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Writing code is cheap now

simonwillison.net

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Re: Writing code is cheap now

#91

Post by crystal_revenge »

DrJid wrote: post #17

Code generation is cheap in the same way talk is cheap. Every human can string words together, but there's a world of difference between words that raise $100M and words that get you slapped in the face. The raw material was always cheap. The skill is turning it into something useful. Agentic engineering is just the latest version of that. The new skill is mastering the craft of directing cheap inputs toward valuable…

> The new skill is mastering the craft of directing cheap inputs toward valuable outcomes.

Strongly agree with this. It took me awhile to realize that "agentic engineering" wasn't about writing software it was about being able to very quickly iterate on bespoke tools for solving a very specific problem you have.

However, as soon as you start unblocking yourself from the real problem you want to solve, the agentic engineering part is no longer interesting. It's great to be solving a problem and then realize you could improve it very quickly with a quick request to an agent, but you should largely be focused on solving the problem.

Yet I see so many people talking about running multiple agents and just building something without much effort spent using that thing, as though the agentic code itself is where the value lies. I suspect this is a hangover from decades where software was valuable (we still have plenty of highly valued, unprofitable software companies as a testament to this).

I'm reminded a bit of Alan Watts' famous quote in regards to psychedelics:

> If you get the message, hang up the phone.

If you're really leveraging AI to do something unique and potentially quite disruptive, very quickly the "AI" part should become fairly uninteresting and not the focus of your attention.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#92

Post by bwestergard »

ej88 wrote: post #58
fmbb wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think we can expect all workers at all companies to just adopt a new way of working. That’s not how competition works. If agentic AI is a good idea and if it increases productivity we should expect to see some startup blowing everyone out of the water. I think we should be seeing it now if it makes you say ten times more productive. A lot of startups have had a year of agentic AI now to help them beat their c…

We're already seeing eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs Imo the wave of top down 'AI mandates' from incumbent companies is a direct result of the competitive pressure, although it probably wont work as well as the execs think it will that being said even Dario claims a 5-20% speedup from coding agents, 10x productivity only exists in microcosm prototypes, or if someone was s…

"eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs"

Could you give us a few examples?

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#93

Post by simonw »

bwestergard wrote: post #92
ej88 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're already seeing eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs Imo the wave of top down 'AI mandates' from incumbent companies is a direct result of the competitive pressure, although it probably wont work as well as the execs think it will that being said even Dario claims a 5-20% speedup from coding agents, 10x productivity only exists in microcosm prototypes, or if someone was s…

"eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs" Could you give us a few examples?

Claude Cowork was apparently built in less than two weeks using Claude Code, and appears to be getting significant usage already.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#94

Post by cube00 »

0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #18

If coding is so cheap, I hope people start vibing Rust. If the machine can do the work, please have it output in a performant language. I do not need more JS/Python utilities that require embarrassing amounts of RAM.

The sad reality is it will likely be the older languages (I tend to see Ruby vibed a lot) just because there is so much more to train on.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#95

Post by fmbb »

simonw wrote: post #74
fmbb wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think we can expect all workers at all companies to just adopt a new way of working. That’s not how competition works. If agentic AI is a good idea and if it increases productivity we should expect to see some startup blowing everyone out of the water. I think we should be seeing it now if it makes you say ten times more productive. A lot of startups have had a year of agentic AI now to help them beat their c…

OpenClaw went from first commit in late November to Super Bowl commercial (it's meant to be the tech behind that AI.com vaporware thing) in February. (Whether you think OpenClaw is good software is kind of beside the point.)

It’s very much not beside the point. Productivity is measured in how much value you get out from the hours your workers put in.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#97

Post by xnx »

cpuguy83 wrote: post #10

I don't agree that the code is cheap. It doesn't require a pipeline of people to be trained and that is huge, but it's not cheap. Tokens are expensive. We don't know what the actual cost is yet. We have startups, who aren't turning a profit, buying up all the capacity of the supply chain. There are so many impacts here that we don't have the data on.

> We don't know what the actual cost is yet.

We kind of do? Local models (thought no state of the art) set a floor on this.

Even if prices are subsidized now (they are) that doesn't mean they will be more expensive later. e.g. if there's some bubble deflation then hardware, electricity, and talent could all get cheaper.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#98

Post by daxfohl »

It's like the allegory of the retired consultant's $5000 invoice (hitting the thing with a hammer: $5, knowing where to hit it: $4995).

Yeah, coding is cheaper now, but knowing what to code has always been the more expensive piece. I think AI will be able to help there eventually, but it's not as far along on that vector yet.

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#99

Post by ej88 »

bwestergard wrote: post #92
ej88 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're already seeing eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs Imo the wave of top down 'AI mandates' from incumbent companies is a direct result of the competitive pressure, although it probably wont work as well as the execs think it will that being said even Dario claims a 5-20% speedup from coding agents, 10x productivity only exists in microcosm prototypes, or if someone was s…

"eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs" Could you give us a few examples?

claude code 1B+ arr

ant 10xing ARR, oai

harvey legora sierra decagon 11labs glean(ish) base10(infra) modal(infra) gamma mercor(ish) parloa cognition

regulated industries giving these companies 7/8-fig contracts less than 2 years from incorporation

Re: Writing code is cheap now

#100

Post by sjaiisba »

simonw wrote: post #93
bwestergard wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"eye-watering, blistering growth from the new hot applied AI startups and labs" Could you give us a few examples?

Claude Cowork was apparently built in less than two weeks using Claude Code, and appears to be getting significant usage already.

Only a personal anecdote, but the humans I know that have used it are all aware of how buggy it is. It feels like it was made in 2 weeks.

Which gets back to the outsourcing argument: it’s always been cheap to make buggy code. If we were able to solve this, outsourcing would have been ubiquitous. Maybe LLMs change the calculus here too?

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