Interesting article, though I've got a few criticisms of it as well as related points I feel it missed out on. 1. AI won't necessarily replace humans because t

Interesting article, though I've got a few criticisms of it as well as related points I feel it missed out on. 1. AI won't necessarily replace humans because the success of a business isn't always dependent on an 'objective' metric like price or technical quality. For example, branding is often more important to the success of a product or business than the actual objective properties of the product is, especially in the world of film/tv/video games/music/etc. Disney won't lose sleep to an upstart creating a Star Wars or Mickey Mouse competitor with AI/machine learning, and Nintendo won't see Mario/Zelda/Pokemon lose popularity to AI generated rivals. Same goes on smaller scale with YouTubers, Twitch streamers, etc. Their fanbase likes them because of who they are, not just some objective quality about their work. So in that sense, I feel it may be likely we get an artist/brand economy when AI takes over, where the only way to succeed is to market yourself/your character/world. I also feel businesses based on location aren't going to be too threatened by AI for the time being either. Objectively, the shops at an airport/station/wherever are terrible, and offer worse wares at higher prices than their competitors. But they still make a ton of money, because for many people 'something edible now' is more important than 'something better in 20 minutes or so'. People are lazy and impatient, so there will always be an audience for convenience, regardless of better options in existence. So in that sense, it's doubtable that AI will put everyone out of work, simply because people aren't purely rational creatures using quality and price as the only important thing they look for in a product or service. 2. The flipside of authoritarianism and technology is that any technology used by tyrants and those already with power can be easily turned against them by their opponents too, especially if cyber security doesn't get much better than it is today. This has both a good and a bad side. On the good one, well it means the rebels/revolution/whatever will be able to literally hijack the military that the powerful are using to try and supress them. Or that peacekeeping forces can basically shut down a dictatorship's army there and then, or cripple their entire 'society' altogether. At the same time however, it also means a small group or individual without any popular support could also take over societies themselves. Which in turn brings me to the depressing point that all negative futurism articles fail to make clear. Namely: Technology makes it possible to rule with a zero percent approval rating. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ZeroPercentApprovalRating https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ZeroPercentAppro... That's the scary thing about its effects on governments and power. The more advanced technology gets, the less a tyrant needs to be loved or even tolerated by the population to hold onto power. Either way, the article's got some good points, and I definitely feel we should planning for these issues before they're too late.