[bwfan123]

In tech, change is the only constant. From embedded software in assembly to mobile/web development in javascript to jit-compiled python. This is not easy on engineers or on businesses as they have to keep reskilling at all times. The silver lining to AI is that it is poor at reskilling itself which is why the data-cutoff is circa 2024 for some models.

[stego-tech]

It’s constant, sure, but the rate of change is not. We’re still in the explosion brought about by silicon-based microprocessors, and that appears to be slowing down significantly as we’ve eked out all the easy gains in performance, power, and efficiency. I’m in the camp that believes, within my lifetime, tech innovation as we view it today will gradually slow and stagnate, resulting in a collapse of languages, models, and products into a handful of standards - and which every business, school, government, and person builds on top of or around until the next big explosion happens. It’s why Big Tech is so adamant about selling walled gardens: deep down, they know everyone is pining to be the next IBM juggernaut.

I think we’re seeing the early signs of that now, as everyone giddily trips over each other to rush into the “next big thing” rather than invest into the serious R&D necessary to make real gains. We’re managing modern technologies with centuries-old methods of corporate and political governance, complete with infighting and backstabbing. In a vacuum, no rational person would have ever backed the current explosion of LLMs given the more prescient problems facing the species, yet here we are squandering water and energy on prediction machines instead solar farms, battery storage, materials science, and infrastructure replacement.

I already see personal evidence in the IT side of things. For all the bickering supporters do between VMs and Containers and K8s and Public Cloud, all I see is just different ways of packaging software with differing sets of limitations or use cases. Everyone is so fiercely competing to make their chosen tech reign supreme over all that they pay no attention to us IT folks just wishing someone would make their container or Helm chart as easy to deploy and support as a modern Linux VM might be and integrating disparate tech instead of seeking to replace and dominate their competitors. There’s a very real attitude among my peers that, despite their advantages, containers are often little more than packages with extra steps and infrastructure for their existing use cases. Whether they’re right or wrong is irrelevant, because they’re making the decisions in their employer.

Change still feels fast and explosive because folks are focusing on niche research papers, extravagant moonshots, and the various implementations of things in SV circles. Outside those, however?

It’s slow. It’s stagnant. It’s boring, because nobody actually listens to what the physical majority has to say about products - only what the biggest paying customers (economic majority) want.