If you have played for even 15 minutes with ChatGPT, you know we are in for a ride. Since I don't want to fall back into an average lifestyle (where "average" means what most people will statistically do), I started thinking about how to best prepare and position myself for a millennial change in the world.

When thinking about these, I didn't focus on any particular technology. But the most pronounced use cases are the following:

• Language models: Interpreting text or speech, communicating like a human being (e.g., ChatGPT)
• Generative media models: Tools that allow you to create or edit images / videos, sometimes integrated with language models to be used with text (e.g., Lensa, Stable Diffusion, Mid Journey)
• Image / video recognition: Has already been around for decades. Face recognition and security-related problem-solving. Mostly a use case of machine learning
• Audio recognition and generation. Nothing new here. Any call queue can recognize your speech, and podcasts are spoken by an AI voice.
• Machine learning: Analyzing and producing data, which then often is used by other tools or helps with decision making (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch)

Assuming AI tools will achieve near-perfect results in the coming years, here are 5 ways to make money away from the impending danger AI brings to the economic market.

1. (Day) Trading

There is nothing new in Wall Street. There can't be because speculation is as old as the hills. Whatever happens in the stock market today has happened before and will happen again.

Jesse Livermore

It may sound surprising, but day trading will likely survive AI for the following reasons:

• There are already many algorithms and trading bots, and it's otherwise massively "softwareized". And yet many human traders are making big bucks from manual trading. Adding any AI is, at its roots, just another algorithm added to the mix of the countless algorithms and programs that already exist. It may out- or underperform by a fraction of a percentage, depending on how the model is trained, but there will never be any code (or human judgment) that will attain perfection. Markets are driven by people, and their money is underpinned by fear and greed.
• The stock market attempts to predict the future at a particular timeline. Unless humanity teaches AI fortune telling or time traveling, in this area, an AI should not be able to attain a more significant advantage than any existing arbitrary algorithm: You can teach and recognize patterns, but because of how diffuse the environment and future are I don't see AI taking over. Some algorithms strive to manipulate the market more than to predict it, which has a much better chance of success.
• Not only is the stock market the attempt to predict the future, but it's also the human sentiment that decides about the perception of the current state of the market (or single companies) that extrapolates to how well the market will do after some time. So the human factor, by definition, is part of the stock market and its evaluation. There is no way to remove it without transforming the financial market into something entirely different.
• The markets operate under uncertainty (as the future is uncertain). If you reach certainty in predicting the next move, it would just make the markets obsolete. If there is a way to know where it will go, why would anyone stay in the market (you can only take money from someone who misjudged the market, but if you can know where it goes, why would anyone end up taking losing bets)? Anyway, it would be nice to finally find a working glass ball!
• Lastly, the best traders always have described trading more as an "art" than a "science". It requires a significant degree of subjectivity, and a computer program, even AI, will not be able to achieve that in the nearest future.

If you're interested in learning to day trade, check out this article in which I describe my experience from a trading signal group.

2. Skilled manual labor and handcrafting

If u build furniture, cut stone, set up solar panels, or renovate apartments, AI will not interrupt you. Watchmakers, Yacht builders, decor creators, and many others have nothing to fear.

Even better, people are getting lazy. Handicrafts got a bad reputation over the last few years, and now everybody is sitting behind their office desks. Nobody wants to get their hands dirty. If you have a talent in the field or are building a career here, don't give up on it. I don't see how AI could disrupt the industry, and I have heard from people I know that the demand is on the rise while the offer declines. As a result, unexpectedly, the prices spiral into the sky.

Prosperous times are moving toward you!

3. Flipping (anything)

Surely AI won't be able to flip physical goods. It may start helping you in the process of doing so, like finding the right products and deals, but the main challenge is still safe from AI influence.

Dropshipping and (online) stores selling physical goods will be just fine, while AI will start creeping into the supply chain and process management.

4. Real estate

Whether you are an owner, buyer, or agent, real estate is one of the most AI-prone industries. You have a property and want to sell or buy it to make money. For that, you will always need to go through people, be it the buying process, solving legislative issues, negotiating,

Apart from the data it may use (again, AI may creep into sub-processes), this industry is vastly disconnected from any digital influence at the battle line.

5. Consulting

Especially AI consulting, but also general consulting should be fine in the future. The moat consulting has against AI is that it is firmly based on inaccessible personal, often publically undisclosed experience. Further, this experience must be applied to the client's unique and specific situation. The consultant needs to identify the critical aspects case by case, which may fall prey to AI's ignorance.

Since the currently emerging AI models infer their "thoughts" mainly from a range of publically available content (e.g., the internet), I don't see how an AI can give anyone that specific, unique, and valuable situational advice.

6. Super niches

Find the niches in your profession that will survive and get a massive push from shifting market economics. They are everywhere - you can not deem a single industry entirely to death or prosperity.

Let's take photographers as an example. With projects like avatarai.me and profileme.ai, it is clear that many photographers are fucked. People doing real-life photo sessions to take pictures for your LinkedIn and Instagram profiles will suffer immensely.

But then there will be some distinct niches that will thrive. Two examples are wedding photographers and passport studios:

An AI can't be physically in place when a wedding is ongoing, so a human person will always be required to capture real emotions in the moment. Wedding photographers are safer than you think - at least from AI.

Passport studios are also fine since it's unlikely that governments will allow computer-generated shots to be used in passports anytime soon. Instead, they may even start requiring a certification that confirms a photo has been taken in real life in a local passport studio to prevent people from even trying to hand in an AI-generated shot, no matter how perfect it turns out.

Even copywriters Yes, informational and educational content will take a hit, but corporate content? Enterprise blogs could easily experience a considerable revival. You would need a human to refer the emotions of using your product to an audience. There is nothing to research and rephrase for a language model. The same goes for testimonials. An AI can not write a review for a product or service because it has never been able to use it. It may summarize existing reviews by extension, but those must always come in first.

These super niches will thrive with the advance of AI, and you will be able to find them in every industry and profession. The landscape will change, and we will find new exciting opportunities that did not exist before. But you must start thinking and searching for these areas now and prepare to switch if you are not yet specialized.

7. Abuse AI to stay in business

Let's step away for a moment from the idea that you need to hedge against AI and instead consider letting it work for you. Now is the time to gain an edge over those who hesitate by embracing.

Especially if you are looking to improve your communication, for example by producing content, AI is an excellent opportunity to boost your output in many ways. It can help you with inspiration, give you first drafts for whatever you want to create, and speed up processes.

While people (or companies) miss entering the space, riding the wave of AI may be one of the safest and best ways to capitalize.

Final thoughts

As AI becomes more capable and integrated into our world, I view it as an immense boost to our social output. Everything that can be used as a teaching resource for AI and is below average will vanish. The conclusion is that talent and dedication that qualitatively outperforms AI will thrive, and smart people will find ways to enhance their work with AI. That sounds quite favorable to me.