In an era of tech companies & influencers pushing hard on #AI, I'm sitting here refreshing my knowledge on PHP programming.
Know the fundamentals and:
- enjoy your craft
- spend less money
- don't fear about when the AI providers alter their deals
You'd think that countries already grappling with the terrible impact of having outsourced their manufacturing - and how that is crippling their economy and national security now - might recognise a new outsourcing of fundamental capability. But no.
I'll re-iterate what I said yesterday:
- Once you outsource your manufacturing to other countries, you no longer retain the skills and workforce to spin it back up.
- Once you're reliant on outsourced work, the people you outsourced to have the power and get to dictate terms.
AI is *exactly* the same thing.
Once it's been relied on long enough that there are not enough juniors with the fundamental knowledge, few to no seniors left... that's the end of your ability to not rely on AI providers.
Which in-and-of-itself isn't "bad" if you're the company or country that owns the AI providers.
That'll change. And then you're fucked.
@mattwilcox this may be playing out at a smaller scale, firms that had sacked copywriters or programmers (or other jobs considered easy AI tasks) are apparently starting to hire these people back.
The jobs will be less fun; they'll involve fixing the mess that happened in the interim.
I hope the turn happens at a smaller scale before whole nations get caught up in this mess!
There may be a skills shortage because people fell into the vibe-coding pit in recent years. Good for the rest of us!
@sarajw 100% agree on all points.
I'm not sure whether people just don't recognise patterns re-playing, or whether that doesn't matter because social and economic systems chug along in their normal flow anyway and are pretty much impossible to actually control, because they're mostly emergent rather than directed.
Like no bird being in charge of the flock - you can see how it works but have no real control. Human systems feel more and more like that.
Matt Wilcox
Sara Joy 