“Vibe coding” - God what a stupid name.

Since AI came on the scene I have heard more and more about how it’s going to replace us all, especially programmers. Be afraid! AI is coming for your job!

Yeah? Have you tried it? Code generation tools are nothing new. They’ve been around for decades. They’re helpful for rapid prototyping, but it’s rare that I’ve seen one generate code that I would want to own and maintain, long term.

See, that’s the part that I don’t hear much about. Everyone is so impressed with how quickly they can get a codebase up and running, simply by describing the work to an AI. No one seems to be talking much about the cost of ownership of that codebase, long term.

Oh let me guess, “We’ll maintain it with an AI.” Sure. And now you can’t maintain your code without paying out to an AI company. That’s about as intelligent as locking all of your documents into a proprietary format owned by one company so you can’t read them again without that company’s permission. Oh, wait, most companies are dumb enough to do that already.

And then there’s what it does to aspiring developers. Ever notice how helpless most developers are to do their jobs when the Internet connection goes down? I suffer from this too, and it bothers me. It means that I, or someone, must pay for a connection so I can reach online resources like Stack Overflow (hey, maybe I’m in desperate need to be treated like dirt, you don’t know). I use my connection extensively of course, but I try to build a skill base that doesn’t require it to do my job, as futile as that is, because I value my own skills and knowledge. I can only imagine what AI in schools is going to most people, and junior developers who depend on it are suspect, in my opinion. Why?

Because I’m worried that they don’t know anything beyond how to use the AI. As the article mentions, they provide the illusion of productivity without any real meat to it. Even worse, management in most companies is falling for this nonsense. Mandating use of AI, as if they have any idea what would make me more productive. Laying off employees to right-side since over-hiring in 2020 and then blaming it on AI to maintain their stock price. Then rehiring when they think no one is looking

This bubble will burst. It’s only a matter of time. I’m just not sure how much damage will be done before it does.