Alex Selling rocks , circa 1970, Honeoye Falls, NY

I am Alex Mountjoy and I am a software developer displaced by AI.

In 2023, I was laid off because, as I was told, no joke, “we need an AI person”.

And this was before ChatGPT

Assuming they got an “AI” person, it’s likely that today that “AI” person is herself obsolete, replaced by person-AI.

We are in the early stages of an extinction-level event for white-collar creative jobs of all kinds. For those whose careers are affected, the impact is deep.

Creativity has been a core strength of mine my entire life. I feel shaken, and anxious for future.

But if things had been different, if the evolutionary pressures hadn’t been so tremendous, then BuildShift would not have come to be, and BuildShift is important.

— Alex