It's clear that AI assisted coding is dividing developers (welcome to the culture wars!). I've seen a few blog posts now that talk about how some people just "love the craft", "delight in making something just right, like knitting", etc, as opposed to people who just "want to make it work". As if that explains the divide.

How about this, some people resent the notion of being a babysitter to a stochastic token machine, hastening their own cognitive decline. Some people resent paying rent to a handful of US companies, all coming directly out of the TESCREAL human extinction cult, to be able to write software. Some people resent the "worse is better" steady decline of software quality over the past two decades, now supercharged. Some people resent that the hegemonic computing ecosystem is entirely shaped by the logic of venture capital. Some people hate that the digital commons is walled off and sold back to us. Oh and I guess some people also don't like the thought of making coding several orders of magnitude more energy intensive during a climate emergency.

But sure, no, it's really because we mourn the loss of our hobby.

Writers: Generative AI models were built on our stolen works, are deeply unethical, and risk devaluing our entire profession.

Artists: Generative AI models were built on our stolen works, are deeply unethical, and risk devaluing our entire profession.

Developers: Wheeeeeeeeee!

I actually feel so fucking dumb today for assuming the US justice system would do anything other than legalize the widespread theft of peoples’ ideas and works by AI companies.

I am pondering removing all my books for sale online and not bothering finishing writing the one that is in progress. There is no point.

The AI folks have won and I am too small and insignificant to make a dent in their efforts.

I hope my peers who are eagerly embracing these tools choke on them.