[Legend2440]

I think we are seeing the beginning of the end of for-sale software.

If anyone can make an app from a spec, how can you profitably sell an app? A million people will make their own copy tomorrow.

[pan69]

> I think we are seeing the beginning of the end of for-sale software.

We're seeing the end of "simple" for-sale software. Like OPs CRUD app, a UI front-end on-top of a database, of which there are a gazillion examples so some AI can easily synthesize some approximation of whatever requested variation.

The selling of software was always in the "moat", not how fast you were able to churn out CRUD apps. We used offshore that to a more viable economy, but now we're offshoring that to an automated process.

We're not seeing the end of for-sale software, we're seeing the beginning of the end-to-end solo founder.

[lesam]

Except this isn't 'an app from a spec', it's the potemkin village of an app whose goal is to get ad impressions and a credit card number.

[mark_round]

This is the issue.

I posted more or less the same thing in a comment over on lobste.rs[1] - being able to create your own bespoke software tools, without any developer experience is (mostly) a really cool thing.

This isn't someone being inspired to build something: It's the automated "drive-by" cloning and scammy, dubious nature of these clones that bothers me along with the copying of personas & identities to spam them across social media.

[1]=https://lobste.rs/s/qtytfe/sloppy_copies

[m463]

we're already there. When apple announced the iphone, the price of software went from can-make-a-profit-$39.99 on a PC to $4.99 and then $0.99 for a phone app. Which became "that's too expensive" at some point, and then reset to free.

[bensyverson]

It has been possible to create full songs in Suno for years now. As far as I can tell, it hasn't affected the music industry.

You've been able to generate full books using ChatGPT for even longer. Somehow, authors continue selling books.

It's almost as if people recognize and will pay for quality creative output from human beings.

[helsontaveras18]

I don’t have data on this. But I’m getting recommended YouTube videos that are 1-2 hr AI generated music, in the genre of background music (coffee listening and focus).

I listened to one. It was pretty good!! There’s no lyrical content, but the production was strong.

In that niche of “music you don’t really pay attention to” I predict AI generated music will only grow.