The author of a viral essay warning of impending AI destruction says he couldn’t wait any longer to get this information out into the world.
“Let’s say there’s only a 20% chance of that happening, which is probably realistic, but may be an underestimate,” Matt Shumer, GP at Shumer Capital, told Business Insider in an interview. “Even if there is a 20% chance of this happening, people should know about it and be given time to prepare.”
Those in the technology industry who previously warned about the impact of AI were mostly speaking to others in the industry, he said. Schumer told her father, an attorney, that he was just a few years away from retiring and hoped he would be able to move quickly through the potential for major changes on the horizon.
He certainly found an audience.
His essay, titled “Something Big is Coming,” had been viewed more than 60 million times on X alone as of Wednesday night. In a roughly 5,000-word post, Schumer wrote that the disruption to people’s lives from AI could be “far greater” than the coronavirus, a comparison that has sparked some backlash online. He also wrote that what we’re seeing in the technology industry is likely to be in store for other industries as well.
“I don’t know for sure if this is going to happen, but I think a lot of people in the technology industry are seeing this progress. It’s dizzying, frankly, and it’s very possible,” he said. “And the more people know, the better.”
Schumer isn’t the only one worried about the future.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, known for writing eyebrow-raising essays, said up to half of entry-level white-collar jobs could disappear in the next one to five years. xAI CEO Elon Musk has called AI a “supersonic tsunami” that will quickly wipe out non-physical jobs.
Schumer also said he is worried about the future of AI. After all, he’s 26 years old and still in the early stages of his career. In 2020, he co-founded OthersideAI, which later created the AI-assisted writing tool HyperWrite.
“If this actually happens, I don’t know how many years I have left in my career,” he told Business Insider. “So, to be honest, it’s a little confusing and scary for someone like me.”
Part of the problem is that AI is unlikely to impact all industries in the same way or at the same time, and career advice will depend heavily on an individual’s specific circumstances.
“If you’re a nurse, you’re probably going to be OK for a while,” he told Business Insider, adding that junior law school employees face much greater risk because many of the introductory tasks they do are already targeted by AI companies.
Shumer wrote in his essay that he realized what was coming after experiencing OpenAI’s GPT-5.3-Codex, released last week. OpenAI said in its release notes that GPT-5.3-Codex was “the first model it helped create.” Schumer writes that AI can now do his technical work.
As for his other work, Schumer has been very open about how AI helped him write a viral essay about AI. He said he spent hours with Claude crafting the message.
“It’s been very helpful,” he told TBPN on Wednesday, “and I think that’s the point.”
Shumer’s message to anyone who turned away from AI, perhaps after a bad experience with an early version of ChatGPT many years ago, is why you should seize the opportunity to see what the technology can do now.
“If you look back in 10 years and realize this was a reality, you’ll be so glad you did,” he told Business Insider.
