Comment by dahwolf | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dahwolf | Hacker News Reader

"When was the last time you got a 5x productivity boost from anything that didn’t involve some sort of chemicals?

I’m serious. I just don’t get people. How can you not appreciate the historic change happening right now?"

That's not how software development works. At all. The actual coding itself is but a fraction of total time spent.

Why aren't people more excited? Because for the vast majority of developers there's no tangible upside. When I'm more productive, will I earn more money? No, because everyone will have this capability. In fact, this will only increase delivery pressure on already overburdened people. When I'm more productive, can I go home early? No.

The only significant, widespread tangible benefit I see is that the type of work everybody hates doing (for example writing unit tests) becomes significantly easier.

The other aspect that the author seems to totally ignore is the mood that this might ultimate replace a lot of people's jobs. Or that it will intensify competition as development becomes even more competitive. None of these are considered good things for many people.

You're missing the point. The benefit is not for you you; the benefit is for your boss. When programmers get better tools and are more productive, your boss needs fewer programmers, which saves money.

I would expect to see a sharp decline in job opportunities for junior developers, and increased expectations for senior developers.

Technology can't fix capitalism but when you are actually capturing the value of your own labor that productivity boost goes right into your pocket.

It sucks so much to see people have such a negative opinion of a technology that can takes work off human hands when the technology isn't what makes it shitty, it's the raw deal we've been handed where nine tenths of your labor goes to your corporate owner.

I totally agree. My vision for the future is that we dial back our obsession with stuff a bit, and in return get back more free time. We drastically need a vision for society to believe in, where life gets better, and not endlessly worse.

Scenario 1: my economic existence is granted, not under constant threat. I'm now cleared to embrace and welcome any and all technology as an enabler to fulfill my dreams, and hopefully in some way improve the world. Which in turn allows others to improve the world. A fly wheel effect.

Scenario 2: I have a family to feed. Fuck this new tool. Another new thing to learn and I already struggle to keep up. No matter how good it is, it will in no way improve my life as it only adds to my load, and will ultimately replace me altogether.

Stark difference.

We were promised a 20-hour work week in response to advances in technology during the Industrial Revolution. Didn't happen. There's always someone hungrier, more ambitious who will work more than you.

Oh I'm getting the point, that was exactly the (implied) point I was making in response to the OP wondering..."I don't get why people aren't excited".

Most of the time these kinds of boosts should lead to more workers being hired, because previously unprofitable applications become profitable. There's not really a bounds on demand for software like there is for, say, food.

If you double productivity then bosses will double the workload. I don't know of any software team that is in danger of completing their backlog.

The backlog might shrink quickly when the LLM is testing and debugging the software 24/7 for the cost of a few dollars per hour.

You’re right that productivity writing new code isn’t everything, but if code is cheaper to write, I think it might shift how often people write new code or rewrite code rather than modifying legacy code? It also might mean fewer dependencies. Maybe programming languages will shift a bit towards code that’s easier to review versus easier to write?

And more generally, writing off all productivity improvements is really cynical. There are people who are just labor for hire in dysfunctional workplaces where there’s no reward for working smarter, but that’s not everyone.

You can also write code as a hobby, and you will be able to do more in a limited amount of time.

Or you could work for a smaller company, where how productive you are matters to how successful the company is.

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