Artificial paths, real costs
There are days when it is impossible not to think that I took a few wrong turns at the crossroads I encountered in life. Today is one of those days.
I chose to leave behind what I had in my homeland and start over on the other side of the ocean because, at the time, I dreamed of becoming a “data analyst”. In the mid-2010s, that could mean many things. Most importantly, however, it meant sifting through the vast amounts of data generated by things as simple as merely moving files from one folder to another, in order to provide new information to decision-makers in a company or government.
But if data-analysis tools were already dreadful to work with back then, things have become even worse in recent years, largely because of the integration of artificial intelligence into everything done in the IT world.
In the end, I did not pursue a career as an “analyst”, but rather as an “engineer”. After all, it was more enjoyable and better suited to my profile to be the person who delivers the data so that it can be examined by someone better trained—and better presented—to deal with the public. Even though what is delivered still has to be very carefully pre-digested so that the “analyst” can actually “consume” the data as effectively as possible.
Yet once again, this crossroads could have led me in another direction. A direction that might have been more stressful and more exhausting overall, but which might have left me more satisfied and less concerned about things such as GitHub Copilot changing its billing model.
During the rounds of interviews shortly before finishing my chosen degree at university, I was approached about an opportunity that is very rare in these parts: an internship at an investment bank. I actually did very well in the interview, but there was a catch: the final stage, which was to be conducted by the company’s CEO, would only take place once he returned from a long trip, two or three months after the initial interview. By then, I would already be signing the contract to join the company where I eventually began my career as a “data engineer”.
I assumed I would never hear back about the opportunity, until around mid-October of the year in which I began my career in IT, when I received a call from that CEO. I had to tell him that I had already been hired by another company.
Considering everything I have done in my life so far, I do not think I have made many bad choices. But here and now, looking at everything taking shape on the horizon both within and beyond the IT world - particularly with the AI “revolution” that will soon explode in our faces - I cannot help thinking that I was a little foolish not even to consider hearing the bank’s offer.
I do not believe I would face insurmountable obstacles in moving into that kind of market, given my academic background and even my willingness to continue studying with a view to eventually changing careers if things become too difficult over the next few years, or even months. Yes, I am being rather dramatic. But I think we are all failing to grasp the true scale of what is happening in this field, or what will happen when energy markets belatedly but structurally reshape the world in which we live. And that is without even considering what AI companies themselves will have to do about investors who are already rather tired of subsidising consumers without receiving any financial return.
It also does not help to be in a place where even the possibility of “escaping” the cloud is impossible. That only increases my anxiety and my “itch” to eventually seek a new direction, preferably somewhere where being swallowed by a whale does not mean spending months, if not years on end, in its gastric juices.