[mmilunic]

> Non-technical middle managers who have not written a line of code in their lives, now feel that the biggest obstacle between them and greatness has lifted.

I find it interesting how this is almost the “democratization” you mentioned that AI provides. While AI “democratizes” certain technical ability, in some ways the democratization of things can actually be bad, in that this “democratization” pushes us towards a system in which people are completely fungible, and so lose their individual bargaining capability. By democratizing this ability to the non-technical middle manager, the junior software engineer ends up losing their unique contribution and hence vote.

I read a while ago about boycotting AI if you can, and I would love to, but this issue makes me wonder if that could even be effective. If the goal is to remove every unique contribution you provide, what can you take away with a boycott?

[ventana]

I'm thinking of some similarity between the non-technical middle manager using agents to avoid the biggest obstacle of their developers, and a person installing a wall socket at home.

It's not too difficult to install a wall socket, but many things can go wrong, so people would normally call an electrician. In some jurisdictions you are not allowed to install it without a license, or probably you can install it only for yourself but not for anyone else if you don't have a license, and you need to call an inspector and check your work when you're done. Some other jurisdictions truly don't care, you can do whatever, and all the possible damage is on you.

Electricians are somewhat fungible, because you often don't care who will do the job for you, but the profession exists and they can pay their bills.

I wonder how far we are until, at least in some jurisdictions, a person won't be legally allowed to update the website that stores customers' data or processes payments without being a licensed software developer, and how rules, should they be adopted, will change our profession.

[RobotToaster]

> in that this “democratization” pushes us towards a system in which people are completely fungible, and so lose their individual bargaining capability.

Hasn't this been the case since the power loom put hand weavers out of a job?

[kjkjadksj]

This time it is different. Ai promised to be the power loom for all things. Knowledge work and all physical work through robotics. And there will be no more jobs to turn to. Why might an AI company allow for humanity to live in this future? They’d have no utility. No economic purpose. They’d have no unique skill. Supporting them over the datacenter amounts to investing in waste heat. And they may even rise up and destabilize the horror you’ve created for planet earth. Game theory suggests keeping humans on earth is increasingly a liability.

[overgard]

I hate the term "democratization". It's putting a respectable face on something that shouldn't be respectable at all. In the age of the internet, coding and other creative skills have always been largely democratized to people that care enough to learn. Nothing is being "democratized" by AI, there's simply (an attempt) at driving the value of actual skill to zero so the skill-less and stupid can purchase their way to mediocrity (without the benefit of transferring that money to someone who has worked to be skilled). There is NOTHING "democratic" about that.

[brookst]

It’s not coding that’s being democratized, it’s the ability to create games, tools, etc, that require coding.

Suppose it became possible to buy a Ferrari (not that new hideous one) for $5k. That would be democratizing Ferrari ownership: far more people could do it. I’m sure there would be investment bankers who would complain it devalues their hard work (I am not a fan of those people, but it is notoriously long hours). Does that make a $5k Ferrari less of a democratization?

[slopinthebag]

If that happened, Farrari's would simply lose their value and something more rare would take it's place. The scarcity is the point. Same with art, if you "democratise" it somehow humans will seek out a new form of artistic expression that is not accessible to people with a $10 midjourney subscription. And that is OK, good actually.

[brookst]

Perhaps to some degree, but there is intrinsic value to a Ferrari if you enjoy driving. That doesn’t change with scarcity.

But I agree, and even celebrate, that a hypothetical future with abundance will be bad for speculators and the luxury-obsessed, and great for people who enjoy the first-order benefits of products.

[FarmerPotato]

They’re letting us test drive the Ferrari while they extract our data.

Then they’ll raise the price.

[overgard]

That's a product, not a skill. We're not talking about people getting cheap cars, we're talking about nobody being able to make a living anymore. And no, this isn't like other revolutions, because there's no "upskilling" into it when it threatens all white collar work. (I'm sorry but I don't think prompting AI is going to be some amazing new profession, it'll be at best a transitory phase). Best case is to buy some durable jeans and learn a trade?

Of course, I don't think this is happening any time soon because I don't believe the hype machine. But if you do believe the hype machine, you should be honest about what you're facing.

Also, for what it's worth as a person that's written (and will continue to write) games and tools etc., there were already plenty of forces democratizing that (free engines, asset stores with reusable code and art, etc.) The difference was that there was still skill involved, and at the end of the day you were paying another human being for their effort if you bought or used pre-existing components. There's no skill in AI, not really.

Also, I'm really not that interested in playing a game created by AI, and judging from the reaction gamers and game developers have had to this technology, I don't think many people are. So, yay, you can make a game that has a tiny audience with zero satisfaction from having done something hard and learned something? Also it's likely going to be extremely derivative, because the AI can only really work with what it's been trained on.

[altmanaltman]

Wait a second, you say its not coding thats getting democratized. It is the "ability to create" software... hm i wonder what would be the ability to write software? Maybe something like software engineering?

Also your example with Ferrari is completely flawed, and I dont give a fuck about what investment bankers think or do. What are you even talking about here?

Please explain the first part more than you hand waved away to make a completely unrelated metaphorical case. What is the ability to create software if not software engineering? How are both different?

[brookst]

The whole point of AI coding is (partial) decoupling of software from human coding.

You might as well ask what the ability is to create arbitrary images to any specification, if not painting? But AI image gen is not painting.

It’s painful and confusing to those who’ve mistaken the tool for the product. Why, you ordered that pizza for delivery, that’s not cooking! No, but it is eating.

Same thing with software. Some people just want the outcome, not the process, and it’s pointless to whinge about how it’s somehow less legitimate.

[fastforwardius]

You can make coffee by brewing it or by using Nespresso.

[skor]

I am against how its being used as well, in fact Authoritarianism is literally "central power to preserve the political status quo" - and that is what you have folks: OpenAI/Anthropic/Google/Facebook/etc are all central powers.

Coding was always power that you can have if you just read the freely available info but having access to a computer and internet is not free - if we can change this it would make democratized.

[altmanaltman]

Coding was always "democratized". You just had to put in the effort of learning and understanding. Finding free resources is very easy.

AI doesn't make that learning and understanding easy but just allows people to skip it.

That doesn't mean democratization at all.

[imtringued]

>You just had to put in the effort of learning and understanding.

Yeah it's always so weird when people anthropomorphize the harsh physical reality of learning a skill that is accessible to everyone as some sort of secret boys club, where the existing club members do not let you in, when the only difference between the members and outsiders is whether they've paid the entry fee or not.

[jononor]

A 10'000 hour entry fee does rule out a fair bunch of people though, in practice. While there are few artificial barriers to learning to code, there still are some natural ones, like time.

[altmanaltman]

is time a barrier or a requirement? its a bit like saying time is a natural barrier to solving hashes. like yeah, its an inherent part of the process that cannot be skipped. You cannot learn without time, but thats just the laws of the universe not a barrier to learning.

[ninalanyon]

> individual bargaining capability

Thinking that "individual bargaining capability" capability is an especially useful thing for society as a whole is one of the things that has got us into the current Hobbesian mess

[rootusrootus]

> democratizing this ability to the non-technical middle manager

Works the other way too. Now a junior engineer can use AI to do much of what a middle manager had been doing in the past.

Frankly I think the middle manager ought to be WAY more worried than most.