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I watched a video of some (unemployed) programmer lamenting over the current job situation market. He had been coding for a good while, but had recently been la

I watched a video of some (unemployed) programmer lamenting over the current job situation market. He had been coding for a good while, but had recently been laid off. The vid was mainly concerning the searching and interview process, but it also did highlight something I find somewhat true and important: Right now we're in a gold rush. Companies, that be established ones or startups, are in a frenzy to transform or launch AI-first products. You are not rewarded for building extremely robust and fast systems - the goal right now is to essentially build ETL and data piping systems as fast as humanly (or inhumanly) possible, and being able to add as many features as possible. The quality of the software is of less importance. And, yes, senior engineers with other priorities are being overshadowed - even left in the dust - if they don't use tools to enhance their speed. As the article states, there are novice coders, even non-coders that are pushing out features like you wouldn't believe it. As long as these yield the right output, and don't crash the systems, that's a gold star. Of course there are still many companies whose products do not fall under that, and very much rely on robust engineering - but at least in the startup space there's overwhelmingly many whose product is to gather data (external, internal), add agents, and do some action for the client. You need extremely competent, and critically thinking technical leaders on the top to tackle this problem. But we're also in the age where people with somewhat limited technical experience are becoming CTOs or highly-ranked technical workers in an org, for no other reason than that they know how to use modern AI systems, and likely have a recent history of being extremely productive.

noduerme 5mo ago
Companies that don't fall under that rubric are established and have actual money on the line if their software shits the bed. Software that handles actual logistics and transactions can't be treated to lots of LLM updates without some serious problems arising. Startups and B2B ones especially have always been cheap, cut corners, screwed up and apologized later, and most importantly just created hype and fluff to get investment that's rarely spent on building solid foundations. There's not much crap AI is writing for them now, as code or marketing material, that wasn't already just as junky when it was written by humans. That's been the mutually agreed upon game that startups and VC have played since the 90s. LLMs just distill the douchery and the flawed logic, and it's pleasant to watch their artifacts go down in flames.
- kakacik 5mo ago
  Most of the software engineering field ain't no startups, however distorted the most vocal representation on HN could be. Neither are they code sweat shops churing one quick templated eshop/company site after another (knew some people in that space, even 20 years ago 1 individual churned out easily 2-3 full sites in a week depending on complexity). Typical companies, this includes banks btw, see these llms as production boosters, to cut off expensive saas offerings and do more inhouse, rather than head count cutting tool par excellence. Not everybody is as dumb and pennypinching-greedy as ie amazon is. There, quality of output is still massively more important than volume of it or speed. CTOs are not all bunch of shortsighted idiots. But these dont make catchy headlines, do they.
  - deleted 5mo ago
    [deleted]
whstl 5mo ago
If anything, the current era looks like how 1995-2015 was for me. Back then I was not in the “nitpicker’s radar” yet. I was working in small teams and shipping like crazy, sometimes fixing small bugs literally in seconds. Things worked, were stable, made money, teams were fun and code and product had quality. The post-Thoughtworks, post-Uncle-Bob world of 2015-2025 was absolute hell for a maker. It was 100% about performative quality. Everything was verbose and had to be by the book, even when it didn't make sense from an engineering or product point of view. Different opinions were simply not accepted. It was the age of bloat, of thousands of dependencies, of nitpicks, of infinite meetings, of quality in paper but not in practice, of doing overtime, of being on a fucking pager, of having CI/CD that took 10 hours to merge, and all the stress it comes with. I would be totally ok if all those “professional” engineers from that generation were to be replaced with hackers, both old and new.
- nly 5mo ago
  Nothing you describe is recognisable to me. It just seems like you chose to work at bad places.
  - pelagicAustral 5mo ago
    Come on now. Even I know exactly what he's talking about and I have worked far and beyond all the craze of the real world, having mainly dedicated time to small dev shops in the past 2 decades.
    - my-next-account 5mo ago
      No man, it's because of their poor ability to pick jobs, not because the other commenter was in a different niche or whatever than they are. It's absolutely not possible for 2 people to have a different experience, as there are at most 5 programmers in the entire world.
      - whstl 5mo ago
        I literally can't picture someone who simultaneously 1) has been managing to land great jobs in small shops, 2) browses HN and 3) doesn't empathize with complaints of bloat, dependencies, pager duty and meetings.
philipp-gayret 5mo ago
You have described exactly the situation of almost all of my clients. And in some way it is good to see our business model validated as we help steer organisations at this level, also technically. I would only add that the quality of software has improved significantly. From my perspective, the bar for quality at most organisations like this is low, extremely low.
lurking_swe 5mo ago
i feel like i saw the same thing! was is this (AsianDadEnergy channel)? https://youtu.be/VeMA9WGKxOg?si=hV1F84P_-U6k9oJi https://youtu.be/VeMA9WGKxOg?si=hV1F84P_-U6k9oJi
tidewinner 5mo ago
I've simply not seen this at all. As someone with 10 YOE who was in the job market from November to early April going for senior software engineer roles, quality and architecture seemed to be the thing every org cared about. The bar not only to secure and interview, but to get hired was unbelievably high. Some of the interviews I were getting were at AI startups and all of them were either doing architectural questions or multiple rounds of architectural, behavioural and leetcode problems. Only one of the orgs was hiring junior engineers and the director of technology mentioned to me he didn't want to as they were "incapable", but it was a quota given to him by the board. I also got told by multiple recruitment agents that I wasn't experienced enough, and some hiring managers were demanding 15 YOE for a senior role.
- DragonStrength 5mo ago
  15 YOE, here: Well, I just interviewed between October - Decemeber of last year, and since then, the company I joined has gone full vibe-coding and is changing to AI interviews. So...
- topaz0 5mo ago
  GP is talking about what they [the companies in question] accept/expect as work product. That has always differed from what they look for in a job candidate. Not surprising that AI psychosis amplifies the discrepancy.
angled 5mo ago
I am somewhat relieved to be working in a regulated industry where deterministic outputs are still needed. Maybe when someone has a validated AI model there will be trouble ...
notabee 5mo ago
Conway's Law still holds true. Software applications will resemble the communication structure of the companies that build them. If the companies are comprised of 90% overly verbose bullshit, so too will be the fragile slop monstrosities that they build.

