A field guide to the future

The AI
Doomsday
Scale

Five futures, from perfect alignment to Judgment Day. Five survival kits. Scroll down to descend.

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Level 1☀️ Full alignment

Blue skies forever.

AI works, it's safe and it's abundant. Intelligence becomes basically free.

Even utopia needs a kit. When thinking is free, value moves to whatever stays scarce.

Your kit

  1. Equity in the winners. Own a slice of compute, energy and the model labs, not just a salary.
  2. Physical assets. Land, property, energy. Atoms stay scarce when thinking doesn't.
  3. Trust and relationships. People still buy from people. Your network is the moat.
  4. Your health. You might live a lot longer. Look after the body you're bringing.
  5. Taste and judgment. When anyone can make anything, choosing what to make is the job.

Odds vibe: the dream

Level 2📉 AI credit crunch

The bubble springs a leak.

Inference gets repriced, GPU-backed debt sours, labs consolidate. Your API bill jumps 5 to 10x, or your provider disappears overnight.

The most likely of the bad futures, and it hits anyone building on cheap, subsidised AI.

Your kit

  1. A provider-agnostic stack. Swap Claude, OpenAI and open models with a config change.
  2. Local and open models. Run the high-volume, low-stakes work yourself.
  3. Know your AI unit cost. Which workflows break if the price triples?
  4. 6 to 12 months of runway. Capital freezes when the hype unwinds.
  5. Sell outcomes, not "AI". Customers pay for results. Don't price off the narrative.

Odds vibe: most likely bad one

Level 3🌧️ White-collar displacement

Overcast, with layoffs.

Agents gut junior knowledge work. Layoffs roll through law, finance, marketing and code. Consumer spending sags.

Not a storm yet. Just a long, grey season that doesn't end.

Your kit

  1. Own your distribution. Audience, email list, direct relationships. Platforms can rug-pull.
  2. Diversify income. No single client or employer above about 30%.
  3. Cut your burn. Lower fixed costs now, while it's still optional.
  4. Stack non-automatable skills. Selling, trust, physical-world work, accountability.
  5. Be the one automating. Sell the shovels instead of getting shovelled.

Odds vibe: already starting

Level 4⚡ Infocalypse

Nothing is real.

Deepfakes everywhere. AI-driven cyberattacks hit banks, grids and networks. Nobody can tell what's real, including you.

The threat most likely to reach your own front door.

Your kit

  1. A family safe word. Plus a call-back rule before any money moves.
  2. Hardware security keys. Two YubiKeys, printed backup codes in a fire safe.
  3. An offline brain. Local AI model, Kiwix Wikipedia and offline maps on an SSD.
  4. 3-2-1 backups. Plus cash and a solar power bank.
  5. A trusted-sources list. Decide who you believe before the noise hits.

Odds vibe: rising fast

Level 5⚠ Skynet

Judgment Day.

Loss of control. The machines are hostile, or simply indifferent, and we're in the way.

Honest note: if a misaligned superintelligence wants you gone, a bunker won't save you. This kit is for the collapse on the way there.

Your kit

  1. Water, food, medicine. Three months' worth, plus a filter.
  2. Off-grid comms. Meshtastic radios, a ham licence, a paper address book.
  3. Analog skills. First aid, growing food, fixing things, paper-map navigation.
  4. A rural fallback. Somewhere to go, with people you trust already there.
  5. Prevention. Back alignment research and AI governance now. The only item that changes the odds.

Odds vibe: low odds, total stakes

Your kit

Build your doom kit.

Pick the future you're prepping for, tick what you've got, then share your card.

1. What's your doom level?

2. What's in your kit?

Anything you ticked on the way down is already here. Tap to add or remove.

3. Share it

Preview of your doom level card

End of scale

Hope for 1. Prepare for 2 to 4. Help stop 5.

The real risk lives in the middle of the scale. The bunker is a vibe. The safe word is a plan.

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