Any story about AI is obsolete the moment it is written. Gemini can handle context. Feed in your own fiction, generate a JSON file of your style, use that as a basis to fill out an outline. A novel, as you note, doesn't have to be great literature, merely something that engages the reader and keeps them turning pages.
Excellent piece. You’ve made the limitations of LLMs very clear, exposing the absurdity of the widespread claims about AI's ability to steal human jobs. Well done.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I have to disagree with you on "the absurdity of the widespread claims about AI's ability to steal human jobs." It can't outperform a top human writer—not now, probably not ever—but it is destroying and worsening jobs already, including for writers. Hollywood is replacing writer's rooms with "two writers, one AI." It's nowhere near as good as a human at anything worth doing, but it's cheap, reliable, and obedient. It will never unionize. It will never quit.
AI's effect on the job market is going to be extremely negative because, even though it can't produce elite-tier human work and is annoying to use even for mediocre work—that's what this essay is about—it costs next to nothing compared to hiring a human. It also gives bosses leverage. Even if there's no cost saving in firing 30% of their staff and forcing them to work inefficiently with AI, it's a way of dehumanizing workers and asserting power.
If we don't radically restructure our economy, we're headed for another Great Depression. The 1930s were a result of ill-managed prosperity—industrial nitrogen fixation led to record crop yields, which made food cheap, which seemed like a good thing until we had cascading rural poverty, starting around 1925; in 1929, it hit the stock market and rich people could no longer ignore it and that's when it was finally called a Great Depression.
This all said, it's not AI "stealing" human jobs. AI is just a technology, neither good nor evil. Capitalism is the problem and always was.
I agree with some of what you said, but honestly, I don’t believe AI is going to steal many real jobs. We’ve already seen plenty of cases where companies replaced humans with AI only to bring humans back because the quality just wasn’t there.
AI is brilliant as a tool, as a complement. But it can’t replace a thinking human being — especially in writing, where nuance and critical thought matter.
Sure, AI might replace writers who were churning out cheap SEO content that no one was reading anyway. Those jobs didn’t need human creativity; they just needed keywords. Machines are perfect for that.
And that’s how it should be: what can be done by machines, should be done by machines. Those aren’t desirable jobs; they’re repetitive and soul-sucking. They were never going to lead to fulfilling, meaningful work.
So no, I don’t think AI is stealing the kinds of jobs that matter. The real issue is how companies use AI to dehumanize work and treat people like replaceable parts — but that’s a capitalism problem, not an AI problem.
"We’ve already seen plenty of cases where companies replaced humans with AI only to bring humans back because the quality just wasn’t there."
Sure, but from the enemy's perspective, this might still be the right move. If the fired humans were unemployed for six months and have learned how bad it is not to have a job, they'll probably accept wages 20 percent lower. Our enemies don't want us unemployed—just as cheap and as powerless as possible.
"AI is brilliant as a tool, as a complement. But it can’t replace a thinking human being — especially in writing, where nuance and critical thought matter."
I agree entirely. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who can't tell the difference.
"Sure, AI might replace writers who were churning out cheap SEO content that no one was reading anyway."
It has. These are jobs no one wants to do. Unfortunately, for many writers, especially early in their career, this was the only option.
"So no, I don’t think AI is stealing the kinds of jobs that matter."
I agree. Have you read Graeber's Bullshit Jobs? It's fantastic and I recommend it highly.
"The real issue is how companies use AI to dehumanize work and treat people like replaceable parts — but that’s a capitalism problem, not an AI problem."
It's not that it doesn't work. It serves an alternative design purpose, which it achieves quite well.
Traditional publishing needs the reading public to believe that all submissions get read, because this would mean that the authors being published are the best in the country, not institutional favorites. The optics are important. Slush-pile rescues need to happen—but only a couple times per year. The odds are nonzero, but poor.
Query letters force authors to learn a skill that most writers detest: the sales pitch. This gives the industry, which doesn't want to invest the time it would take to find great new authors, plausible deniability. "Maybe you were right. But you did not convince me."
It also forces people to accept bourgeois culture. You cannot call yourself a serious anti-capitalist, nor critic of the human experience, if you invested time and emotion into three hundred personalized cold pitches.
