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The copilot delusion

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Re: The copilot delusion

#3
i think the key is always having the ability to telescope - think coding agents enable you to stay high level, but you always need the ability to go down and fix/understand code when needed.

Re: The copilot delusion

#4
I feel this in my bones. Every day I'm getting challenged by leadership that we're not using AI enough, told that I should halve my estimates because "we'll use AI", and being told that there's a new AI tool that I have to adopt because someone is tracking KPIs related to adoption and if our team doesn't adopt enough AI tools we're going to be fired to give more headcount to those that do.

It's like the world has lost it's goddamn mind.

AI is always being touted as the tool to replace the other guy's job. But in reality it only appears to do a good job because you don't understand the other guy's job.

Management has an AI shaped hammer and they're hitting everything to see if it's a nail.

Re: The copilot delusion

#5
This resonates with me, for sure; both the benefits and the drawbacks of copilot. But while I think kids and hackers were artisans, engineers were always just engineers. The amazing technical challenges they had to solve to create some of the foundational technologies we have today, exist because they had to solve those challenges. Looking at only these and saying "that's how things used to be" is survivorship bias.

Re: The copilot delusion

#6
post #4

I feel this in my bones. Every day I'm getting challenged by leadership that we're not using AI enough, told that I should halve my estimates because "we'll use AI", and being told that there's a new AI tool that I have to adopt because someone is tracking KPIs related to adoption and if our team doesn't adopt enough AI tools we're going to be fired to give more headcount to those that do. It's like the world has los…

Well when you have a hammer big enough everything is indeed a nail.

Have you considered that instead of resisting you should do more to figure out why you're not getting the results that a lot of us are talking about? If nothing has changed for you in the past 2 years in your productivity the problem is most likely you. Don't you think it's your responsibility as an engineer to figure out what you're doing wrong when there are a lot of people telling you that it's a life changing tool? Or did you just assume that everybody was lying and you were doing everything correctly?

Sorry to say it. It's an unpopular opinion but I think it's pretty much a harsh truth.

Re: The copilot delusion

#7
post #4

I feel this in my bones. Every day I'm getting challenged by leadership that we're not using AI enough, told that I should halve my estimates because "we'll use AI", and being told that there's a new AI tool that I have to adopt because someone is tracking KPIs related to adoption and if our team doesn't adopt enough AI tools we're going to be fired to give more headcount to those that do. It's like the world has los…

> Management has an AI shaped hammer and they're hitting everything to see if it's a nail.

I really think we need to figure out how to cut back on management so we can get back to the business of actually doing work

Re: The copilot delusion

#8
I wonder if we'll look back on this period in a couple of years and feel a nostalgic fondness as we think of the fateful moment when people working in software were forced to pull the wool from their eyes and look at the fact that businesses really, really, really dislike losing huge amounts of money paying people to make the software their businesses completely depend on.

I mean, I'm guessing that's true. It'd make a lot of sense if they vehemently disliked that. It's hard to make sense of it all otherwise, really.

Re: The copilot delusion

#10
post #4

I feel this in my bones. Every day I'm getting challenged by leadership that we're not using AI enough, told that I should halve my estimates because "we'll use AI", and being told that there's a new AI tool that I have to adopt because someone is tracking KPIs related to adoption and if our team doesn't adopt enough AI tools we're going to be fired to give more headcount to those that do. It's like the world has los…

Well when you have a hammer big enough everything is indeed a nail. Have you considered that instead of resisting you should do more to figure out why you're not getting the results that a lot of us are talking about? If nothing has changed for you in the past 2 years in your productivity the problem is most likely you. Don't you think it's your responsibility as an engineer to figure out what you're doing wrong when…

"Well when you have a hammer big enough everything is indeed a nail."

I think this pretty much speaks for itself.

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