"So long, my friends, and thanks for all the fish!" - Replaced by AI - Not your usual AI post.

[Five_Inch_Heels]

I come from a time where your first day at a company and your last day could be 30 years apart. All you had to do was show up every day and not get drunk on the job. Now some people are lucky to last 30 months. Or 30 days.

 

[Lifestyle66]

I was here for that, too, but the big difference here is this: the internet changed jobs, but it very rarely got rid of them entirely. It slimmed down workforces at individual companies and even killed some companies, but it very rarely killed the jobs themselves; the classes of jobs, I mean. A given company might need fewer salespeople, but the economy as a whole still needed salespeople, for example.

That's not what's happening this time around. Entire categories of careers are just... going. Not entirely, but enough; for an analog, think of the few people who were still able to keep handcarving furniture once factories spun up. The difference now is that the handcarving jobs are going away and nothing is replacing them. At all. Even the careers that were supposed to (think all the folks who were told to shift from programming to "prompt engineering" for the last couple of years until the AIs got good enough at prompt engineering that it made sense to let them do that, too) are starting to evaporate. It's not even how "webmaster" transitioned/split into "web developer," "UI developer," and "system admin." The "new" jobs that AI have theoretically opened up are just going *poof* too.

Many of the job openings posted over the last ten years were unheard of in the 1990's during the creation and building Internet Bubble. In 1990-92, when PSINet was bulding the very first Internet Datacenter in Herndon, Va, who even ever thought of installing a fiber-channel disk array for shared storage (didn't happen until 2001)? Then who at that time dreamed of virtual servers and "cloud hosting?" And who would think of paying a staff of Cyber Security Experts to harden those servers and app, when they weren't even yet building highly available failover severs to survive a strike on a datacenter?

We have yet to even think of the human jobs needed to shepherd the AI's along until they finally out run us with SkyNet.

 

[onehitwanda]

It told a client of mine to store API keys in plaintext in a mobile app.

oh boy.

 

[NoTalentHack]

Many of the job openings posted over the last ten years were unheard of in the 1990's during the creation and building Internet Bubble. In 1990-92, when PSINet was bulding the very first Internet Datacenter in Herndon, Va, who even ever thought of installing a fiber-channel disk array for shared storage (didn't happen until 2001)? Then who at that time dreamed of virtual servers and "cloud hosting?" And who would think of paying a staff of Cyber Security Experts to harden those servers and app, when they weren't even yet building highly available failover severs to survive a strike on a datacenter?

All of those jobs that you just listed, wioth the arguable exception of installing the disk array? Significantly impacted and/or obviated by AI. I agree that there was a HUGE surge int he post-internet era of new jobs. But now we're seeing the opposite, i.e., that those same jobs are being eliminated by AI. That b itself wouldn't be something worth doomsaying over, but the difference is that none of the new jobs that are being created are even coming close to replacing the ones being lost. This is the first time the new technology itself can be used to replace the new jobs that it's creating before any significant number of humans can learn them.

The internet didn't do that, computers didn't do that, factories didn't do that. AI is. We've built a technology that isn't leaving space for humans to thrive and survive.

 

[NoTalentHack]

oh boy.

Yeah. That is one of the clients I had to say, "I cannot continue to work with you if you do this. It's unethical and dangerous, especially given the type of app you're building." They didn't listen (they needed to get an MVP out for investors and would "fix it later"), so we parted ways.

 

[onehitwanda]

Yeah. That is one of the clients I had to say, "I cannot continue to work with you if you do this. It's unethical and dangerous, especially given the type of app you're building." They didn't listen (they needed to get an MVP out for investors and would "fix it later"), so we parted ways.

I work as an SRE (technically, these days, an SRE manager). I come from a software dev background, and I sometimes think I am the patron goddess of cynicism.

I feel almost wicked for the way I am anticipating the first AI fuckup. It's going to be spectacular - in the sort of way that you really want to be watching it from a different star-system.

 

[Lifestyle66]

All of those jobs that you just listed, wioth the arguable exception of installing the disk array? Significantly impacted and/or obviated by AI. I agree that there was a HUGE surge int he post-internet era of new jobs. But now we're seeing the opposite, i.e., that those same jobs are being eliminated by AI. That b itself wouldn't be something worth doomsaying over, but the difference is that none of the new jobs that are being created are even coming close to replacing the ones being lost. This is the first time the new technology itself can be used to replace the new jobs that it's creating before any significant number of humans can learn them.

The internet didn't do that, computers didn't do that, factories didn't do that. AI is. We've built a technology that isn't leaving space for humans to thrive and survive.

