Tell HN: ChatGPT is like the invention of the spreadsheet

The spreadsheet (visicalc) is perhaps top 5 most revolutionary pieces of software ever created. It lets non programmers unlock a ton of computing use cases without hiring programmers. It’s a plausible programming environment for most people. Think of how hard it was to develop even trivial accounting software before the 70s?

ChatGPT similarly unlocks a lot of trivial natural language oriented programming tasks for real people. You can use it and a bit of prompt engineering to create simple interactive systems. Instead of unlocking the mathematical compute, like in a spreadsheet, you unlock the essentially most common human knowledge.

It’s thoroughly revolutionary. But like the invention of the spreadsheet, it’s not some zero sum game. Sophisticated systems require precise correctness. And we do currently write pretty terrible code on average. Perhaps because we’re burdened by so many mundane tasks that we can hand off to chatbots.

So don’t despair. Spreadsheeets didn’t kill programming as a profession. Neither will ChatGPT.