5 ms·

The hype in some areas is around replacing coders, which is a fantasy without orders of magnitude better systems.

by api 2y ago

TheOtherHobbes 2y ago
Yes, that's exactly it. Many corporations firing coders because "AI can do that" and then discovering that AI can't. It's offshoring 2.0. $developing_country is cheaper so let's hire them, and why is everything broken now? This fantasy economy is based entirely on Numbers Must Go Up. Everyone seems to have forgotten the numbers are linked to real people in a physical world, and the real people and the physical world both have rules and consequences of their own which don't care about quarterly returns.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > It's offshoring 2.0 Doesn’t this analogy break down inasmuch as offshoring eventually worked?
  - lazide 2y ago
    Did it?
    - out_of_protocol 2y ago
      It did, e.g. Poland have very good bang for buck ratio. Something like Bangladesh wouldn't work for IT, but more developed countries will
      - lazide 2y ago
        The challenge with Poland, is that if there is going to be WW3 soon it looks likely to be the immediate front lines. So relatively high risk, from a business disruption perspective.
  - hatefulmoron 2y ago
    T-shirts are made in Bangladesh while code is still being made by extremely well compensated professionals in developed countries. That's despite code being easier to transport internationally than clothes. It's hard to say that it's worked yet.
    - adrianN 2y ago
      A lot of code is made by people in countries with relatively low incomes, eg eastern Europe. Most of the software in your car is probably written by an offshore team for example.
      - nogridbag 2y ago
        That probably explains why most people use Android Auto and Apple CarPlay!
        adrianN 2y ago
        Probably not for their engine control unit or their abs controller.
    - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
      > while code is still being made by extremely well compensated professionals in developed countries T-shirts are also being made in small print shops across America. As is code being written on the cheap in Poland, Brazil and India.
      - hatefulmoron 2y ago
        Sure, but I don't think that the code being produced in the US is "small code shops" producing artisanal code. It's not about whether code is produced in other places, it's if it's produced at a high scale locally. I don't think it's a problem that Poland and India have programmers.
  - csomar 2y ago
    The problem is not with offshoring, per se but the mentality of the person doing the offshoring and why they are doing it.
- api 2y ago
  > This fantasy economy is based entirely on Numbers Must Go Up. Everyone with any form of savings wants numbers to go up. Everyone who wants to retire wants numbers to go up. The financial industry is just doing what their customers want, and anyone with net-positive wealth is a customer. The problem is they can't forever. The Earth is not infinitely large and there is not infinite demand. Even if we did settle the Moon or Mars, it probably wouldn't make a huge difference to the terrestrial economy because of the distances involved. We'd just have founded another economy out there that would follow its own growth and maturation curve. I think this is why you see such an outright panic right now about birth rates. If people don't have more and more kids, number can't go up. I'm predicting -- to the extent that it's not already here -- the emergence of something I'm calling authoritarian natalism. The government will try to more or less force people to have kids, probably by taking away womens' rights and/or taxing people who are childless. It won't work, but it will be attempted in some places. Eventually the financial industry as we know it will collapse. It's inevitable. A major political question of the 21st century might be how much pain we inflict on ourselves in an attempt to save it. I know a lot of people will cheer for that, but it will also likely mean the end of low to zero risk compound interest on savings and the end of retirement among other things. I don't expect retirement as an institution or widespread practice to survive much longer than 20-30 more years.

The hype in some areas is around replacing coders, which is a fantasy without orders of magnitude better systems.

by api 2y ago

The hype in some areas is around replacing coders, which is a fantasy without orders of magnitude better systems.

Yes, that's exactly it. Many corporations firing coders because "AI can do that" and then discovering that AI can't. It's offshoring 2.0. $developing_country is cheaper so let's hire them, and why is everything broken now? This fantasy economy is based entirely on Numbers Must Go Up. Everyone seems to have forgotten the numbers are linked to real people in a physical world, and the real people and the physical world both have rules and consequences of their own which don't care about quarterly returns.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> It's offshoring 2.0 Doesn’t this analogy break down inasmuch as offshoring eventually worked?
- lazide 2y ago
  Did it?
  - out_of_protocol 2y ago
    It did, e.g. Poland have very good bang for buck ratio. Something like Bangladesh wouldn't work for IT, but more developed countries will
    - lazide 2y ago
      The challenge with Poland, is that if there is going to be WW3 soon it looks likely to be the immediate front lines. So relatively high risk, from a business disruption perspective.
- hatefulmoron 2y ago
  T-shirts are made in Bangladesh while code is still being made by extremely well compensated professionals in developed countries. That's despite code being easier to transport internationally than clothes. It's hard to say that it's worked yet.
  - adrianN 2y ago
    A lot of code is made by people in countries with relatively low incomes, eg eastern Europe. Most of the software in your car is probably written by an offshore team for example.
    - nogridbag 2y ago
      That probably explains why most people use Android Auto and Apple CarPlay!
      - adrianN 2y ago
        Probably not for their engine control unit or their abs controller.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > while code is still being made by extremely well compensated professionals in developed countries T-shirts are also being made in small print shops across America. As is code being written on the cheap in Poland, Brazil and India.
    - hatefulmoron 2y ago
      Sure, but I don't think that the code being produced in the US is "small code shops" producing artisanal code. It's not about whether code is produced in other places, it's if it's produced at a high scale locally. I don't think it's a problem that Poland and India have programmers.
- csomar 2y ago
  The problem is not with offshoring, per se but the mentality of the person doing the offshoring and why they are doing it.
api 2y ago
> This fantasy economy is based entirely on Numbers Must Go Up. Everyone with any form of savings wants numbers to go up. Everyone who wants to retire wants numbers to go up. The financial industry is just doing what their customers want, and anyone with net-positive wealth is a customer. The problem is they can't forever. The Earth is not infinitely large and there is not infinite demand. Even if we did settle the Moon or Mars, it probably wouldn't make a huge difference to the terrestrial economy because of the distances involved. We'd just have founded another economy out there that would follow its own growth and maturation curve. I think this is why you see such an outright panic right now about birth rates. If people don't have more and more kids, number can't go up. I'm predicting -- to the extent that it's not already here -- the emergence of something I'm calling authoritarian natalism. The government will try to more or less force people to have kids, probably by taking away womens' rights and/or taxing people who are childless. It won't work, but it will be attempted in some places. Eventually the financial industry as we know it will collapse. It's inevitable. A major political question of the 21st century might be how much pain we inflict on ourselves in an attempt to save it. I know a lot of people will cheer for that, but it will also likely mean the end of low to zero risk compound interest on savings and the end of retirement among other things. I don't expect retirement as an institution or widespread practice to survive much longer than 20-30 more years.