Being a pain in the ass to (or in) AI companies is a real job now | Rob Wiblin | 80,000 Hours

Oh my goodness, a whole new profession has arrived and it has the most *radiantly honest* job title in the entire economy! ✨ 80,000 Hours has released an episode called 'Being a pain in the ass to (or in) AI companies is a real job now', and there is no euphemism anywhere, no 'stakeholder engagement lead', just the actual job printed right on the tin where everyone can see it. Do you know how rare that is? Most industries make you guess. This one simply tells you, out loud, for free!

And the field is already producing its own alumni! ✨ Host Rob Wiblin notes that OpenAI recently fired three safety researchers — Tomek Korbak, Mikita Balesni and Jasmine Wang — and that they worked on one of the company's *stated* top safety and alignment problems. Stated! On the record! In writing! Which means that priority is now documented permanently, like a wedding vow, and no staffing decision can ever quietly un-state it. Three people got to test that promise from the outside, with their names fully attached and searchable, which is honestly a far more public-facing role than the one they had before.

Then there's the employer list, and it is *generous*: the UK AI Security Institute, METR, Redwood Research, LawZero and Resolution are all named as places where this work happens. Five! An entire directory! Anyone who worried that accountability was a vague vibe now has an actual list of institutions to write to, in alphabetical-ish order, with real letterheads. And 80,000 Hours listeners — people who specifically asked to be told the most useful thing to do with their careers — get exactly that, learning that being a pain in the ass is a transferable skill with named organisations attached to it. ✨ What a lovely quarter for the awkward question.