Tom Bilyeu: What to Do If AI Threatens Your Career

SPEAKER_1 (0:01)

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SPEAKER_2 (0:32)

Today on The James Altucher Show.

Tom Bilyeu (0:35)

Well, if you're in your mid-40s, history says that you are going to lose your job, and you're not going to recover, and it is going to be brutal. And I think lying about that isn't going to help anybody. So every time we've gone through a major technological revolution, there is a type of person who is unwilling or unable due to intellect, they're unable to exist in the new economy.

And it is a tragedy.

James Altucher (0:59)

The danger is, and you have to be very careful as a user of this danger, is that the AI likes to please. They want to please you so you keep interacting with it.

Tom Bilyeu (1:08)

If you're looking for the ways that it can improve your life, financially, emotionally, you will also find that. It is the most extraordinary tool humans have ever had access to. Some people will avail themselves and others won't. And the people who do will win, and the people who don't will be left behind, which is that simple.

SPEAKER_2 (1:28)

This isn't your average business podcast, and he's not your average host. This is The James Altucher Show.

James Altucher (1:46)

So, back in the 90s, I built websites. I did American Express' first one, actually. And I'd walk into JPMorgan and say, you know, every one of your customers is going to deal with you through a website. They laughed at me.

Look, they weren't stupid. They just didn't want it to be true. I think about that a lot right now. Like, when I was a programmer, a good day was 100 lines of working code. With AI, I can do, I don't know, maybe 50,000. Tom Bilyeu kind of keeps reinventing himself. First Quest Nutrition, then Impact Theory, which, I mean, came out of nowhere and became one of the biggest podcasts out there. And now he's building a video game the size of planet Earth with AI.

So I asked him the question I was honestly kind of scared to hear the answer to. You're in your mid 40s. You've got a mortgage, you've got kids. AI is coming for your job. What happens? And he didn't comfort me. He said, look, history says you lose that job and you don't recover. Every big technology revolution leaves a group of people behind. But then he said something that made me feel better. It's not really about age. It's about like what kind of person you are, whether you look for the opportunity or only the downside. And by the way, he also told me the one question he asks AI before he starts anything. It's not help me succeed. It's tell me why this will fail.

I'm stealing that. Okay. This is Tom Bilyeu.

Tom, first off, I think it's been about six years since we last ran into each other.

I recognize the studio. I was at your house. I was at the studio. How are things going?

Tom Bilyeu (3:33)

Good, man. Good. The core of what we do is our content. Content is singing. We've got a network now. I don't know if you know who Mian Bialik is from the Big Bang Theory, but we rep her. We rep some other people. So that's been great. Our game that we've been developing now for almost four years comes out in 13 and a half months, so I'm very excited about that. So yeah, things are good here.

James Altucher (3:55)

Tell me about the game, and then I want to talk about AI with you.

Tom Bilyeu (3:58)

Yeah. So the game is what's known as a craft-like. So it's in the genre of Minecraft, though it plays very differently. So we're like a high mobility Minecraft where combat and creature capturing is like the core of the loop.

Very expansive world, all procedurally generated, so every world is unique. It's the size of planet Earth and not in a boring way where it just repeats and repeats and repeats. So yeah, we think we've got something pretty special and we're very excited to hit the December date that I'm going to need every minute of that time.

James Altucher (4:33)

Well, let me ask you, I'm just going to jump right into some AI stuff and then we can go further.