I don’t think the analogy to the Industrial Revolution holds weight for starters because it did not remove manual labor it simply shifted it. A better analogy would have been the information revolution of the late 20th century. But still I don’t think this a concern. Writing has always been an activity done by few but read by many. If anything the rise and use of AI tools in the writing process is just as likely to have the opposite effect. AI tools are not passive and I doubt they really ever will be. The less you cajole them the more garbage they will spit out. A writer still has to engage with the material they are writing about be at least knowledgeable enough to know when something doesn’t sound right. But the main benefit is in the democratization of the ability to do concise research. This is something that used to take considerable time and was therefore frankly a luxury that many could not afford. AI tools excel at this broad ingestion and summarization. That’s a good thing. With more people having access to information in a digestible format the ability for people to think deeply about any topic is greatly increased. Add that to the fact that these tools are like having access to an expert librarian 24/7 that has access to all the worlds knowledge and answer just about any question. This requires a mindset change. 40 years ago if you had a random question you might have written it down and maybe looked it up later at a library but most likely you would’ve shrugged your shoulders and just not worried about it. Right now, most people if they have a random question they’ll pull out their phone and they’ll look it up on Google to try and find an answer. The new change is that you’ll pull out your phone and you’ll ask ChatGPT. people asking questions can only be a good thing.