LLMs are quickly becoming cheaper. Soon they will be “cheap as free,” to quote Homestar Runner. Then programming will be solved, no need for meatbags. Enjoy the 2-5 years we have left in this profession.
I’m personally hoping for a future with free local LLMs, and I do hope the prices go down. I also recognize I can do things a little cheaper each year with the API.
However it is far from a guaranteed which direction we’re heading in, and I don’t think we’re on track to get close to removing the monetary barrier anytime soon.
The spend prices most of the developing world out -- an programmer earning $10k per year can't pay for a $200/month Claude Max subscription..
And it does better than $6k-$10k programmers in Africa, India, and Asia.
It's the mainframe era all over again, where access to computing is gated by $$$.
No, but a computer earning $10k per year can probably afford a $200 used ThinkPad, install Linux on it, build code that helps someone, rent a cheap server from a good cloud provider, advertise their new SaaS on HN, and have it start pulling in enough revenue to pay for a $200 Claude Max subscription.
> It's the mainframe era all over again, where access to computing is gated by $$$.
It's still the internet era, where access to $$$ is gated by computing skill :)
LLM code still needs to be reviewed by actual thinking humans.