The future of work and artisanal cheese

Artisanal Cheese and the Future of Work azeem.azhar@exponentialview.co @azeem

www.exponentialview.co Gaspard Clair Français Marie-Riche de Prony 1791 Task: Mapping France after the revolution

www.exponentialview.co Gaspard Clair Français Marie-Riche de Prony 1791 Task: Mapping France after the revolution Approach: Hire human computers and store data in cache

www.exponentialview.co Tables de Prony

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www.exponentialview.co Computers can catch up with ‘human abilities’

www.exponentialview.co Computers can catch up with ‘human abilities’ AI system LipNet 93.4% of words correctly Human lip-readers 52.3% of words correctly

www.exponentialview.co Computers can catch up with ‘human abilities’ Microsoft speech recognition error rates 5.8% Human speech recognition error rates 5.9%

www.exponentialview.co Computers can catch up with ‘human abilities’ Sketch-a-Net identified type of bird in sketches 42.5% of the time Humans identified type of bird in sketches 24.8% of the time

www.exponentialview.co Predictions of current automation 47% of US jobs are at 'high risk' of automation in the next 1-2 decades Frey and Osborne, 2013 Typists, personal assistants, bank and post office clerks, assemblers are between 85-99% probability of automation; there is 1% probability nurses, teachers, educators will be replaced. Deloitte, The Impact of Technology on Jobs in the UK, 2013 35% of UK jobs are at 'high risk' of automation in the next 1-2 decades Deloitte, The Future of Work, 2017

www.exponentialview.co Does automation kill jobs?

www.exponentialview.co The ATM (didn’t) steal my job

www.exponentialview.co The Lump of Labour Fallacy

www.exponentialview.co But the picture is mixed

www.exponentialview.co Labour market shifts In areas exposed to industrial robots both employment and wages decline in robust and significant manner [between 1990 and 2007] One more robot per thousand workers reduces aggregate employment to population ratio by about 0.34 percentage points Acemoglu and Restreppo, 2017

www.exponentialview.co Employees to support $5bn in revenues 0 1 3 4 5 6 Blockbuster (1) Blockbuster (2) Netflix 90k 59k 2k

www.exponentialview.co The dematerialising company 0 7.5 15 22.5 30 GM (1979) Microsoft (2015) Facebook (2015) Rev/employee Mktcap/employee

www.exponentialview.co XKCD Comics

www.exponentialview.co A world where computers can do everything better

www.exponentialview.co Automated perfection will be common place, human imperfection will be relatively scarcer

www.exponentialview.co The human-made will be valuable because it is rare

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www.exponentialview.co 🧀 🔮 🙌 @azeem azeem.azhar@exponentialview.co www.exponentialview.co

www.exponentialview.co Mass production of perfect

www.exponentialview.co But is there enough for an artisan economy? 🙋🧀 🧀 Perfect Human No Yes Yes No Experiential, discretionary, intimate High risk, reliable, repetitive 🧀 🧀🧀♂️ 👬 🌴 💉 👮🧀 ✈️ 📚

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www.exponentialview.co Mass production of perfect

www.exponentialview.co de Prony’s cheese makers?