> Even the fate of the smallest business like a bakery or shoe store will be determined by whether they can create some form of moat.
This is the main reason I'm terrified of AI: near as I can tell, it's a 'moatpocalypse.' ('Moaterdammerung'?)
I keep seeing posts voicing self-reassuring thoughts like "if you're not a low performer you're not at risk."
But this seems to miss the basic point. Let's say that AI never replaces humans and always augments them. (A wildly optimistic view, but I have to start somewhere.)
In this case, me+AI is now competing in a job market against Bob-who-learned-to-code-last-week+AI. That's twenty-plus years of experience that, up until this year, was a deep fscking moat (who else can recite iptables lore, write a safe bash script, and work in perl, python, C, C++, Typescript, etc?)
Today the answer to that question is "virtually anyone."
This means that my employment will hinge on questions of "cultural fit" rather than talent, which, yes, means that in general, there will be less tolerance for asshole behaviour (probably a net good.) So, no new Torvalds or Stallmans (Stallmen?) will be spawned. *But it also means* that mean-girls psychology is going to triumph. Employment will literally be a popularity-contest _Survivor_, as anyone can be replaced at any time, and their replacement will be good enough.
The brunt of this impact will be felt by those of us who are "diverse hires" --- why would you hire Susan, who is brilliant but no fun at parties, when you could hire Hank, who looks, sounds, and talks exactly like you, was best man at your wedding, and holds those wild keggers? Sure, Hank only knows rudimentary Python, but who the hell cares about that now?
ChatGPT implies the Triumph of the Bro.