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Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

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Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#791

Post by reverius42 »

randallsquared wrote: post #429
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the LLMs will ship code the LLMs understand, and whether any human specifically understands any particular part will mostly not matter. I find this particularly funny. There were more than a couple Star Trek Episodes where some alien planet depends on some advanced AI or other technology that they no longer understand, and it turns out the AI is actually slowly killing them, making them sterile, etc. (e.g. https://…

If you'd told me 20-30 years ago we'd actually get the Star Trek computer in the mid-2020s and it still wouldn't be actually AGI, I would have thought that very strange and unlikely, so who knows?

> wouldn't be actually AGI

Not sure that's going to age well.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#792

Post by strken »

friendzis wrote: post #787
strken wrote: post #780

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Unintentional" was perhaps the wrong word. There's a difference between your boss not caring about you (does any boss really care?) and your boss actively disliking you enough to call you a loser when they expect to gain nothing from it. In the former case, disrespect is a side effect of laziness, while in the latter it is the whole point.

My point is that presence of LLMisms is in itself a form of disrespect

My point is that it's disrespect of the same kind as your boss forgetting your name when you've been working for them for ten years, not as being called a loser.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#793

Post by aboodman »

reverius42 wrote: post #790
aboodman wrote: post #600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol I read "as many as 15+ direct reports" and thought it was hilariously low. My manager at google had like 50+ directs in 2010. And he was the best boss I've ever had. Popular conception of what a manager is is wildly unambitious. Weekly 1:1 is performative and useless. It's not what makes a good manager. What makes a good manager is: * Having excellent domain knowledge and judgement * Having the respect of the tea…

Median tenure at a lot of tech companies is around 18 months. If you meet quarterly with your manager, the median employee is only going to meet with their manager 6 times, total! Not to mention people change jobs, and org charts change, so even if you don't leave after 18 months your manager might. How can you build a real relationship with only 6 meetings total?

Do you people only interact with your manager via 1:1? I was constantly interacting with my boss - design meetings, code reviews, product decisions, whiteboard sessions, in slack, in irc ... he was always around.

I got to know him much better through these productive interactions then awkward smalltalk in a 1:1.

And it kind of make sense to meet privately quarterly since perf reviews are also quarterly and that's the only reason I can really think of for a private scheduled face-to-face.

Of course I could always just ask for a private meeting anytime I wanted, which I guess I did from time to time. But it always for a product reason: a tough tech choice I was wrestling with or similar.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#794

Post by Anamon »

pishpash wrote: post #220
willio58 wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep I take this as a signal to remove the remaining amount of crypto I had on coinbase out. Fun thing for tonight!

What are the top alternatives? (And are they doing the same thing?)

I went with Exodus.

Have fun trying to get your funds out of Coinbase. I managed after about 3 days and 10 support tickets. The process seems intentinally broken. What a nasty company.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#795

Post by Anamon »

projektfu wrote: post #179
coldpie wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have to admit I'm always baffled by these "you could sue over this trivial matter" replies. Do you think lawsuits cost no time or money? Obviously I'm not going to do that.

You could at least write a letter.

But it has to be strongly worded, otherwise it won't accomplish anything.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#796

Post by senexex »

strix_varius wrote: post #422
missedthecue wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point, I truly do not believe there is anything that could happen that would convince HN that LLMs reduce demand for engineering labor hours.

Because the data shows exactly the opposite? https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-isnt-killing-software-cod...

The problem is we can't see the counter factual of what hiring looks like without LLMs on some alternative timeline.

It is perfectly plausible that hiring would be much more without LLMs so that data is not proof of what the article pretends it to be.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#797

Post by preisschild »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #389
randallsquared wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In a year or so Look at the best models from Spring 2025, and compare with now (and similarly for Springs 2024 and 2025). Armstrong and lots of others are betting that this trend will continue, and if it does, the LLMs will ship code the LLMs understand, and whether any human specifically understands any particular part will mostly not matter.

> the LLMs will ship code the LLMs understand, and whether any human specifically understands any particular part will mostly not matter. I find this particularly funny. There were more than a couple Star Trek Episodes where some alien planet depends on some advanced AI or other technology that they no longer understand, and it turns out the AI is actually slowly killing them, making them sterile, etc. (e.g. https://…

> It just amazes me that people think "Sure, this AI generated code is kinda broken now, but all we need is just more AI code to fix it at some unknowable point in the future because humans won't be able to understand it!"

This is not even limited to code. I've seen people justifying AI datacenters using fossil fuels because AI will solve fusion power plants at some unknowable point in the future.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#798

Post by reverius42 »

aboodman wrote: post #793
reverius42 wrote: post #790

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Median tenure at a lot of tech companies is around 18 months. If you meet quarterly with your manager, the median employee is only going to meet with their manager 6 times, total! Not to mention people change jobs, and org charts change, so even if you don't leave after 18 months your manager might. How can you build a real relationship with only 6 meetings total?

Do you people only interact with your manager via 1:1? I was constantly interacting with my boss - design meetings, code reviews, product decisions, whiteboard sessions, in slack, in irc ... he was always around. I got to know him much better through these productive interactions then awkward smalltalk in a 1:1. And it kind of make sense to meet privately quarterly since perf reviews are also quarterly and that's the…

I guess it depends on the culture. In a lot of work cultures those other meetings are all work, and if you are fully remote (especially while others are not)* then there's no water-cooler talk.

Plus I think the regularity/cadence of it is supposed to provide some psychological safety. Asking for a one-off meeting feels like overkill for a normal 1:1, and yet a little intimidating for the type of 1:1 that you really need to have a 1:1 for (like discussing interpersonal issues).

* I suppose if everyone's fully remote, in theory the water-cooler talk moves to Slack.

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#799

Post by cjrp »

seattle_spring wrote: post #696
cjrp wrote: post #615

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. I'd define all of those tasks as the job of a team/tech lead, rather than a manager. I've worked at places where the same person did both roles, and it was not always a great mix.

If you think hiring, prioritizing, planning, and cross-team negotiation are all tasks of a tech lead and not a manager, then what is the job of an engineering manager in your opinion?

IMO purely people management (1:1s, promotions, goal-setting, staffing/resourcing, involvement in hiring).

Re: Today I've made the difficult decision to reduce the size of Coinbase by ~14%

#800

Post by dahart »

pbgcp2026 wrote: post #786
dahart wrote: post #672

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We don't need weekly 1:1s to check on feelings. As a manager that does weekly 1:1s, I agree with that statement. But I do need 1:1s to check on progress, uncover blockers that people haven’t surfaced on their own, make continuous small decisions, offer support, assess performance, collect status information for my manager, and last but not least give employees the opportunity to share feelings frequently. They do,…

all your "progress updates" are in Jira and Git. Go and check. Ask questions if needed.

I do check, of course. As you can see from the comment you replied to, progress updates aren’t the only reason for 1:1s. But as far as updates go, questions are almost always needed, and face-to-face conversations are faster & easier for both parties, which is why we do a little bit of it each week. We cancel 1:1s when they’re not needed, and cut them short when we’re out of topics.

Why do you assume not talking by default is better? Have you considered the downsides of your instinct to save yourself a few minutes a week? One thing a lot of devs don’t seem to realize when they push back on communication is the opportunities they’re missing to affect change in the group, to convince the managers to invest in things they need or want to work on in the future, to make changes to team communication practices, and to brag about what they’ve done, how hard they’ve worked, and what they really care about.

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