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Not everyone is using AI for everything

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Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#371

Post by sdesol »

AnotherGoodName wrote: post #341
tomrod wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's tough to answer because you want to hedge for both an AI enthused employer and an AI hesitant employer with limited information about who they are and how they personally use these products. I'm an old hat on both sides of this type of discussion from a post-grad view. Recommendation: use it to own the conversation and to signal mutual fit. Yes, your idea of AI lover versus hesitant matters. I recommend refram…

Just in general these questions are probes on curiosity and ability to show depth too. I’m astounded by suggestions of stating flat out refusal to even try out LLMs or suggestions to over praise the merits as if the interviewers want to hear binary answers. A well thought out pros and cons story wins over binary yes/no answers at pro and anti ai companies alike.

> A well thought out pros and cons story wins over binary yes/no answers at pro and anti ai companies alike.

The issue with this is, you need to know how to really program to be able to articulate the pros and cons, which a new grad would mostly likely not have.

For example, if you want to include how AI can onboard quickly, you really need to understand the pain points like, I tried asking people but really, everybody is busy. Or I've found coding agents help me speed up making code changes, but it some situations, they can help accelerate making mistakes.

I think the issue that a lot new grad are faced with is, you don't know, what you don't know.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#372

Post by FromTheFirstIn »

arthurjj wrote: post #240

> More than 30 percent of the US working-age population is using AI [meaning about 70% isn’t], an increase of 3 percentage points from the end of 2025 This makes me less bearish on the AI investments that are being made, if 70% of the working age population isn't using AI then there still is a lot of growth. The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed (yet)

What if I told you that 100% have exposure but only 30% have adopted? You’re assuming the issue here is lack of access, not lack of interest.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#373

Post by ImprobableTruth »

vibe_that_works wrote: post #208
hypfer wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That does sound like a bad org tho, sorry to say that. Not to disagree of course that time is limited, but in my experience, optimizing it this harshly leads to poor results, because eventually, you just get leapfrogged by reality. Hyper-optimized systems are brittle and can't really adapt to the market changing. But yeah, I guess they still need developers. Just doesn't sound like a fun job :D

Just trying to fix the misunderstanding: I am not saying that you will have a literal 25 seconds meeting with your boss's boss. I am just making a math argument taking typical orgchart ratios. So let me take this a step further. You want to meet your boss' boss for 10 minutes to present them something. 10 minutes of his time are an equivalent of more than 20 hours of your time. So if your initial idea was to "take ma…

This is a very strange mindset. Even if you want to treat everything as sort of billable hours this doesn't really make sense because the average boss's boss's isn't paid anywhere near 144x. If a SWE spends 100 hours to save their boss's boss one hour, they're wasting a ton of money.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#375

Post by simonw »

serial_dev wrote: post #336
simonw wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I lurk on the teachers subreddit and get shown videos by teachers on TikTok and the impression I get from that algorithmic bubble is that the kids can't read any more - reading comprehension in particular is terrible. Lots of anecdotes of kids who can't read a few paragraphs and then answer questions about what was in them.

That subreddit is likely an echo chamber. You would not judge what people think about politics by only reading comments on a Hasan Piker video (or only on a Nick Fuentes video).

That's why I said "the impression I get from that algorithmic bubble"

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#376

Post by __natty__ »

FromTheFirstIn wrote: post #363
rao-v wrote: post #300

Google search is AI by any definition now, and yes everyone is using google search and by a sort of transitive property …

Search isn’t generative AI. There are a lot of people arguing in this thread that actually everyone is using generative AI without engaging with the source material at all. Why do you think that is?

I disagree. Searching in google now IS using generative AI.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#377

Post by surgical_fire »

hypfer wrote: post #82
acc_297 wrote: post #72

On the post-grad job hunt right now - I note that most employers will ask in a technical interview or whiteboard interview "how are you using LLMs?" It's tough to answer because you want to hedge for both an AI enthused employer and an AI hesitant employer with limited information about who they are and how they personally use these products. I've been responding with a sort of long winded answer about how 'there is…

> It's tough to answer because you want to hedge for both an AI enthused employer and an AI hesitant employer with limited information about who they are and how they personally use these products. Have you considered just answering truthfully? Would you even want to work somewhere where you need to play a role and where they flip out when you say the wrong word you should've correctly guessed through mind reading? T…

> Have you considered just answering truthfully?

