alt Hacker News> The only reason to reduce headcount is to remove people who already weren’t providing much value.
There were many secretaries up until the late 20th century that took dictation, either writing notes of what they were told or from a recording, then they typed it out and distributed memos. At first, there were many people typing, then later mimeograph machines took away some of those jobs, then copying machines made that faster, then printers reduced the need for the manual copying, then email reduced the need to print something out, and now instant messaging reduces email clutter and keep messages shorter.
All along that timeline there were fewer and fewer people involved, all for the valuable task of communication. While they may not have held these people in high esteem, they were critical for getting things done and scaling.
I’m not saying LLMs are perfect or will replace every job. They make mistakes, and they always will; it’s part of what they are. But, as useful as people are today, the roles we serve in will go away and be replaced by something else, even if it’s just to indicate at various times during the day what is or isn’t pleasing.
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The crucial observation is the fact that automation has historically been a net creator of jobs, not destroyer.
> At first, there were many people typing, then later [...]
There were more people typing than ever before? Look around you, we're all typing all day long.
The thing that replaces the old memos is not email, its meetings. It not uncommon for meetings with hundreds of participants that in the past would be a simple memo.
It would be amazing if LLMs could replace the role that meetings has in communication, but somehow I strongly doubt that will happens. It is a fun idea to have my AI talk with your AI so no one need to actually communicate, but the result is more likely to create barriers for communication than to help it.