When I was a child, life in Britain was relatively stable. Desktop computers, mobile phones, and the internet had yet to cause significant disruption to daily life. Out-of-town shopping malls were the only real competition for the streets of shops that ran through most town centres.
Then the internet became widespread and changed our lives. It was a disaster for shopkeepers, but for anyone who enjoyed writing, it greatly opened up opportunities. Writers became bloggers, social media experts, copywriters, editors, and self-published authors.
In the decades before the internet, there weren’t so many career opportunities for writers. If they weren’t accepted by publishing houses, advertising agencies, or magazines, there wasn’t much else out there.
As we all know, the following 20 to 30 years were quite different. Writers used the internet to make names for themselves, writing in many different fields. They also earned a good living behind the scenes, in marketing and other areas of commercial communication.
A few years ago, the public release of Gen AI helped to bring the writers’ golden age to an end. Jobs for writers still exist, and creative writing is going strong … but things are different now.
Today’s writing prompt asks, “What are your thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?”
I think people who live for a long time experience a lot of change. New conditions come in and become normal for a few decades before giving way to something completely different.
Even though I lived through the first internet revolution, I didn’t expect this most recent change. I thought that the opportunities for writers would stay the same forever. I imagine that people in their eighties and nineties wouldn’t have been so easily surprised!
The Beta Files 