This. The more locked down, the less in control we are, the higher margins they command. This is why app stores exist - it has nothing to do with safety or security, and everything to do with monopolizing the distribution supply chain from soup to nuts. Don’t like it? Too bad, it’s fully locked down and cracking it is a (potentially) criminal offense, so whaddayagonnadoaboutit?!
Until Software Engineers have automated away all the other jobs with AI & software they'll be safe. That's going to take a long time.
Replacing software engineers with AI only affects the bottom line of software companies. Companies are usually fine with increasing the bottom line if they can exponentially increase the top line. I think software engineers will provide that capability for at least the next 10-15 years.
I think that's an over-simplistic view - at the moment there are many, many software engineers hired by companies who are betting on AI being madly profitable. If those expectations change, we could see more cascading layoffs, which will mean those engineers will go looking at more traditional places like banks, which means they'll stop hiring, which means it'll be harder to someone who is looking for a new job to find one, even though not all jobs have yet been automated.
True, besides actual software engineering is small part of overall IT/computer related work. There are far more analysts, managers(project, program, IT, agile etc), QA, operations and so on. So engineers who employers think are capable of leveraging AI and do 20 s/w engineer worth of work with 5 people will remain in demand for time being.
Even without outright layoffs one can see how fast leverage of average IT engineer is disappearing. After 20 years of experience my value or feedback matters less than when I was 4 years into paid job. And it has far less to with AI so far.
Most custom work of past is just a library, component or framework to use. And those are mandated to be used as it much easier to hire/replace teams to work on those.
Now It may be always be true to have reusable components created but growth of IT industry kept people employed in ever greater numbers. However now it seems to be reaching limit. Leaving aside highly visible layoffs by US tech giants, growth is fading in countries like India with huge IT offshoring workforce. There are millions upon millions jobless fresh graduates waiting to get jobs with some IT degree.
I was a cofounder when rip good times came out. We were not a sequoia company but in hindsight we were really appreciative they published their advice publicly. Our team happened to be at a quarterly offsite when it came out. I remember we fiercely debated whether or not to believe it but we eventually came out of the offsite taking action - we cut founder salaries significantly, cut other non essential priorities, adjusted our forecasts and expectations and had an all hands meeting where we informed our employees that we’d extended our runway by another year and the cuts we’d made were to preserve their roles. Things turned out nearly exactly as sequoia predicted - we had just enough cash to grow the business, keep everyone on board, and get to an exit without raising another round. I’m hopeful coronavirus won’t be as bad across the board but I would strongly think about my alternatives before betting against sequoia.
I default to expressing my opinion politely, trying their idea, and if needed reminding them of my idea.
I find this is effective and saves a lot of face. You might learn a few things and/or after a few times where he is wrong and you’re right he (and everyone else) will start to solicit your opinion from the get-go.
Telling your developers to bugger off for 1 week every month will never work out. They still need to be at the office, but they can pursue learning, help with planning (this is critical), or focus on other development tasks they actually want to make.
