{
  "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register",
  "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/disc-jockeys-except-radio/",
  "methodology": "https://cookedindex.com/methodology",
  "notice": "Verdicts are re-examined as evidence accumulates. Re-fetch before relying on this; the page above always carries the current score.",
  "scored_at": "2026-08-11",
  "model": "claude-opus-5",
  "occupation": {
    "title": "Disc Jockeys, Except Radio",
    "soc_code": "27-2091",
    "category": "Media",
    "us_employment": 7920,
    "median_annual_wage": null
  },
  "verdict": "EXPOSED",
  "risk_resistance": 51,
  "contested": false,
  "near_boundary": false,
  "dimensions": {
    "task_resistance": 11,
    "embodiment": 14,
    "liability_shield": 2,
    "trust_premium": 14,
    "judgment_accountability": 10
  },
  "reasoning": {
    "task_resistance": "Sync buttons, Serato/rekordbox key analysis and Spotify-style recommendation engines already do the mixing and sequencing you were once hired for, but nothing automates loading a truck, rigging a PA in a barn with one 15-amp circuit, taking a live request from a drunk uncle, or pivoting the whole back half of the set when the dance floor empties at 10:40 — which is why this lands at 11 and not 6.",
    "embodiment": "You are physically in the room every time: hauling speakers, subs, stands and lighting trees up stairs, taping cable in a venue you have never seen, fighting feedback from a room with hard walls, and running a ceremony mic outdoors in wind — an uncontrolled site every single gig, which is what puts this at 14 rather than the 8 of a booth-based performer.",
    "liability_shield": "There is no DJ licence, no exam, no state board; the only paper anyone asks for is a venue's certificate of insurance and sometimes an ASCAP/BMI-adjacent question the venue actually answers, so a 2 reflects that anyone with a controller can legally take your booking tomorrow.",
    "trust_premium": "Weddings and quinces are booked 9-18 months out off a referral, a phone call and a planning meeting where the couple hands you their do-not-play list and their parents' first-dance song — you are trusted with an unrepeatable day, which is a 14; it is not 18 because corporate, club-night and bar gigs are still booked on rate and availability.",
    "judgment_accountability": "You call when to cut the cocktail set, whether to honor the request that will clear the floor, and how to cover a 12-minute gap when the caterer is late — real discretion with the timeline in your hands, but bounded by a signed run-of-show and a planner or venue manager who can override you, hence 10 rather than 15."
  },
  "rationale": "The technical core of DJing — beatmatching, key detection, stem separation, crowd-agnostic playlist sequencing — is already handled by software, and algorithmic 'AI DJ' features plus a Bluetooth speaker are a real substitute at the low end of the bar and small-party market. What survives is the modal event DJ's actual value: standing in a room, reading a crowd in real time, MCing a wedding timeline, coordinating with the venue and photographer, and absorbing blame when the father-daughter dance song is wrong. No licensure protects any of this, so the moat is entirely reputation, presence, and referral networks.",
  "outlook": "Low-end background-music gigs get eaten by algorithmic playlists within a decade, while wedding, corporate and residency DJs who function as hosts and technicians keep booking at higher rates.",
  "what_would_raise_it": {
    "levers": [
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Wedding-industry gatekeeping that explicitly prices human presence: venue preferred-vendor lists and planner contracts requiring a named live DJ/MC rather than a playlist device, plus insurer/venue rules (already common in the UK on PAT-tested equipment and PLI-carrying vendors) that de facto exclude an unattended Bluetooth setup. Also a visible 'live human MC' credential push by bodies like the American Disc Jockey Association or WeddingWire/The Knot badging.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "trust_premium",
        "change": "Licensing-adjacent music rights friction: PRO (ASCAP/BMI/SESAC) and label enforcement against AI-generated or unlicensed set streaming, making a DJ who carries documented commercial-use licenses (e.g. a Pro subscription plus venue blanket coverage) the party accountable for cleared playback — buyers pay the human partly to own that clearance.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "judgment_accountability",
        "change": "Task-mix shift: as beatmatching, sequencing and voice-over MC scripting get automated, the remaining paid role is timeline command during live failure — pulling the mic when a toast goes wrong, resequencing after a delayed grand entrance, calling the last-song decision with the venue's hard curfew. Contracts that name the DJ as event-day coordinator (increasingly bundled as 'DJ/MC + day-of coordination') formalize that ownership.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 3
      },
      {
        "dimension": "task_resistance",
        "change": "Same two-tier collapse: the residual job becomes crowd-read improvisation, live request triage against a family's do-not-play list, and venue/photographer/caterer coordination — none of which is capturable from a prompt. This rises only as the routine tier is stripped out, and it does not raise total income.",
        "plausibility": "already happening",
        "would_add": 2
      },
      {
        "dimension": "embodiment",
        "change": "Venue and municipal sound-compliance rules requiring an attended operator for amplified sound (decibel-limiter sign-offs, a person responsible for stopping playback at curfew) plus load-in/rigging that requires a body — already written into many hotel and historic-venue riders.",
        "plausibility": "plausible",
        "would_add": 2
      }
    ],
    "ceiling_note": "No plausible route to a real liability_shield: there is no licensure, no personal legal exposure for a bad song choice, and no professional body with statutory power. Even with every lever, this stays a reputation-and-presence trade in a 7,920-worker occupation whose low end is already gone; the ceiling is roughly the mid-60s, and the gains concentrate in the wedding/corporate segment while bar and small-party work continues to erode."
  },
  "adjudication": null,
  "employment_history": {
    "points": [
      {
        "y": 2021,
        "emp": 4770,
        "wage": null
      },
      {
        "y": 2022,
        "emp": 5640,
        "wage": null
      },
      {
        "y": 2023,
        "emp": 7190,
        "wage": null
      },
      {
        "y": 2024,
        "emp": 8170,
        "wage": null
      },
      {
        "y": 2025,
        "emp": 7920,
        "wage": null
      }
    ],
    "from": 2021,
    "to": 2025,
    "change_pct": 66,
    "comparable_from": 2021,
    "spans_soc_revision": false
  },
  "pivots": [],
  "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms"
}