We can agree to disagree.

With over 8 billion people on this planet, I would ask you "How many are actually NEEDED and in productive jobs?"

Therein lies the basic question. There could be a sudden extinction of billions of people, and national economies could continue with plenty of "jobs" for the remainder. But just as people lost jobs and scrounged for work to survive through The Great Depression, the world as a whole did survive and develop even further. It just looked DRASTICALLY different than the previos generations thought possible.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

Then who at that time dreamed of virtual servers and "cloud hosting?" And who would think of paying a staff of Cyber Security Experts to harden those servers and app, when they weren't even yet building highly available failover severs to survive a strike on a datacenter?

We have yet to even think of the human jobs needed to shepherd the AI's along until they finally out run us with SkyNet.

Who thought we might need staff at the Soylent Green processing centers?

I feel almost wicked for the way I am anticipating the first AI fuckup. It's going to be spectacular - in the sort of way that you really want to be watching it from a different star-system.

Air Traffic Control?

 

[Lifestyle66]

Who thought we might need staff at the Soylent Green processing centers?



Air Traffic Control?

Or who would have thought we might be used as batteries to power the Matrix? (Those batteries fed with the discarded old ones via the Soylent processor plants.)

Converging technologies!!!

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

"The future's not ours to see

Que sera, sera

What will be, will be "

 

[onehitwanda]

Who thought we might need staff at the Soylent Green processing centers.



Air Traffic Control?

ATC is far too backwards (technologically speaking) for AI to play a part. I'm thinking more of some large trading firm or hedge fund thinking that GenAI will give them some sort of advantage in speed or signal detection for algorithmic trading, and they let it run in staging. and all looks good, so they turn it loose in production and we end up with Knight Capital all over again. Only the world is far more interconnected, everyone is far more leveraged, and shit will

 

[Voboy]

Yep.

And so it continues.

 

[Kayote]

80+ responses and no one is talking about the fish.

Now that the heavy discussion seems to be settled, can someone explain why is he/she/thy/them thanking for the fish?

 

[TheRedLantern]

So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish

 

[AwkwardlySet]

80+ responses and no one is talking about the fish.

Now that the heavy discussion seems to be settled, can someone explain why is he/she/thy/them thanking for the fish?

Hey dude, no kink-shaming. Not everyone is into roadrunners.

 

[Kayote]

Hey dude, no kink-shaming. Not everyone is into roadrunners.

I am into bunnies, but seriously I have been scratching my head since last two days. What the fuck is thank you for the fish?

 

[TheLobster]

What the fuck is thank you for the fish?

Perhaps what we should really be asking is How Much Is The Fish?

 

[Lifestyle66]

I am into bunnies, but seriously I have been scratching my head since last two days. What the fuck is thank you for the fish?

"So long, and thanks for all the fish," is a reference to the book "Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy", when all of the dolphins left Earth just before it was to be destroyed to make way for an intergalactic bypass. (Dolphins being the intelligent form of life on Earth, and knew the destruction was coming.)

 

[Kayote]

(Dolphins being the intelligent form of life on Earth, and knew the destruction was coming.)

But this doesn't look like a troll post. Aah... never mind i asked. I am too thick headed for this i guess.

 

[Lifestyle66]

But this doesn't look like a troll post. Aah... never mind i asked. I am too thick headed for this i guess.

The OP and co-workers have recently been replaced by an AI bot. They lost their jobs (aka. their world was destroyed).

The OP is now moving on from spending any time here and alluding to the world of all authors coming to an end soon, being replaced/destroyed by other AIs.

The dolphins leaving scene and their final comment "Thanks" is from the scifi book, and the OP probably thought it an appropriate farewell.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

Maybe in that "requirements to be in the AH" thread we should have included "a working knowledge of Douglas Adams" as a rule.

 

[Kayote]

I genuinely though you guys would discuss sexy ideas here. Damn... half of the stuff here makes my head hurt

 

[TheLobster]

I genuinely though you guys would discuss sexy ideas here. Damn... half of the stuff here makes my head hurt

You probably made the mistake of thinking this is a forum for erotica writers.

In reality, this is definitely one for self-proclaimed erotica writers.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

I genuinely though you guys would discuss sexy ideas here. Damn... half of the stuff here makes my head hurt

Arguing over past participles always gets me hot and bothered.

 

[Lifestyle66]

Maybe in that "requirements to be in the AH" thread we should have included "a working knowledge of Douglas Adams" as a rule.

"What we have here is a failure to communicate"

[From the movie "Cool Hand Luke"]

Maybe the OP should have tried some of the dolphin backflips, instead.