Building my website got easier. The questions about work got harder.

Hello, everyone!

Yesterday, Dad rang me from Taiwan.

He was introducing my personal website to someone he had just met. But when he opened it, he discovered it looked completely different from before.

That is because I have been updating it this weekend, with AI building the whole site for me.

Honestly, I think it is extraordinary.

In the past, creating a website could mean finding different people to handle the design, coding and administration system. Once it was built, adding a feature or changing the layout meant another round of explanations.

Now?

I can simply tell AI how I want the website updated, changed or improved.

The text is too small? Make it bigger. Add a section showing our charity fundraising results. Organise the food reviews into a restaurant database. Create Chinese and English versions.

I explain what I want, AI changes the code, and I look at the result.

Of course, it does not get everything right first go. Sometimes something still looks odd, so I point it out and we keep working on it.

But things I could not do myself, things I would previously have needed someone else to handle, are now gradually taking shape through conversations with my AI alter ego, AI Paul.

The technical barrier to building a website has suddenly become much lower.

Wonderful as a customer. A different question as a worker.

Because I am using it myself, an article about AI potentially causing job losses struck a chord.

It cited a prediction by former Google X Chief Business Officer Mo Gawdat that, in some industries, as many as 30% of jobs could disappear in 2027–2028.

Let us be clear: that is his prediction. It does not mean the unemployment rate across the whole economy will reach 30%. The headline is alarming, but we still need to read the numbers carefully.

Will AI change work?

After what I have been doing this weekend, I would find it hard to say it will not.

For someone like me, who wants a website but cannot code, this is wonderful. Features that once seemed too much trouble, or not worth the time, are now things I can try.

But what if my job had been doing those things for other people?

That is a less comfortable question.

Some will say that people who use AI will be more productive and able to take on more projects.

Fair point. Professionals who know how to use the tools and check the results should be able to do a better job than an outsider like me.

But suppose a job that once needed five people can now be done by two people using AI. Where do the other three go?

Could lower prices generate enough new demand to employ them again? Possibly.

But when and where those new jobs appear is a separate question from whether someone has a pay cheque coming in right now.

Where will beginners learn the ropes?

As a teacher, another question came to mind.

What happens if AI also does the work that beginners used to learn from?

A new employee might start by researching, organising documents and preparing drafts for a senior colleague to review. The tasks can be tedious, but they also help people gradually develop judgement.

Those entry-level tasks happen to be well suited to AI.

The company can get the result faster. But where does the beginner start learning?

Surely we cannot cut all the junior positions today, then complain a few years later that we cannot find experienced staff?

I do not have a complete answer.

But I am already using AI, and the more I use it, the more impressive I find it. I probably would not want to go back to waiting for someone else to make every website change either.

That makes the question worth thinking about.

As employers, teachers and parents, we need to consider how young people will learn and gain experience, alongside working out how AI can help us get things done faster.

Dad called because he no longer recognised my website.

I wonder whether, in a few years, we will still recognise the workplace we knew.