I don’t particularly like the horse to engine angle because it doesn’t capture the issue well.
When we automated physical activity people that were crowded out moved into knowledge work. Now we’re automating knowledge work so people move into ???
Leisure? Become a useless class? UBI? Something else entirely?
The knowledge economy was already on the way out in favour of the performance economy even before LLMs. LLMs have also shown that they can produce in the performance space, of course, so it remains to be seen how valuable humans are in that position but so far it would appear that many are willing to pay for a "human connection".
Plenty if not all people put more value into handmade things, but they can't afford to have everything handmade. An IKEA coffee table is $15. Handmade one from a woodworker is $400 - $1000.
Absolutely. Hence why manufacturing died long ago, and why the knowledge economy was already on the verge of death even before LLMs, and why we were already moving to the performance economy: because in the performance economy the consumer and the buyer are able to be disparate entities, where the buyers can have deep pockets even if the consumers don't.
In the performance economy it doesn't matter how rich the consumer is, but what the consumer wants to consume does matter. Because the buyer and consumer are disjointed in the performance economy, the consumer isn't swayed by cost. However, if the consumer prefers AI performances, which they quite easily could, then humans are in trouble. But so far it seems human performances remain what the consumer wants to consume.
(Technically manufacturing and knowledge work could have established the same separation, but since the bright minds went to performance nobody thought to before it was too late)
Havoc · · focus · HN ↗
When we automated physical activity people that were crowded out moved into knowledge work. Now we’re automating knowledge work so people move into ???
Leisure? Become a useless class? UBI? Something else entirely?
win311fwg · · focus · HN ↗
OroPla · · focus · HN ↗
win311fwg · · focus · HN ↗
In the performance economy it doesn't matter how rich the consumer is, but what the consumer wants to consume does matter. Because the buyer and consumer are disjointed in the performance economy, the consumer isn't swayed by cost. However, if the consumer prefers AI performances, which they quite easily could, then humans are in trouble. But so far it seems human performances remain what the consumer wants to consume.
(Technically manufacturing and knowledge work could have established the same separation, but since the bright minds went to performance nobody thought to before it was too late)