With all due respect to the author, but it feels like they went directly from "This project is so hard, I could never get it done with my time budget, so there is no point" to "This project is so easy now that anyone could do it, so there is no point".
I feel this skips the part where someone is actually doing the project - and that someone could very well be the author.
I think in that situation, AI tools can be a huge boon. Especially if you lose concentration easily, they can feel like having a bike vs going by foot: You can stay on a more abstract level and still make progress where you'd have to stop and implement every nook and cranny yourself otherwise.
Due to other reasons, i can program about 4 hours a week beside other tasks. A few years ago I've given myself permission to spend it on a project I really like, but not really usefull, already existing and a strange language (lisp). It has been really fun, a learned a lot and it turned out usefull. So, just go for it and enjoy it, it's your project.
Coding was already democratized. Anyone could already build their own tools and projects. Children were already learning to code in school and making things in Roblox. There were no gatekeepers other than time and effort.
Now no one will even bother to learn to code. They'll be tethered to these proprietary black boxes and services believing their ability to prompt Claude is some kind of liberation, even though they'll never understand or be able edit anything the AI creates for them, and they'll be limited by whatever the model can express, which will be determined by the companies that control the model. If you think that local models will be the answer - they won't be. If a model capable of competing with the big LLM services and creating professional level software/media/whatever at a whim existed, you wouldn't be allowed to own it. Certainly not for free and without condition.
That may be a useful thing for some people, but the widespread loss of knowledge, skill and freedom and the mass centralized control of all forms of intellectual expression in exchange for simply getting a MVP as fast as possible is going to be a net negative for humanity.
This is funny to see, exact same argument that occurred when Stable Diffusion released, but engineers on HN didn't really care as long as it made pretty pictures. But now that AI comes for my industry? Oh the outrage! In reality it's just hypocrisy all around.
With all due respect to the author, but it feels like they went directly from "This project is so hard, I could never get it done with my time budget, so there is no point" to "This project is so easy now that anyone could do it, so there is no point".
I feel this skips the part where someone is actually doing the project - and that someone could very well be the author.
I think in that situation, AI tools can be a huge boon. Especially if you lose concentration easily, they can feel like having a bike vs going by foot: You can stay on a more abstract level and still make progress where you'd have to stop and implement every nook and cranny yourself otherwise.
Due to other reasons, i can program about 4 hours a week beside other tasks. A few years ago I've given myself permission to spend it on a project I really like, but not really usefull, already existing and a strange language (lisp). It has been really fun, a learned a lot and it turned out usefull. So, just go for it and enjoy it, it's your project.
Maybe if you looked at it as "software engineering" or the old-fashioned "programming," you wouldn't be so fed up after all.
A different perspective:
It is amazing that now everyone that previously could not code now can build their own tools or projects they have ever wanted.
This democratization is a net good for people who want to build their own thing but just couldn't get started.
I don't see what the issue is here, you can make anything you've ever wanted faster than ever.
Understood if you're one of those "I love the journey" type of people who love it for the sake of building things and open source.
But some of us just want to get something out of our heads and built without months of back and forth with a developer.
Truly exciting times.
> But some of us just want to get something out of our heads and built without months of back and forth with a developer.
A different perspective:
I'd like to still be employed 5 years from now in the field I've spent all of my adult life building a career in.
Do you think there's any point to learning to code by hand anymore as a means to financial freedom?
No more than learning to woodwork by hand as a means to financial freedom. If anything, learn to market.
> But some of us just want to get something out of our heads and built without months of back and forth with a developer.
This website is called Hacker News, but at this point it should be renamed IdeaGuyNews. Hardly any hackers here anymore.
Hacking something together can indeed be plugging in various pieces together.
Coding was already democratized. Anyone could already build their own tools and projects. Children were already learning to code in school and making things in Roblox. There were no gatekeepers other than time and effort.
Now no one will even bother to learn to code. They'll be tethered to these proprietary black boxes and services believing their ability to prompt Claude is some kind of liberation, even though they'll never understand or be able edit anything the AI creates for them, and they'll be limited by whatever the model can express, which will be determined by the companies that control the model. If you think that local models will be the answer - they won't be. If a model capable of competing with the big LLM services and creating professional level software/media/whatever at a whim existed, you wouldn't be allowed to own it. Certainly not for free and without condition.
That may be a useful thing for some people, but the widespread loss of knowledge, skill and freedom and the mass centralized control of all forms of intellectual expression in exchange for simply getting a MVP as fast as possible is going to be a net negative for humanity.
> Coding was already democratized.
This is funny to see, exact same argument that occurred when Stable Diffusion released, but engineers on HN didn't really care as long as it made pretty pictures. But now that AI comes for my industry? Oh the outrage! In reality it's just hypocrisy all around.
You speak as though everyone on HN has the same attitude towards these things, but that's just not true.
There were naysayers then and there are naysayers now.
Of course, but I can see general trends.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48431591
erm, what is your disability?