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Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

simonwillison.net

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Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#61

Post by codexb »

happytoexplain wrote: post #48
singpolyma3 wrote: post #24

The problem isn't getting rid if people's jobs. Jobs are not inherently valuable. The problem is we have not built a society or economy where everyone can thrive regardless of their employment.

That's like saying "the problem isn't the unmaintainable cost of healthcare, it's that we haven't eliminated all diseases and aging". I.e. the latter is a long way off, and might not ever be 100% feasible, so it's horrifying and inhumane to imply we should allow the suffering caused by the former in the meantime.

I think it's a stretch to call having to make a living in a career other than your preferred job "suffering". Even before AI, there were surely millions of people who grew up wanting to be an artist, or an astronaut, or an architect, or any number of things that they never had the skills or the work ethic or the resources to achieve. I'm sure before cars there were people who loved maintaining stables of horses and carriages, and lamented the decline of the stable master profession. It's no different now.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#62

Post by mmooss »

Lerc wrote: post #44
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even that short changes the original source: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/i-was-forced-to-use-ai-u... I bookmarked the series which looks exactly like what everyone in tech is saying ISN’T happening: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/s/ai-killed-my-job But I’m sure somebody will blow this off as “it’s only three examples and is not really representative” But if it is representative… “then it’s not as bad as ot…

The world changes and jobs cease to exist. Historically there hasn't been a great deal of support for those who lose their jobs to change. While there are issues that are AI specific, I don't feel as if this is one of them. This happens for many reasons, of which AI is just one. In turn, I think this means that the way to address the problem of job loss should not be AI soecific. If it turns out that AI does not crea…

> The world changes

We change the world. It's not happening to you; you're doing it. You're doing it right now with your parent comment - you're not an observer on the sideline, you're in the thick of it, doing it, your every action - my every action - has consequences. Who will we be in our communities and societies?

> I have read pieces nearly a hundred years old saying this

You can read pieces 100 years old talking about famine, polio, Communist and fascist dictatorships, the subordination of women, etc. We changed the world, not by crying about inevitability but with vision, confidence, and getting to work. We'd better because we are completely responsible for the results.

Also, inevitability is a common argument of people doing bad things. 'I am inevitable.' 'Human nature is ...' (nature being inevitable). How f-ing lazy and utterly irresponsible. Could you imagine telling your boss that? Your family? I hope you don't tell yourself that.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#63

Post by nubg »

moltar wrote: post #42
Mistletoe wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know you aren’t reading it every day?

Because I tried using LLMs to write a compelling copy for a landing page and it’s just not that great. I tried a lot. A real copywriter will do a lot of research about your ICP and write targeted copy.

This tell us more about your (lacking) skills at using AI than the state of AI tools themselves.

You're probably using the free lobotomized versions of LLMs, and shooting a one-off short ambiguous prompt and wondering why it didn't turn out the way you imagined.

Meanwhile people spend hundreds of dollars on pro LLM access and learn to use tool calling, deep research, agents and context engineering.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#64

Post by coffeefirst »

rfarley04 wrote: post #2

I'm a full time copywriter for SaaS companies and I'm actually finding the opposite. My experience is people are having AI write stuff then trying to massage it themselves. When they can't get it to a point where they're happy with it they eventually just throw up their hands and hire me for pre-AI project scopes with 2025 rates. Not saying that's the experience everywhere, but AI has been much less problematic for m…

I expect we’ll see a lot of this as genAI content is seen as shlock.

But we’re also seeing a lot of schlock…

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#65

Post by szundi »

singpolyma3 wrote: post #24

The problem isn't getting rid if people's jobs. Jobs are not inherently valuable. The problem is we have not built a society or economy where everyone can thrive regardless of their employment.

History failed on this one badly

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#66

Post by mmooss »

simonw wrote: post #59
mmooss wrote: post #58

Shouldn't the OP link to the original story, not a short blog post referencing it? https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/i-was-forced-to-use-ai-u...

Yes.

That's the current OP author, and now I see they already said it:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46264119

Thanks, and thanks for bringing the article to wider attention.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#67

Post by szundi »

omnimus wrote: post #56
mvkel wrote: post #35

I can't help but wonder if this is a bit like a few years ago when comedians were complaining that nobody was laughing at their jokes anymore. They realized that it was a mandate to figure out how to be funny again, because what was considered "funny" had changed. In this instance, and probably most instances of art/craft, copywriters need to figure out what is creative again, because what is considered "creative" ha…

The problem is that most copywriting is not and shouldn't be very creative. Often times it's just outsiders who know how to make public communication clear. The sad part is that the managers deciding on using AI are the ones who rarely understand what is good public communication - that's why they were hiring someone to help them with it. With AI they get some text that seems legit but the whole process of figuring o…

It is actually quite hard to copywrite if you’re doing a good job.

Also firing people for a minimal bonus is always a lot of people are going to go for

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#68

Post by codexb »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #29
simonw wrote: post #16

My additional commentary on this one is not worth much - I suggest reading the original article instead: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/i-was-forced-to-use-ai-u...

Even that short changes the original source: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/i-was-forced-to-use-ai-u... I bookmarked the series which looks exactly like what everyone in tech is saying ISN’T happening: https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/s/ai-killed-my-job But I’m sure somebody will blow this off as “it’s only three examples and is not really representative” But if it is representative… “then it’s not as bad as ot…

There will always be value in doing work that other people don't want to do themselves or that requires expertise and skill that isn't conveyed all that well through books or pictures. The economy used to be full of stable masters for horses and carriages, and manual typists, and street lamp lighters, and television repairmen, and any number of jobs that don't exist anymore.

I'm pretty sure we'll survive.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#69

Post by bdcravens »

MangoToupe wrote: post #22
bdcravens wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps, but then it becomes a buyer's market, and salaries will reflect that.

> and salaries will reflect that. Hilariously naive.

Do you think I mean salaries will go up? That's not what a "buyer's market" means. It means there's more supply, so the buyers (employers) can pay less than in the past.

Assuming you understand what I meant: As for being naive, that's hardly true; my opinion comes from experience. When the bubble burst in the early 2000s, you saw a ton of developers looking for work. This pushed salaries down, even for senior and advanced developers.

Re: Willison on Merchant's "Copywriters reveal how AI has decimated their industry"

#70

Post by burnerRhodov2 »

zeroonetwothree wrote: post #41

Why don’t we see it in the aggregate job data? Could it be that people sometimes lose jobs for “reasons” but that’s just the normal flow of the economy? Until there’s some effect on actual unemployment rates I wouldn’t be worried.

Employment stats are designed to measure economy-wide shifts, not early, localized, white-collar disruptions. The sampling will smooth those effects away until they’re large.

CPS samples 60k households per month to represent ~150+ million workers. Households stay in the sample 4 months, out 8, back 4.

Copywriters will get smoothed out in the aggregate, and the definition will mask this. Even if you work one hour, you are technically employed. If you are not actively looking for work for more than a month, you are also not technically unemployed.

Unemployment data is a lagging indicator for detecting recessions not early technological displacement in white-collar niches.

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