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This article will focus on using AI as a generation tool / multiplier in the following contexts:

• AI in technology – i.e. coding, building systems
• AI in Music production
• Writing, video, images etc.
• What the heck is going to happen

For the first time in my career, there is some uncertainty in the technology world, as typically, compensation has been rightfully linked to the rarity and high value that our skills represent.

Now with the AI hype, ensuing gold-rush and typical industry response, half being faux and the other half being valid, our relevance is being tested.

We need to adapt and up-value-compete-perform to stay on the top half of the pile…

In this article, I try and outline a mind map of where to focus and how to leverage AI into creating more relevance to our human work.

There are four main groupings of output which, in my mind, AI helps generate:

• Slop
• Productivity Empowered (individual level)
• Super-powered (typically at an org level, or super-human, sophisticated multi-modal agents, groups of agents.)
• Where AI is irrelevant (and human-ness is valued)

Article TLDR;

I believe productivity empowered individual and super-powered individuals / orgs will see the biggest capitalization of AI. Those who embrace it as a producitivity multiplier.

Slop is a waste of time.

The human element: Naturally some human output (repetitive, administrative, low-skilled, repeatable) will be and is already being rendered irrelevant, HOWEVER, specific, niche, highly skilled, highly artisanal human work will drastically rise in value, much like asset prices are constantly rising in our in-equality driven, rich-get-richer, get rich-or-die-trying economy.

Take away at the end of the article…

Lets get the lowest hanging fruit out of the way, SLOP!

This category offers the least value to society and in effect, can see as a modern day form of spam – digital polution! All platforms are already doing a good job of essentially hiding, de-indexing, blocking, removing these forms of generated content. And for the good. There was a small window of opportunity to capitalise on this in the early days, but since the end of 2024 – this time has passed.

Slop is entirely AI generated, mostly unsupervised, unchecked and low quality. Here are some current examples.

• SEO articles – even with good prompting == so bad. No matter what SAAS tool you use to structure or humanize – the outputs are never good, rich and search engines know this, can detect it and HEAVILY de-index this content.
• AI generated images – artifacts and “overly busy-ness” and bad text. Stands out – even when its “good” – think AI-gen influencers.
• AI music remixes, interesting to the everyday listener, but contains low fidelity (mp3 bitrate like-ness), bad voice recreation in mix context. Thinness / Tinniness.
• AI video without any sophisticated context preservation and low quality input. Object deformities/morphing and inconsistencies,
• Vibe coding / without actual deep knowledge – getting something pretty / “just working” on the face, but a messy birdsnest on the inside. Security issues, breakages, you name it.

Stop wasting your time generating SLOP! Naturally – this is where one should start when playing with the AI tools, but don’t waste energy trying to capitalise on it. Even if you find some return on your investment, it will be short lived.

AI powering individual productivity

The great unblocker!

AI – given the right inputs, can unblock the static and rigid thought trenches that highly skilled people experience when solving complex problems. We should not use it as a crutch, merely as a peer or rubber duck, where we borrow its output as a lens of perspective.

This, is a TRICKY slope – as modern tooling gets so good at making it easy to fall back into the SLOP trough. Tools like code auto-completion, chat agents, while helpful inevitably end up in you switching off your brain – which leads to rot.

“if using an AI agent to help code, what part of the brain could easily switch off when trusting too much of the AI provided code and not reviewing critically enough”

If you trust AI-generated code too much and don’t critically review it, you’re likely “switching off” key parts of your prefrontal cortex, particularly:

1. Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (DLPFC) – Responsible for critical thinking, problem-solving, and logical reasoning. If you overly rely on AI, you may stop engaging deeply with the logic of the code, leading to shallow understanding.
2. Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC) – Involved in error detection and conflict monitoring. If you’re not questioning AI suggestions, you might overlook inconsistencies, bugs, or security flaws that would normally trigger a “wait, this looks off” response.
3. Hippocampus – Key for memory and learning. If you don’t engage actively with the code, your brain may not properly encode patterns and structures, making it harder to recall or apply concepts later.

Figure out a way to boost productivity while preventing AI from doing your work.

I personally find that code completion is useful and not invasive enough to distrupt my thought processes as it is easy for me to evaluate output without it doing so much as to bring in errors.

I find chat agents are too disruptive to that process and hijack the brain.

When working on complex problems / blockers – I prefer to prepare detailed, redacted prompts for ideas only – and cross reference output alongside official documentation. Then, I take this new perspective back to the code and use this collective power to think about, first, and then implement potential solutions.

AI-nomics

There is a lot of sceptisim around the costs of

Takeaway

What to do?

Remain valuable, or die trying.

Do you compete with AI?

• Yes:
  • (e.g. software engineer)
    • If your skill requires / competes with AI, use AI to first empower you at the individual level (e.g. remaining as a highly skilled, AI-enhances super-employee)
    • Everyone is going to be a business / solopreneur. Companies are going to reduce in size drastically. As such, create powerful businesses by automating systems and AI agents to emulate the power and capability of large corporations today, with a handful of people or alone.
• No:
  • Some fields, until we have a large robotics revolution, which is still a while out, imo, still require semi-skilled, skilled human labour. Nurses, caregivers, plumbers, electricians, construction etc. You are good – your value will increase in the short-medium term.
  • If you are rare/bespoke/truly unique artisan and create “human-only” art – like a highly talented musician, composer, painter, carpenter, jeweler – things that cannot easily be recreated by machines / AI, and are valuable for their ‘human-ness’ – you will probably forever be “safe” due to how humans value human produced goods for their sentimental and bespoke value.

Do you not offer any special skills or value to society? Do you consume more than you produce?

• Yes:
  • I don’t know, I guess this is where the UBI model comes in, which I have serious doubts about due to the way modern economies are structured. It can only lead to hyper-inflation imo. So I am not sold on UBI unless things globally are drastically restructured which would require changes to the collective.
  • More simplistically, and brutally, excuse me, but poverty and misery in some way or form. Much like the middle class is hollowing now – that every-rising line is the yard stick to this divide between those who have, are, are above, and those who are below.

TLDR; Become / Remain valuable, get lucky or struggle.