AI Stole My Identity and Left Me to Watch My Craft Die
Hello everyone. Gather round, because today’s special is a gourmet serving of existential dread with a side of silicon-flavored reality check, courtesy of one tech author’s candid breakdown of what it feels like to be mugged in broad daylight by AI – not for your wallet, but for your purpose in life. Buckle up, because this isn’t just another “robots might take our jobs” sob story. This is a man watching the one skill he’s sharpened over decades become an open-source buffet for algorithms, and still holding out hope for a utopian afterparty. Truly, the chef’s kiss of bittersweet irony.
The Setup: From Code Wizard to Background NPC
Our protagonist is a seasoned code-slinger and wordsmith who prides himself on explaining complex concepts with the precision of a raid leader walking first-timers through a World of Warcraft dungeon. Multiple books under his belt, glowing reviews, and a long-standing knack for knowing the best order to teach something. For years, this was a winning formula – until AI decided to roll into town like some smug level 99 player armed with all your quest guides… written by you… for free.
He’s been excited about AI. Skeptical, sure, but enthused. Then he noticed that if you want to learn a programming topic today, AI is the default party healer. Need Gleam explained? Sure, the AI might fumble the pull, hallucinate a bit, and take some unnecessary damage, but you’ll still clear the dungeon. Bad news if your livelihood involves being the best human source for those explanations.
The Book That’s Feeding the Beast
He wrote a book – made it free online – and while the altruism is commendable, it’s like leaving your best loot chest in the open because you “want people to enjoy it.” Which is noble… right until the bots strip it for parts and repurpose it without tipping their hat. He knows the risks, queries AI to check if it’s already ingested his material, and so far – no definitive proof – but as any conspiracy-minded gamer knows, that doesn’t mean the data vampires aren’t at work behind the firewall.
The Uncanny Doppelgänger
Here’s where it gets downright creepy: you can ask AI to “explain Gleam in the style of Dusty Phillips,” and it will. It’s not perfect – uncanny valley in prose form – but close enough to make you check the author bio twice. Imagine a raid group where your healer has been replaced by an AI bot that does 80% of your job cheaper and faster, and the rest of the team starts asking themselves if they really need you there. That’s the mood.
It’s not exactly me, but I won’t say it’s not not me either.
The Core Crisis: Commodification of Skill
The crux of the agony is that decades of honing a craft – the surgical precision of explaining difficult tech in human-friendly ways – has been flattened into a commodity. Like spending years perfecting a rare recipe in a cooking sim, only for a patch update to hand it to every player for free. First, authorship goes. Next, coding? Could AI “vibe coding” actually trivialize software development too? Possible. Fiction writing? Also up for grabs. At that point, the fallback career is woodworking – wonderful, yes, but about as financially viable as selling Green Hill Zone currency in 2025.
A Flicker of Hope… or Futility?
He toys with the utopian vision: AI does the boring grind, humans get to play for the joy of it. Like building a Minecraft house while knowing the server has an auto-builder plugin that does it better. And yet… will the joy still be there when you know you’ve been sidegraded to “optional content”? Will you write that next book if the AI does it faster, better, and in your own style – without needing sleep or coffee breaks? That’s the unanswered question rotting at the edge of this otherwise optimistic toast.
Final Verdict
This article is an intriguing, raw, and occasionally gut-punching insight into what many creators will face soon – a slow-motion recognition that the thing you thought defined you can be emulated by a machine learning model trained on the breadcrumbs of your life’s work. It’s not a luddite tantrum; it’s the sound of a craftsman taking inventory, calculating hit points, and realizing the boss fight might not be winnable without changing class entirely. Smart writing, vulnerable, and absolutely worth reading – but don’t expect it to send you skipping into the AI sunset.
Overall impression? Strong piece. Sharply written. But under the surface of composure, it’s dripping with that dread all of us creative types feel when we realize the game’s meta just shifted, and we may have rolled the wrong build years ago.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, is entirely my opinion.
Article source: My AI-Driven Identity Crisis
