[ilovecake1984]

I think in the long term AI will be a massive market. I just don’t think it will be massively profitable. The hardware will get better, the models will be even more commoditised. It’s useful and it will get even more useful.. it’s just not going be a licence to print money.

[Schiendelman]

In the last year we've gone from "this is annoying but sometimes useful" to "I don't need to hire junior engineers". There are some 25 million software engineers worldwide today, and do not ignore Jevon's Paradox - there are far more people who would hire software engineers if the price of engineering was slashed 90% (which is likely an understatement).

If you don't think this will be profitable, you're saying you don't think software, the most profitable enterprise in human history, will be profitable. Looking at it that way, does it make sense why those of us on the business side of software disagree? I've produced more software (and quite good software) in the last six months than I did in the first ten years of my engineering career.

[ilovecake1984]

I’m not saying software will be unprofitable. I’m saying Ai models will be low margin businesses. I think AI is going to decrease the price of software and allow us to automate things we couldn’t. I just don’t see how this value accrues to AI companies.

[d4ng]

How much value in present terms was created by n hours of your time before LLMs, and how much value is created now by n hours of your time? If everyone is using LLMs, has that value calculation result changed?

People used to go to work by foot. The best runners would get to work first. Then the bicycle came along. The person who was the best runner before is now still getting to work first on the bicycle.

[Schiendelman]

Yes, that value calculation result has changed. The gap between building software and financial value is knowing which software to build and how to break into a market, not how much code you can write. There are not very many good product managers. Not that I'm necessarily good! But I try to be. :)

[d4ng]

Please see the bicycle analogy. Resources available at a given time are finite. If everyone is now churning out software at a higher rate with LLMs, what changes in terms of the value gained?

[Schiendelman]

You're making a bit of a category error there - the "everyone" is different after LLMs. You aren't comparing the same market.

[d4ng]

I think I agree. The question is what happens before then. The S&P 500 went down about 40% following 2000 and 2008. The FTSE 100 showed similar losses.

My questions are: Will we still have jobs if there’s a crash? How can we start researching what the optimal hedge is against such a crash?