AI is making us write more code. That's the problem.
I analyzed research papers on AI-generated code quality. The findings:
→ 1.7x more issues than human-written code
→ 30-41% increase in technical debt
→ 39% increase in cognitive complexity
→ Initial speed gains disappear within a few months
We're building the wrong thing faster and calling it productivity.
The bottleneck was never writing code. It's understanding what to build.
If you're using AI coding tools, focus on:
• Smaller features (if it's 1000 lines, it's too big to review)
• Clear acceptance criteria before you prompt
• Tests first, AI-generated code second
• Security audits (AI can't do this)
More code isn't the goal. Solving real problems is.
@mlevison I had a discussion with some developers about this last week. If we expect developers to take responsibility for the code they generate, the amount of work is capped by their ability to review code. And if we expect more (which is absolutely necessary, if we want the promised productivity gains), we can't blame them, if it goes wrong.
If we celebrate huge productivity gains, we give up the right to complain, if AI fails. And it will fail.
Mark Levison
Konstantin Weddige