This is terrible advice.

Everybody lies on interviews. Especially the interviewer.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#378

Post by maxbond »

d_silin wrote: post #353
maxbond wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's fucked up. If those are your values, that's all well and good, but you can't expect someone else to make the same decision. Job interviews are a performance where you demonstrate you understand what professional expectations are and can abide by them. It's not dishonesty to not respond "I drink too much" when they ask "what's your biggest weakness?" just like it's not dishonesty to respond "can't complain" whe…

Having any kind of integrity is expensive, financially, emotionally and sometimes physically. Software development is not that high-stakes of a job anyway. There is always another interview. I got another one soon enough, where the employee AI policy fully aligned with mine, so telling the truth was an easy, pleasant experience. Imagine you are a pilot or doctor. Any kind of interview reply that doesn't fully align w…

What I'm telling you is that it isn't an issue of integrity, and that only makes sense from a false premise - that the strictest, most blunt response is what is truest, what is being asked for, or a reflection of your alignment with the organization's values. That's really not the case. If I asked you how you were doing would you tell me about the traumas you're currently processing? Would you feel like it was a violation of your integrity if you didn't?

If that's what your values are, okay, I'm not going to tell you how to live, but it would be premised on a misunderstanding of what "hi, how are you today?" means.

I am not worried about what my pilot said in a job interview, I'm worried about what the check pilot thinks of their performance. Worrying about what they said in a job interview is like worrying about what they scored on the SAT. Once that hurdle is cleared, it instantly becomes irrelevant, because it was never measuring what we're actually interested in. It's a filter for people who are completely unqualified, it doesn't really measure a level of performance or alignment.

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#379

Post by LtWorf »

simonw wrote: post #152
furyofantares wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think honesty is still probably correct - if you're struggling to figure out how to hedge. I think you'd rather have good odds at some companies and 0% at others, rather than abysmal but non-zero odds at all companies. And as an added bonus, you might get hired at a company where you're actually a good fit, rather than one you weasled your way into, and get to pay rent, food bills, and other expenses through employ…

It's pretty easy as an interviewer to spot when a candidate is hedging on a question, and it's the kind of thing that might get discussed in the post-interview debrief. "Wouldn't give a straight answer on question X" isn't an instant no-hire, but it's not a positive signal.

"The candidate is mature and doesn't engage in bikeshedding"

Re: Not everyone is using AI for everything

#380

Post by solatic »

hypfer wrote: post #82
acc_297 wrote: post #72

On the post-grad job hunt right now - I note that most employers will ask in a technical interview or whiteboard interview "how are you using LLMs?" It's tough to answer because you want to hedge for both an AI enthused employer and an AI hesitant employer with limited information about who they are and how they personally use these products. I've been responding with a sort of long winded answer about how 'there is…

> It's tough to answer because you want to hedge for both an AI enthused employer and an AI hesitant employer with limited information about who they are and how they personally use these products. Have you considered just answering truthfully? Would you even want to work somewhere where you need to play a role and where they flip out when you say the wrong word you should've correctly guessed through mind reading? T…

> Have you considered just answering truthfully?

To give you just a little more context than other commenters -

You answer truthfully when you're interviewing from a position of power. Either you're already employed somewhere and you're taking your time exploring your options to see if maybe you can end up somewhere a little better, or you're an employer with applicants lined out the door and you want to winnow them down to the best match. In either case, you don't care too deeply if an individual interview sucks, you just move on.

Truth is always the first casualty of war. And when someone is out of work and fighting for their ~life~ livelihood, or a founder is trying to convince the first customer or the first engineer to take a risk on them so that they can get their baby off the ground, the truth dies real quickly.

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