"Software quality is tied to the market incentives and always has been."
Yes -- but. The market is irrational especially in a time of mania or panic. The AI phase we are in has mania, bubble aspects. There is no rational calculation about what is happening to software quality and is that good for customers or the industry (or individual businesses). We are too far into FOMO. It won't stop until it STOPS. Uh oh.
A friend of mine works in a niche software field at a small company. It was recently acquired and the whole technical team was laid off because the new director of engineering determined that they could replace the whole team with AI. All of the people who wrote the product were dumped as well as the whole cohort they had trained. Everyone.
I really noticed this a few years ago to the point that I changed a few things and they have helped.
1. I notice the movement of my attention. I used to default to something like: sit down at my computer to look something up. But before I do that, just check the email. Then I am down some sort of rabbit hole. I did this sort of thing with no awareness or conscious choice. The change is that I notice what I'm doing. Then I can rein it back. I make a choice. (I think scrolling videos gets us into a habit of not choosing what to pay attention to.)
2. Be aware of my curiosity. Try to stay in touch with it. If I get into the space of curiosity I have a lot more juice for sustained attention. Something that helps with this is long form reading, especially fiction (!). I find myself replenished for all my work. The next thing I will try is some group support: silent reading groups where you read together.
3. I have an app on my devices that limits my access to twitter and reddit etc to small windows in the day.
4. Turn off ALL notifications except text messages.
My son has ADHD and I never knew what it meant but this year I made him get coaching for it and I made him get meds. He was living at home for free rent and the condition of staying was to address this. My experience is that getting treatment for this condition helped him a lot. The coach really helped, the meds really helped. He is full of zest for the work that lies ahead. He's off on his own now and while I think he'll have stumbles it's basically very positive.
One thing about ADHD coaching. The coach is a consistent person who helps frame a positive attitude with agency and skills and this takes you away from negative self talk. It's good. I think ADHD folks need this positive support.
There is more to this story. I have heard Harvard (and its ilk) described as a smallish university attached to a massive investment fund. One of the criteria for admission is how much you and your family will be "good for" donations to the university. They much prefer students from rich families, even if they are the children of disagreeable dictators.
I was listening to a podcast where the host and the guest were both Black and both had been to Harvard. This was before the Supreme Court ruling. They joked that it was well known that the Black students at Harvard who were descendants of American slaves were about 10% of the Black student body at Harvard. There were a lot of children of Nigerians and 3rd world tycoons and such.
I think there is a good argument for a help up for people whose communities are still impacted by the history of American slavery (and all its ills) but giving these slots to children of the wealthy and often immigrants does not feel right.
what is missing from this is the issue of power. tech companies interpret the rise of AI as empowering management and disempowering workers.
It's the American way to disempower workers. Tech people used to have a moat called expertise and management believes AI has made that obsolete.
Eventually workers in America will need to fight for power, probably through unions. That is the time honored way. There will be a lot of degradation and impoverishment on the way there I think. Fasten your seatbelts.
I was walking through a startup neighborhood in San Francisco the other day and I encountered several telephone poles which were posted with advertisements for software engineering jobs. These were not generic or scam advertisements. This was a particular startup, looking for software engineers. What is old is new again.
Shout out to American Giant. I have like 15 t-shirts from them, some are ten years old and they look new. Buying good stuff saves money in the long run!
Not just many foreign militaries. Our military. General Dan Caine by report advised Trump about the negative consequences of this action. MAGA elected a fantasist and narcissist and we will all bear the consequences. I was no fan of Kamala but the appalling limitations of Trump are of a different order and it is a disgrace that our voters by majority elected him.
Private car ownership is better everyday for suburbs and rural areas but in cities that is not true. Public transit can improve downtown access and reduce congestion. You need some density for transit.
This is not Facebook but I have a young friend who gets her news on Epstein from tiktok. She is convinced they were eating babies. I do worry (a little) that she will go over the conspiracy theories deep end. I told her tiktok news was bad "mental hygiene" but she didn't get it.
The prospect of going the last mile to fix the remaining problems reminds me of the old joke:
"The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time."
I'm anxious about code quality in critical infrastructure in 5 years or so.
Also my mastery of code starts with design and implementation that results in deep, intuitive understanding. Then I can do good code reviews and fix bugs fast fast fast.
Now engineers leap from AI assisted or even dominated implementation to code reviews. Lots of reading code without that deep level of mastery. With this approach I have less confidence in the humans who are in the loop.
Yes -- but. The market is irrational especially in a time of mania or panic. The AI phase we are in has mania, bubble aspects. There is no rational calculation about what is happening to software quality and is that good for customers or the industry (or individual businesses). We are too far into FOMO. It won't stop until it STOPS. Uh oh.
A friend of mine works in a niche software field at a small company. It was recently acquired and the whole technical team was laid off because the new director of engineering determined that they could replace the whole team with AI. All of the people who wrote the product were dumped as well as the whole cohort they had trained. Everyone.