“An AI literally took my job away.”

earthpressnews

One company paid a small team to provide high-quality content to Spanish-speaking readers. But now all employees are being laid off and the task is being left to the AI.

Our cover image is a symbolic image.

Artificial intelligence (AI for short) is being used in more and more areas. Software like ChatGPT has become so good that thousands of people have lost their jobs to AI.

Now Ars Technica reports that the online magazine Gizmodo has laid off a team to let AI do the work from now on. One of the former employees, Matìas S. Zavia, posted this on Twitter:

Recommended editorial content

At this point you will find external content from Twitter that complements the article.

View Twitter content

I agree to external content being displayed to me. Personal data can be transmitted to third-party platforms. Read more about our privacy policy.

The tweet says (in Spanish):

Hello friends. On Tuesday, @GizmodoES closed to convert it into a self-publishing translation shop (an AI literally took over my job).

I’ll be looking for a new job soon. If you know of an offer that matches my 13 years of experience, I would be very grateful for your help.

Team developed projects and translated texts into Spanish

What was the team responsible for before the layoff? The team took care of translating English-language content into Spanish or developing its own projects. According to Ars Technica, this was the parent company’s attempt to make its websites more international and not just offer content for its home country.

But that’s exactly what’s over now. Gizmodo has laid off its Spanish-speaking team and is now relying on an AI translator. At the end of the translated articles there is a disclaimer pointing out the machine translation and linking to the original.

Gizmodo’s parent company has reportedly been relying on AI-generated content since the summer of 2023. This probably went so far that the union felt compelled to criticize it as unethical. Gizmodo probably neither informed the editors of this nor reported on this practice elsewhere. In addition, the texts were sometimes error-prone and inaccurate.

Replacing employees with AI is controversial and is rarely well received

What is the current situation? It is not uncommon for companies to replace their employees with AI. Because good AI can relieve a lot of work and replace people. Companies then like to talk about “cost optimization.” People repeatedly report that they are losing their jobs to AI or are receiving fewer and fewer orders because artificial intelligence takes over these tasks.

But such “restructurings” don’t always end well and AI can also cause a lot of nonsense. This is what cbsnews.com reported:

  • Media companies like CNET laid off a number of reporters and let AI take over the tasks. The AI ​​articles had to be subsequently corrected due to allegations of plagiarism.
  • An eating disorder counseling center used a chatbot to replace human employees who had unionized. After the bot gave people problematic tips, it had to be switched off.

    • Nevertheless, more and more people fear that they could lose their jobs due to artificial intelligence. Because this is getting better and better and would make a lot of things easier.

    Are there secure jobs? The head of ChatGPT explained in an interview which professions AI cannot replace. In total, he came up with 34 professions that would be safe from artificial intelligence. In addition to bus drivers and hairdressers, these also include some other, lesser-known jobs:

    The inventor of the AI ​​ChatGPT reveals which 34 professions an AI can never replace

    mmod-game