AI's Impact On Future Writer Career Paths

Here's how technology will augment each career path for the next decade.

Dear Writer,

One of the most common questions I get asked these days is:

“Cole, how is AI going to change things for writers?”

And the answer for each Writer Career Path is somewhere between “marginally” and “exponentially.”

Will AI render the craft of writing obsolete over the next decade? Of course not. In fact, the counterargument I often present pessimists is, “What skill do you need to have in order to use any of these consumer AI models and platforms? In order to prompt you have to… that’s right… you have to know how to write.”

Writing just might be (if it’s not already) the single most valuable skill of the next few decades.

The next analogy I like presenting is to look at previous innovations in meaningful industries:

• The Industrial Revolution and the invention of the tractor didn’t destroy farming. It scaled farmers exponentially, and led to the globalization of trade.

• Photoshop didn’t destroy the animation, sketching, drawing, or design trade. It lowered the barrier to entry and allowed exponentially more people to become professional designers. (And then Canva did the same thing, lowering the barrier to entry further, allowing non-designers to become reasonably proficient.)

• Instagram didn’t destroy the photography business. It lowered the barrier to entry and allowed exponentially more people to become photographers.

The list goes on.

All throughout history, new technologies have had net-positive effects on society. These technologies reduce costs, democratize access, increase competition, and accelerate innovation. Now, have some industries declined, or been rendered irrelevant in the process? Of course. But these losses sit in a broader context of an abundance of opportunity.

And if you don’t believe or agree with me, let’s just invert the question:

• Would you trade access to the Internet (digital paper) to keep the once-booming physical paper industry? Of course not.

• Would you trade modern pharmaceuticals to maintain the sales of outdated, now-terrifying medical devices from the 1900s? Of course not.

• Would you trade your iPhone for a rotary phone because you don’t want the rotary phone companies to go out of business? Of course not.

Over and over again, innovation doesn’t destroy industries. It changes them, augments them, and provides opportunity for people to develop new skills. And more times than not, these new skills lead to increased productivity, less work (or less “taxing” work, as seen with the decrease of blue collar jobs and the increase of white collar jobs), and more income—for both these new businesses, as well as their employees and shareholders.

Now, the big counter-argument here is that “AI is going to be different.”

And I agree, yes, it will.

But I also disagree, and no, it won’t.

I can’t speak for all industries. However, I’ve been writing on the Internet for over 15 years now. And, without patting myself on the back too hard, I have been right about every major writing trend of the past two decades.

• I started writing online in 2007, back when the masses called “blogging a fad.”

• I started self-publishing on Amazon in 2013, back when the masses called “self-publishing a scam.”

• I started a ghostwriting business in 2016, back when the masses called ghostwriting “unethical.”

• I started a paid newsletter business in 2017, back before Substack raised hundreds of millions of dollars, pioneered the category, and started educating journalists on how much more money they could earn starting their own 1-person publication (aka: a paid newsletter with subscription revenue).

• I started a cohort-based writing program in the pandemic, when the masses thought the sky was caving in, opportunities didn’t exist anymore, and society was going to collapse.

• Etc.

Now, admittedly, AI is a completely new and different technology than we’ve ever known. So despite having been “right” many times in the past, I have no idea what’s going to happen in the future—especially the further out we project.

My goal here is simply to give you my best guess on how I see AI augmenting each of the major Writer Career Paths for the next decade:

1. Writer Career Path #1: Literary Writer

2. Writer Career Path #2: Genre Fiction Writer

3. Writer Career Path #3: Non-Fiction Writer

4. Writer Career Path #4: Newsletter Writer

5. Writer Career Path #5: Content Writer

6. Writer Career Path #6: Ghostwriter

7. Writer Career Path #7: Copywriter

8. Writer Career Path #8: Writerpreneur

9. Writer Career Path #9: Category Copywriter

Let’s dive in.

Writer Career Path #1: Literary Writer