The Future of Knowledge Work with AI

The article describes knowledge workers who now spend their days managing and reviewing the output of AI agent "swarms" that draft copy, write code, and produce strategy, and argues that when every company in an industry runs its thinking through the same small set of LLMs, competitive differentiation erodes and skills atrophy. Drawing on the Kissimmee River straightening, Kyle Chayka's "Airspace," and research on LLM homogenization, it predicts a barbell-shaped future in which cheap high-volume AI output and premium verifiably human craft both thrive while the middle hollows out.