noduerme 5mo ago

Companies that don't fall under that rubric are established and have actual money on the line if their software shits the bed. Software that handles actual logistics and transactions can't be treated to lots of LLM updates without some serious problems arising. Startups and B2B ones especially have always been cheap, cut corners, screwed up and apologized later, and most importantly just created hype and fluff to get investment that's rarely spent on building solid foundations. There's not much crap AI is writing for them now, as code or marketing material, that wasn't already just as junky when it was written by humans. That's been the mutually agreed upon game that startups and VC have played since the 90s. LLMs just distill the douchery and the flawed logic, and it's pleasant to watch their artifacts go down in flames.

kakacik 5mo ago
Most of the software engineering field ain't no startups, however distorted the most vocal representation on HN could be. Neither are they code sweat shops churing one quick templated eshop/company site after another (knew some people in that space, even 20 years ago 1 individual churned out easily 2-3 full sites in a week depending on complexity). Typical companies, this includes banks btw, see these llms as production boosters, to cut off expensive saas offerings and do more inhouse, rather than head count cutting tool par excellence. Not everybody is as dumb and pennypinching-greedy as ie amazon is. There, quality of output is still massively more important than volume of it or speed. CTOs are not all bunch of shortsighted idiots. But these dont make catchy headlines, do they.
- deleted 5mo ago
  [deleted]

whstl 5mo ago

If anything, the current era looks like how 1995-2015 was for me. Back then I was not in the “nitpicker’s radar” yet. I was working in small teams and shipping like crazy, sometimes fixing small bugs literally in seconds. Things worked, were stable, made money, teams were fun and code and product had quality. The post-Thoughtworks, post-Uncle-Bob world of 2015-2025 was absolute hell for a maker. It was 100% about performative quality. Everything was verbose and had to be by the book, even when it didn't make sense from an engineering or product point of view. Different opinions were simply not accepted. It was the age of bloat, of thousands of dependencies, of nitpicks, of infinite meetings, of quality in paper but not in practice, of doing overtime, of being on a fucking pager, of having CI/CD that took 10 hours to merge, and all the stress it comes with. I would be totally ok if all those “professional” engineers from that generation were to be replaced with hackers, both old and new.

nly 5mo ago
Nothing you describe is recognisable to me. It just seems like you chose to work at bad places.
- pelagicAustral 5mo ago
  Come on now. Even I know exactly what he's talking about and I have worked far and beyond all the craze of the real world, having mainly dedicated time to small dev shops in the past 2 decades.
  - my-next-account 5mo ago
    No man, it's because of their poor ability to pick jobs, not because the other commenter was in a different niche or whatever than they are. It's absolutely not possible for 2 people to have a different experience, as there are at most 5 programmers in the entire world.
    - whstl 5mo ago
      I literally can't picture someone who simultaneously 1) has been managing to land great jobs in small shops, 2) browses HN and 3) doesn't empathize with complaints of bloat, dependencies, pager duty and meetings.

philipp-gayret 5mo ago

You have described exactly the situation of almost all of my clients. And in some way it is good to see our business model validated as we help steer organisations at this level, also technically. I would only add that the quality of software has improved significantly. From my perspective, the bar for quality at most organisations like this is low, extremely low.

lurking_swe 5mo ago

i feel like i saw the same thing! was is this (AsianDadEnergy channel)? https://youtu.be/VeMA9WGKxOg?si=hV1F84P_-U6k9oJi https://youtu.be/VeMA9WGKxOg?si=hV1F84P_-U6k9oJi

tidewinner 5mo ago

I've simply not seen this at all. As someone with 10 YOE who was in the job market from November to early April going for senior software engineer roles, quality and architecture seemed to be the thing every org cared about. The bar not only to secure and interview, but to get hired was unbelievably high. Some of the interviews I were getting were at AI startups and all of them were either doing architectural questions or multiple rounds of architectural, behavioural and leetcode problems. Only one of the orgs was hiring junior engineers and the director of technology mentioned to me he didn't want to as they were "incapable", but it was a quota given to him by the board. I also got told by multiple recruitment agents that I wasn't experienced enough, and some hiring managers were demanding 15 YOE for a senior role.

DragonStrength 5mo ago
15 YOE, here: Well, I just interviewed between October - Decemeber of last year, and since then, the company I joined has gone full vibe-coding and is changing to AI interviews. So...
topaz0 5mo ago
GP is talking about what they [the companies in question] accept/expect as work product. That has always differed from what they look for in a job candidate. Not surprising that AI psychosis amplifies the discrepancy.

angled 5mo ago

I am somewhat relieved to be working in a regulated industry where deterministic outputs are still needed. Maybe when someone has a validated AI model there will be trouble ...

notabee 5mo ago

Conway's Law still holds true. Software applications will resemble the communication structure of the companies that build them. If the companies are comprised of 90% overly verbose bullshit, so too will be the fragile slop monstrosities that they build.