[jaredcwhite]

We were literally told that because of the Computer/Internet revolution, the entire nature of business was changing…politics too! Companies would become collectives, employees would have immense power to set their own goals and be radically UX-focused, profits would be widely distributed, and the old corporate structures & crony capitalism would largely be done away with. In a certain sense, becoming a software engineer was to be birthing a new form of leftism.

That largely turned out to be complete and utter hogwash. The instant capitalists realized they had extracted enough out of that myth to gain ultimate power and reassert dominance, they pounced. 2020-2026 has been a boiling-frogs-in-pots shift from collectivism to an extreme sort of New Oligarchy. Software engineers weren't making the world a more fair, creative, and democratic place. LOL! The exact opposite, in fact, has occurred.

Yes, of course we're grieving. But using agents to generate "code" isn't the issue. That's merely a symptom, one among many. The root cause? Societal systems based on pure greed and bigoted supremacy which were NEVER properly dismantled. The new leftism of tech? Nothing but a mirage. Millennials got played.

And wow did we fall for it.

My only hope at this point: Gen Z will succeed where we clearly failed. Our best hope is to listen to them, partner with them, help them channel their rage into action, and take control back from the tech moguls and oligarchs.

[ChrisArchitect]

Gen Z? Hardly. They'll hand it over without question not having any reference to the prior computer era, technologicial independence etc. Sure some of them are anti-establishment etc, but huge swathes are totally dependent on the platforms telling them what to do, have a ephemeral disdain for any history and exist only in an empty, cultureless now grapsing at only the recognizable/familiar. Not betting on them.