Any story about AI is obsolete the moment it is written. Gemini can handle context. Feed in your own fiction, generate a JSON file of your style, use that as a basis to fill out an outline. A novel, as you note, doesn't have to be great literature, merely something that engages the reader and keeps them turning pages.
Excellent piece. You’ve made the limitations of LLMs very clear, exposing the absurdity of the widespread claims about AI's ability to steal human jobs. Well done.
I'm glad you enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I have to disagree with you on "the absurdity of the widespread claims about AI's ability to steal human jobs." It can't outperform a top human writer—not now, probably not ever—but it is destroying and worsening jobs already, including for writers. Hollywood is replacing writer's rooms with "two writers, one AI." It's nowhere near as good as a human at anything worth doing, but it's cheap, reliable, and obedient. It will never unionize. It will never quit.
AI's effect on the job market is going to be extremely negative because, even though it can't produce elite-tier human work and is annoying to use even for mediocre work—that's what this essay is about—it costs next to nothing compared to hiring a human. It also gives bosses leverage. Even if there's no cost saving in firing 30% of their staff and forcing them to work inefficiently with AI, it's a way of dehumanizing workers and asserting power.
If we don't radically restructure our economy, we're headed for another Great Depression. The 1930s were a result of ill-managed prosperity—industrial nitrogen fixation led to record crop yields, which made food cheap, which seemed like a good thing until we had cascading rural poverty, starting around 1925; in 1929, it hit the stock market and rich people could no longer ignore it and that's when it was finally called a Great Depression.
This all said, it's not AI "stealing" human jobs. AI is just a technology, neither good nor evil. Capitalism is the problem and always was.
I agree with some of what you said, but honestly, I don’t believe AI is going to steal many real jobs. We’ve already seen plenty of cases where companies replaced humans with AI only to bring humans back because the quality just wasn’t there.
AI is brilliant as a tool, as a complement. But it can’t replace a thinking human being — especially in writing, where nuance and critical thought matter.
Sure, AI might replace writers who were churning out cheap SEO content that no one was reading anyway. Those jobs didn’t need human creativity; they just needed keywords. Machines are perfect for that.
And that’s how it should be: what can be done by machines, should be done by machines. Those aren’t desirable jobs; they’re repetitive and soul-sucking. They were never going to lead to fulfilling, meaningful work.
So no, I don’t think AI is stealing the kinds of jobs that matter. The real issue is how companies use AI to dehumanize work and treat people like replaceable parts — but that’s a capitalism problem, not an AI problem.
"We’ve already seen plenty of cases where companies replaced humans with AI only to bring humans back because the quality just wasn’t there."
Sure, but from the enemy's perspective, this might still be the right move. If the fired humans were unemployed for six months and have learned how bad it is not to have a job, they'll probably accept wages 20 percent lower. Our enemies don't want us unemployed—just as cheap and as powerless as possible.
"AI is brilliant as a tool, as a complement. But it can’t replace a thinking human being — especially in writing, where nuance and critical thought matter."
I agree entirely. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who can't tell the difference.
"Sure, AI might replace writers who were churning out cheap SEO content that no one was reading anyway."
It has. These are jobs no one wants to do. Unfortunately, for many writers, especially early in their career, this was the only option.
"So no, I don’t think AI is stealing the kinds of jobs that matter."
I agree. Have you read Graeber's Bullshit Jobs? It's fantastic and I recommend it highly.
"The real issue is how companies use AI to dehumanize work and treat people like replaceable parts — but that’s a capitalism problem, not an AI problem."
100.
what makes you think querying doesn't work? sour grapes?
It's not that it doesn't work. It serves an alternative design purpose, which it achieves quite well.
Traditional publishing needs the reading public to believe that all submissions get read, because this would mean that the authors being published are the best in the country, not institutional favorites. The optics are important. Slush-pile rescues need to happen—but only a couple times per year. The odds are nonzero, but poor.
Query letters force authors to learn a skill that most writers detest: the sales pitch. This gives the industry, which doesn't want to invest the time it would take to find great new authors, plausible deniability. "Maybe you were right. But you did not convince me."
It also forces people to accept bourgeois culture. You cannot call yourself a serious anti-capitalist, nor critic of the human experience, if you invested time and emotion into three hundred personalized cold pitches.
Thanks for expanding on that