This week, a documentary aired in Britain about automation and the job market. Channel 4’s Will AI Take My Job? featured a television reporter walking the streets of London as she contemplated which jobs might be at risk in the near future.

Dressed smartly in a crisp white shirt and tailored jacket, she began: “Call centre workers, customer service agents. Maybe even TV presenters like me,” she paused, “because I’m not real.”

Channel4’s AI-generated presenter Aisha Gaban.Credit: AI generated. Dispatches, Channel 4

The twist of the show was that the very realistic host who had been taking the audience through the journey was AI-generated. Her voice and likeness were all figments of a robot’s imagination, designed to push our uncomfortable human buttons about where all of this is heading.

One of the most consistent messages we’ve heard is that no job is safe in AI’s eyes because it’s going to either do the work for us or make us so efficient that there will be nothing left for humans........

© The Age