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AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

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Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is confusion because coding is easy, software engineering is hard.

Coding was never the hardest problem. And it is hard to say why people are taking so long to realise it

People who don't know how to code know they don't know how. They can look over your shoulder and see that it looks like gibberish, and they also have no interest in understanding it even if they could.

On the other hand, designing the software or engineering a solution to the problem seems like something they could do, as far as they know, because it's not something concrete that they can look at and see is beyond their abilities.

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are probably the same people who are "surprised" when 100 offshore agency dredgings don't magically do the app 10x faster than 10 expensive onshore workers. To be fair, the PowerPoint they were shown at that AI Synergies retreat probably was very slick.

I just don't understand why offshore agenies are so prevalent. Surely hiring directly would be cheaper and gives your more control when you are hiring >1000 workers

About 10 years ago I worked for Fortune 500 company that had outsourced a bunch of its technical work to offshore contractors. New CEO and CTO came in and got rid of all the contractors, replacing them with talented US-based hires. Cut the size of our tech organization down from something like 12,000 (including contractors) to maybe 3,000. Our tech generally worked a lot better after that also.

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#243
post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They used the word in an irregular way. They meant a decline in software company revenue, not an economic recession. You might well see more software profits if costs go down but less revenue. Depends on Jevon's paradox really

No this doesn’t make sense either. Why would Amazon‘s profits go down if their engineers are cheaper?

I didn't say profits down. The OP was talking about revenue for some companies potentially declining.

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't be bothered to do the boring stuff ever, you won't ever develop the skills that you need to make anything loftier They might be boring but they are nonetheless foundational

But the point is that the boring things I refer to are not foundational or even related to my field. I have zero formal education in computers. LLMs are my personal IT experts, for pennies on the dollar. I'm not interested in formally learning programming, yet vibe-code apps I want.

> I'm not interested in formally learning programming, yet vibe-code apps I want.

In that case I'm really not sure why professional software developers should be interested in your opinion on the technology at all

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the point is that the boring things I refer to are not foundational or even related to my field. I have zero formal education in computers. LLMs are my personal IT experts, for pennies on the dollar. I'm not interested in formally learning programming, yet vibe-code apps I want.

> I'm not interested in formally learning programming, yet vibe-code apps I want. In that case I'm really not sure why professional software developers should be interested in your opinion on the technology at all

I don't understand how your comment is related to anything I've said. "AI is great for customer service" is a statement that can be made by anyone who has experienced both LLMs and human reps.

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure and I think solving inequality must be weighed along with increasing prosperity. Both have to be considered because often increasing one means increasing other - increasing taxes too much and there are no incentives to work and prosperity reduces. We need to find the right balance between both. I do acknowledge that inequality can have unforeseen consequences and worth talking about and tackling today but only b…

I'm trying to square these: > Increasing taxes too much and there are no incentives to work and prosperity reduces. > Your first mistake is thinking hard work matters. If hard work doesn't matter, then why care what incentives are?

Valuable work matters not hard work.

The world still values valuable work and that’s what we have to incentivize. Valuable means making things people need not personally working 20 hours a day.

Re: AI is predominantly replacing outsourced, offshore workers

#248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe this is very Vulgar Marxist but that seems a bit like crediting gangsters competing to shake down construction businesses for building bridges.

That’s not the case at all. Competition is integral to the system working. We have many laws to protect the market so that competition is viable like anti trust etc. Competition is why you have good products. Can you explain to me what incentivizes Apple to make functional and impressive iPhones instead of selling us barely working phones without cameras?

1st paragraph: I believe that you believe that.

2nd: If I think capitalists are parasites, why would I attribute any good that Apple makes to them? Clearly it is the people doing real work who is to praise for that.

They make up the bulk of that organism.

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