Jobs, Farming, and Directors of Wizardry

The jobs have been taken. Not all of them, but plenty. I know many people, including some sitting near me, where compared to September 1st, 2025 the job they do is not the same. 

Being this early on the frontier means likely the company, role, title, pay is all the same but the function is something different. Pick your preferred inflection: magically, drastically, or horrifically different. 

There are new jobs too, not quite fully baked. AI Builder as a title is bland because there's no runway in front of it. At least let the people be Input Architects. 

I already miss the days of appealing to vanity and whims, and the business cards that were printed with some random honorific of Wizard. 

I am glad I am not a farmer, as farming is hard. Lucky me though, I fell in love with work that is hard in a different way. Hard enough, that like farming, it was always going to be sent to the machines. 

Hard enough that the roles were never filled.
Hard enough that salaries were high. 
Hard enough that we let some people be assholes without question.

If I take a second to unclench my pearls (and other things) and remember the world outside the algorithms it's not hard to find evidence that the evolution is working as it does. 

My grandma started picking cotton and retired a Walmart cashier. My mom printed payables on a dot matrix printer and retired an elementary teacher who made it through COVID remote public schooling. In that view, it feels like being alarmed at the passing of time. 

The work was always hard, but the lives got easier and more expansive. I have no children so it's just me and the machines.

It's the lessons from farmers that worry me most. I don't want the model weights that took the job I had last year to end up like the tractors and seeds, as equipment the operator can't repair or truly own, or borrowed IP that can't dare be used without signed agreements, ID verification, and package deals without price ceilings.