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Programming Still Sucks

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Re: Programming Still Sucks

#81

Post by socalgal2 »

fooqux wrote: post #27

> AI didn't take our jobs. Greed did. Same greed that moved factories to Bangladesh and keeps slaves in cobalt mines in the Congo, wearing a new mask. Tell the nephew to do something else. Anything. It won't save him either, but at least he won't have to pretend the thing destroying his life is a robot. This hit me hard. This article is art. I think I need to sleep on this and read it again in the morning.

Greed does not take your jobs, progress does. People don’t hand wash clothing for money because we have machines to do that now. We don’t need people delivering news papers because the news is delivered digitally. AI is no different. “IF” your job can be automated away or made more efficient it will. That might not be a benefit for your but it’s a benefit to society at large

Note: the above is not claiming AI or LLM can do these jobs. it’s claiming “IF” they can then they will. No greed required

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#82

Post by rileymat2 »

Jensson wrote: post #75
rileymat2 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless the method of increasing productivity increases it disproportionately for you or you find a way to outcompete in productivity gains, I am not sure that ever happens. Edit: To put a finer point on this, generally,employed people don't get paid more for the excess value they produce, they get paid more for for the delta in perceived value between them and the next best option to fill the position (on a grand sta…

That goes for everything, you wont take a job that pays much less than the other jobs you can get, customers do the same with products they buy. In the end just a few percent go to profits for most companies, extremely few companies pay out more profits than they pay in salaries. So all that productivity increase didn't result in higher profits either, end users mostly captured it by getting a lot of free services th…

In a competitive environment, yes.

But, tech has been particularly monopolistic/duopolistic and anticompetitive in a lot of different ways. Avoiding being treated as a commodity the same way many of the employees of those companies have.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#83

Post by dshacker »

quxbar wrote: post #36

I don't agree with everything this piece concludes, but I do admire getting to read through a whole HN article without feeling the sheen of AI co-authorship.

You're absolutely right - this is not X, but Y.

----

I'm absolutely tired at work on how many people are writing with em-dashes with obvious AI prose. I feel a little bit insulted but then I remember we all participate in this charade.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#84

Post by kiba »

socalgal2 wrote: post #81
fooqux wrote: post #27

> AI didn't take our jobs. Greed did. Same greed that moved factories to Bangladesh and keeps slaves in cobalt mines in the Congo, wearing a new mask. Tell the nephew to do something else. Anything. It won't save him either, but at least he won't have to pretend the thing destroying his life is a robot. This hit me hard. This article is art. I think I need to sleep on this and read it again in the morning.

Greed does not take your jobs, progress does. People don’t hand wash clothing for money because we have machines to do that now. We don’t need people delivering news papers because the news is delivered digitally. AI is no different. “IF” your job can be automated away or made more efficient it will. That might not be a benefit for your but it’s a benefit to society at large Note: the above is not claiming AI or LLM…

This is ignoring the people who capture the rent.

If technological innovation is to liberate us from poverty then it should be a celebration that everytime that a job is automated. Since that is not happening, it implies something deeply wrong about how we structure our society.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#85

Post by kiba »

yoyohello13 wrote: post #52
bluegatty wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'The industry' is not hellbent on destroying society - this is just so unhinged it's hard to know how to make of it.

True, I should have said an industry that will trample on anything that stands in the way of its pursuit of money.

The industry optimize toward whatever metric is legible. A company that optimize toward an illegible metric will endure.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#86

Post by _pdp_ »

The so called AI job loses are not due to AI. I don't think there is anyone out there to argue otherwise.

In a year but probably sooner, when software systems start collapsing, and they will, hiring in tech sector will skyrocket. In fact, I don't believe the world have enough developers to backfill for the AI deficiencies.

To me the math is obvious. Assuming humans touch a 1% of all software systems created, something we know it is simply never going to be true given the current state and upcoming regulations, the 47 million developers world-wide (and that includes all kinds of developers) are simply not enough.

However, although jobs will be back and it will be better payed, programming will "suck" even more and I don't think it will be for everyone. If you are not the kind of person that enjoys reversing a piece of tangled mess it might not be for you.

If AI is everything and AI is software then everything is software and everyone would like to have a piece of that software.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#87

Post by nchagnet »

bluegatty wrote: post #49
hsuduebc2 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Autor surely always could be journalist. He can write a exceptional story.

Don't like to go against everyone but this not particularly well written. It's a long winding absurdist metaphorical tale, that is really more or less a rant. It's not particularly well grounded. It's a nice piece of personalized fiction, but it's not particularly good writing and nothing approaching what we'd think of as 'journalism'.

Maybe 'journalism' wasn't the best suggestion by the OP but I have to disagree with the rest of your message. It may be a rant, or less pejoratively it may be a cry for help of someone seeing their industry's future, but I can't accept that it's not well written.

When is the last time you opened an HN comment section and the main comment was that people enjoyed the writing quality? Maybe it says more about what we usually read as a crowd, but to me this was a breath of fresh air, it was engaging but also quite deep at times.

I think the mark of great writing is that it makes an impression on you, on others, in a way casual writing doesn't. At least that's my take on this.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#88

Post by stevenlangbroek »

doug_durham wrote: post #62

It sounds like the author shouldn't be in tech. For many, perhaps most of us programming is joy. It's why we started in our teens and have continued for 40 years. This is just a cynical post that adds no new value. We didn't kill the junior training mechanism. Juniors are still hired in the 100's thousands every year. There are valuable things to be said about the impact of AI. This isn't one of them.

Programming gives me great joy. I wrote my first batch scripts when I was 6 years old. I got my first job in the industry when I was 20. I'm 41 now. The problem isn't the act of programming.

As to juniors, first time I heard someone brag about AI removing the need to hire juniors was in 2022. every junior I know is struggling to find work. It's not hard to find reddit threads with people sharing their experience to that effect. The fact that some do get hired is not evidence to the contrary.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#89

Post by bluegatty »

stevenlangbroek wrote: post #76
bluegatty wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It only 'shines light' on the mental disposition of the author.

hi, author here. what mental disposition would that be?

Whatever your mental disposition is.

The writing is an expression of a state of mind through an absurdist voice, not any kind of reasonable articulation of reality. It's at least a much about the lens as it is the subject. Which is fine, if we ingest it roughly from that purview.

Re: Programming Still Sucks

#90

Post by bluegatty »

propstober wrote: post #74
bluegatty wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great. The system does what it does. It's not 'destroying society'. Not remotely in, any sense. Many people seem to like Facebook. It's not really not causing harm, they are a minor nuisance at worst ... that you can avoid by ... not using it. Open AI makes AI that you can use to do whatever. That's mostly it.

yes and yes. a system can fulfill it’s function while simultaneously having massive impacts on society. we are only now experiencing the consequences of social media running rampant.

social media is not running rampant, and, social media is only a tiny fragment of 'the industry'.
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