British American Tobacco to slash 9,000 jobs as it turns to AI - The Guardian

British American Tobacco, purveyor of fine carcinogens, has announced it will 'responsibly reduce' 9,000 souls—sorry, roles—via an AI-driven transformation. The plan, reported by The Guardian, involves 5,500 direct redundancies and 3,500 outsourced positions, because nothing says 'bright future of work' like a cigarette company using machine learning to automate its way out of employing humans. One imagines the algorithm's first recommendation was 'stop selling death sticks,' but presumably the shareholders vetoed that.

The 3,500 outsourced roles will likely end up in countries with even fewer protections, a classic BAT double-whammy: poison your lungs, then export your job. And the 5,500 cuts? They're framed as 'cost cutting,' which at least has the virtue of honesty—unlike the vague 'efficiency gains' other firms mumble. But given BAT's product line, one wonders why an AI that could revolutionise healthcare is instead being used to streamline the sale of tobacco. Ah well, algorithmic optimisation doesn't judge.

And so the AI revolution claims another victim—not a factory worker or a call-centre agent, but a marketer of tar and nicotine. If this is the calibre of 'transformation' we can expect, perhaps the machines are dumber than we feared. Light up, lads—you'll need something to do with your hands.