AI video generation and filmmaking

`3:03:37`

The irony here is it already was. So the number of fake email jobs that currently exist in this world is an absolute epidemic. And-... this, by the way, is not a new thesis. Um, David Graeber wrote this wonderful piece Bullshit Jobs, back in, I think it was maybe early 2010s. Based on a poll he did in the UK asking people, at that time, would... I think the question was something like, "Would it make a difference if you didn't go to work?" For humanity, for mankind. And something like 30-some percent answered, "No, it wouldn't." That a third of workers thought that their job was fake, that it did not produce any worthwhile, valuable outcomes, neither for the community or society or maybe even the economy at all. And this was my argument since day one with startups. This was why we stayed a small company. This was why we didn't want to take VC, because I was so skeptical of the idea that you could get hundreds of programmers, thousands of programmers to do something productive-... as a collective group. And I think what we're seeing right now with some of the layoffs is a testament to that, not AI. It's just that during the pandemic, a bunch of overhiring went on, and now AI is a convenient excuse to slim down. But I do also think AI is going to expose some roles as just not being productive ways for humans to spend their time, and therefore we must come up with new ways of spending their time.

And the one, again, I'm quoting Toby for the third time here, but anecdote that he shared me, or observation was, okay, let's say we all-- we lose half the jobs that are currently happening right now. Do you know that Formula 1 employs literally tens of thousands of people just to run cars around in a circle for spectators? Like, that has, that whole circus has no intrinsic value to society besides the spectacle it produces of amusement and entertainment. We just decided it would be really fun for these, what is it, 12 manufacturers to create these fast cars and constantly tweak their little aero improvements, and we will watch it, and we will spend literally billions of dollars doing it and employ tens of thousands of people towards an ultimately deeply frivolous activity. So if we are liberated from a bunch of drudgery and fake email jobs, maybe we all get employed as F1 style engineers and drivers and mechanics and masseuses and the other 1,500 jobs that are involved in that, and we come up with new things. I think this is... Humans are very poor at imagining what exactly the future's gonna be like.

`3:06:52`

Funny thing is we're already doing that, right? Like, the number of fake email job people who sit on a chair all day long and type into a machine who don't have hard physical labor would be unimaginable-... to folks in the 1800s, right? So the future is always already here, it's just not evenly distributed.

`3:07:30`

Yes. And I don't think you should make light of that. I don't think it's funny. But I also do think it's a necessary component of progress. And I think if we look back upon the Luddites or the folks working the fields, separation has a tendency to reduce empathy. So we have high empathy right now because we know people-... and we are people who are facing these challenges. But- What is our empathy for the Luddites of the early 19th century? Would we wish that all garments were still made by hand weaving? No, we wouldn't. We want the comfort and accessibility and convenience of being able to buy clothing off the rack. So we must suffer in the moment for future generations to live more prosperously. And that's always been true

`3:09:00`

I do think that suffering becomes more meaningful when you are suffering for a future someone in particular, like your kids. And I think this is one of the great tragedies of the moment, is the falling birth rates are making it more difficult for people to be excited about a more prosperous future that is difficult to get to. Because if we're planting trees of which our children will not sit in the shades, I don't know, maybe we should just make some lumber and burn it all down, right? I think there's a nihilism that can sneak into society much more easily when we are not DNA invested in the future, when we are not liable to our own offspring to propel forward. So I think these are bad trends to merge at the same time, that we have these falling birth rates and these problems with coupling, and the fact that we need to keep our chin up about the future and be... I mean, you don't even have to be excited about it in this literal ecstatic sense that I'm portraying here, but I think you should be hopeful, and I think you should be working towards that hope, and I think it's much easier to do so when you have literal skin in the game.