and had concerns.

Its answer began:

Then it spat out another 1100 words featuring a detailed list of 9 items and, bonus, 4 bullet points.

Julie and I grew worried.

What's with this realtor?!

Is she trying to pull one over on us??!!

Finally, after running the same prompt/question by Claude Fable 5.1, and poring over its similarly foreboding remarks for 2-3 hours, including printouts and highlighters, we said to ourselves, "Maybe we should ask our attorney."

And that's what we did.

She read over the agreement and replied, "This looks good and is standard."

What's my takeaway, you ask?

Especially when you're not an expert in a subject, AI can be extremely impressive. It will swiftly, exhaustively output grammatically perfect copy and pleasantly presented advice. It might even be right.

But as good as AI can be, for high-stakes matters such as a home sale or a fundraising appeal, you can't yet trust it fully.

I mean, you can, but would that be in your best interest?

For now at least, probably not.

If AI gets good enough to handle anything and everything, then we're in a very different world and "all bets are off."

I submit to you: we're not there yet!

Randomly yours

For your brain, heart, and funny bone...

• Fundraisingly Informative — 5 Tips for Writing Emails That Sound Human (And Get Opened!) with Danielle Wallace via Tactical Thursdays (a 1-hour video podcast episode featuring lots of great tips for effective fundraising email writing)​
  ​
• Ridiculously Relatable — Funniest Game Show Answers of All Time via theSeanGShow (a 15-minute YouTube video compilation that just might break your funny bone)
  ​
• Absurdly Lucky — Irish Americans via SNL (a 5-minute comedy sketch about how an Irish American might daydream about being welcomed with open arms and pints of Guinness in a pub in Ireland)

Until next time: May you always remember to use what works (ethically), avoid what doesn't work (or isn't ethical), and have the wisdom to know the difference!

Grateful,

Julie Cooper & Brett Cooper
Fundraising Copywriters​
​FundraisingWriting.com​
​Fundraising Copywriting & Design​​
​100% human, thank you very much.