Seeing this industry, this community being in overwhelmingly large parts gobbled up by the LLM hype and cheering through it, trying to pull everyone else down the drain, really makes me question where I see my own future within all this…
Looking at it more honestly, the current trends really just lay bare the moral bankruptcy and contempt for the actual craft and engineering of building systems that has been there all along, barely hiding.
When I got into tech, I was a naive teenager. I believed automation is generally a good thing, I believed that computers and the internet were generally something good, something cool and flashy. I grew up surrounded by this vague sense that people who understand computers are in some way superior to those who don't.
And I looked up to some of the people who were doing good and important work and hence, believed them to be generally good people.
Now, I'm glad I have some other frames of reference. Questioning the substance of flashy and cool things, and which interests they serve. Big tech as a capitalist force, trying to extract as much money down the line, which means luring people in, locking them in, controlling their behavior, making them dependent now. Startups following the ever same cycle of burning venture capital to try and enter this playbook, cannibalizing yet another profession.
And I've learned to value crafts, solid reasoning, taking responsibility for your work. I value art, music, genuine human expression, journalism, theoretical analysis, humanity.
And I also see how many of the people I used to look up to making excuses for the former, or eagerly supporting it, bowing before it; and kicking dirt on the latter.
And I see so much "well I only use LLMs for X and Y but not for Z" around me, and it just makes me sad. I don't want to scold these people, because at least they're still holding on to some sliver of critical thinking, but on another level I'm worried they might already be lost either way.
And sure, the bubble will pop in one way or another, but I doubt any of this will truly go away again.
So, where does that leave us? Will there be a part of this community that upholds its principles in an environment where that becomes increasingly difficult? Will niches in the industry emerge where human software engineering and craft is still valued and slop is kept out (and which are not morally rotten in some other way)?
Is this a field that is worthwhile to stay in? Is that something I will want to do?
I honestly don't know.