Gear Acquisition Syndrome is a very different problem. Even if you haven't cured the issue the new synth was meant to fix, at least you have a new synth.
It is an almost universal fact that dealing with retail customers is something that is left to the lowest paid, lowest status workers and often outsourced and now increasingly left to LLM chatbots.
While you obviously can't have highly paid engineers tied up dealing with user support tickets, there is a lot to be said for at least some exposure to the coal face.
> While you obviously can't have highly paid engineers tied up dealing with user support tickets,
You obviously can, that's one of the more visceral way to make them aware of the pain they cause to real people with their work, which sticks better, or simply serves as a reminder there are humans on the other side. There are even examples of higher paid CEOs engaging, we can see some of that on social media
To shuffle it up in semi-random ways that make you think. If you're determined to hate LLMs for any reason or any purpose, just think of them as an elaborate game of Exquisite Corpse or Ultimate Mad-Libs.
You don't have to think LLMs are smart or real people to think of them as useful. I love it when I can make an idea clear enough in text that an LLM can completely regurgitate it and build upon it. I also love it when an LLM trips over and misses the one real novelty that I've slipped into something; what better for an originality test than trying to choke an automatic regurgitator?
Transistors have no understanding of what I'm doing, but somehow I still find them useful.
I feel people talk to LLMs in chat format just so they feel there's someone listening. This puts thats in a journaling/blogging context, hopefully delivering the same value in a unique context.
Did pewdiepie not write a voice to text for his LLM setup?
Thing is, we can talk faster then most of us can type.
Voice + Programming is slow because of all the special symbols. But voice + vibe coding? The ability to tell your LLM to do tasks, while you focus on other parts of the code, without the need to switch tabs/windows.
What about "change the color green on this element (html page), where my mouse is pointing"... Annoying with keyboard if you need to switch windows, very possible with voice.
And LLMs are very forgiving for mistakes, unlike if you want to voice program where every symbol needs to be accurate.
People do not realize that programming as we know it, is going to change.
>People do not realize that programming as we know it, is going to change.
I saw yesterday that I had been approaching software incorrectly. It feels futuristic because it's so fast, but it's still linear. One guy making one thing at a time (with some help from the computer).
But software can now be made so rapidly, that the bottleneck is actually curation. You can now generate a hundred ideas for software and a prototype for each one in the time it takes to make some coffee.
Going through all of it is the part that doesn't scale, it's bottlenecked by the individual. That's the reward function, right? Taste, discernment.
At this point software can grow itself, it can mutate, and it can combine with other software. I think building is entirely the wrong metaphor now.
I think a better metaphor would be a genetic algorithm. You try a bunch of stuff and see what works. Then you combine the best parts.
> You can now generate a hundred ideas for software and a prototype for each one in the time it takes to make some coffee.
Yep ... thinking the old way to make software is going to end.
In the past, we made a framework, then sold that framework for clients. But we always had the issue where client X wanted Y features, client Z want X features ... And over time the framework bloats, you get issues with features that may conflict between clients. Then you start to split the framework maybe for client Z because its too much different. Now your have issues when features or bug need to be fixed...
In todays LLM world, i see it more like custom software per client, with "instruction files"...
You make a custom framework for a client, with the AI writing it based upon a instruction file, that is supplemented by custom requirements for the client. Its written for that client and only that client.
The next client, same ... the next same. If a client sees a feature that they want, you instruct the LLM to update the framework for that client using again, a addendum instruction file.
If you instruction file was written correctly, bugs are going to be on the low end, and most clients do not need constant updates to their software.
A client wants to go to a different company and can not get the source files? That company needs the database files + the original design / analysts and the new company rebuild it again into a new version.
So ironically, we are going to, to a world where custom software is very normal, and cheap.
> I think a better metaphor would be a genetic algorithm. You try a bunch of stuff and see what works. Then you combine the best parts.
Yep, put that in practice last week.
I wrote a database in barely a week and half time, and was "slow" because i made like 5 different versions playing around with clustering, different parsers, more advanced each time (regex, token, lexer-ast) and tons of other features.
When i did not like a version, o LLM, rebuild it using my new updated instructions. O, i do not like the parser as it had issues, lets make a more advance one.
We are not talking toy DB ... full insert/update/delete, joins, CTE, Window function, SubQueries, Index's, alias, ... you name it, all working correctly. If i used my instruction file today, i can make you a custom DB in a day. Two if you need something custom. If somebody told me this 6 months ago, i call you crazy lol
Normally, when you build something, you spend days, weeks into it, especially if its advanced. Your reluctant to just tear it down and restart from zero. Or pull a important component out to rebuild from zero. Because sunk cost ... Now its just a half a day work, a day at worst, and you redid what will have taken you weeks or months. It really allows for a lot more experimenting, finding what fits better as time becomes different vs you on your little keyboard typing for ages, rebuilding, making tests, again and again. When a LLM does it 10, to 100 times faster.
For somebody who is a senior programmers, your actually the most easy to adapt and get the most out of LLMs (and ironically often the most resistant to change to using LLMs). Programmers that do not adapt to the new, are going to be left behind.
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