4 ms·

> Perhaps. I think AI changes the equation here. Honestly, AI changes what "solo developer" even means. I disagree; it's even more obvious with AI that, with A

> Perhaps. I think AI changes the equation here. Honestly, AI changes what "solo developer" even means. I disagree; it's even more obvious with AI that, with AI, a solo dev can go even faster, but still, with AI, you need a team to go further.

johnj-hn 4mo ago
Can you talk a little about what "further" means to you?
- lelanthran 4mo ago
  Sure: 1. A primary meaning, "Further" means "revenue" (or "profit"). You and your AI together can sit and create a competitor to Windows 11, do the marketing copy, a sales strategy, feature testing etc, but without a team that product isn't going anywhere. 2. A secondary meaning, "Further" means "Stamina". You + AI can create everything above, but without a community (whether paying customers or free users), the product dies when your interest in it dies, even if it is still making money!
  - johnj-hn 4mo ago
    Ok, I see where we diverge now. My project is free and open-source so there's no money at play here. It's a labor of love. I agree with you if you're talking about a for-profit product that you'll probably do better with a team.
    - xboxnolifes 4mo ago
      Even as a labor of love, the second definition still applies. Once your interest wains, the project dies.
      - johnj-hn 4mo ago
        Sure but if it's open-source then anyone is free to fork it to keep it going, if they want to. That's the beauty of open-source.
  - satvikpendem 4mo ago
    Neither of those definitions require a team. There are many solo founders making tons of money, like Pieter Levels, and he has a community too.
- oooyay 4mo ago
  I see OP responded but I'd add on that "further" can mean product vision and pivots. When you're the only one in the room that voice is limited; even when you may have only listened to 1% of these pitches it may be the one you never would've come up with. It can mean the power of delegation and creativity. The worst kind of teams are monocular, democratically oriented teams where every member must be on and act in the same manner. It's great for efficiency, it's horrible for productivity and creativity.
Kon5ole 4mo ago
In the time it takes me to make a single-node webservice with a CLI POC client I can now have a fully scalable SAAS with clients for iOS, Android, mac, linux, windows and web-based, user documentation in several languages and a suite of unit tests. Surely that's both faster and further? IMO AI agents are like a team of remote consultants that only talk shop and have no sense of humor.
- skydhash 4mo ago
  > I can now have a fully scalable SAAS with clients for iOS, Android, mac, linux, windows and web-based, user documentation in several languages and a suite of unit tests. Which you won’t be brave enough to put on the internet.
  - satvikpendem 3mo ago
    Many people do however.
honr 4mo ago
AI does change the equation. It frees a solo developer to focus more on the big picture. BUT... with the current generation of AI agents, I think you are still right. You still need a second (or ideally more; I'd say 5) developer(s) to get enough perspective to have solid plans and roadmaps. So, while I currently [mostly] agree, I think the / a next generation of agents might take that over a threshold and make solo development close enough to the equivalent of current 2-dev work to meaningfully change the equation. Furthermore I think that does not even need new models; I think current models with better "harness / tooling / system prompting / skills / etc." (whatever you may call the text files describing important procedures), might be able to fill most of that gap. Obviously work that needs more than 2 devs planning might take even longer to fully solve with 1 dev + multiple agents, if ever. My current mental model is that humans can very well think about and walk the boundary of problems, while [current] AI agents can fill the inside to some extent. If a problem has inherent "multi-dimensional boundaries", it might be hard for a person to imagine and walk it well to guide the agents. And I think most of the interesting problems fall in this category.

johnj-hn 4mo ago

Can you talk a little about what "further" means to you?

lelanthran 4mo ago
Sure: 1. A primary meaning, "Further" means "revenue" (or "profit"). You and your AI together can sit and create a competitor to Windows 11, do the marketing copy, a sales strategy, feature testing etc, but without a team that product isn't going anywhere. 2. A secondary meaning, "Further" means "Stamina". You + AI can create everything above, but without a community (whether paying customers or free users), the product dies when your interest in it dies, even if it is still making money!
- johnj-hn 4mo ago
  Ok, I see where we diverge now. My project is free and open-source so there's no money at play here. It's a labor of love. I agree with you if you're talking about a for-profit product that you'll probably do better with a team.
  - xboxnolifes 4mo ago
    Even as a labor of love, the second definition still applies. Once your interest wains, the project dies.
    - johnj-hn 4mo ago
      Sure but if it's open-source then anyone is free to fork it to keep it going, if they want to. That's the beauty of open-source.
- satvikpendem 4mo ago
  Neither of those definitions require a team. There are many solo founders making tons of money, like Pieter Levels, and he has a community too.
oooyay 4mo ago
I see OP responded but I'd add on that "further" can mean product vision and pivots. When you're the only one in the room that voice is limited; even when you may have only listened to 1% of these pitches it may be the one you never would've come up with. It can mean the power of delegation and creativity. The worst kind of teams are monocular, democratically oriented teams where every member must be on and act in the same manner. It's great for efficiency, it's horrible for productivity and creativity.

Kon5ole 4mo ago

In the time it takes me to make a single-node webservice with a CLI POC client I can now have a fully scalable SAAS with clients for iOS, Android, mac, linux, windows and web-based, user documentation in several languages and a suite of unit tests. Surely that's both faster and further? IMO AI agents are like a team of remote consultants that only talk shop and have no sense of humor.

skydhash 4mo ago
> I can now have a fully scalable SAAS with clients for iOS, Android, mac, linux, windows and web-based, user documentation in several languages and a suite of unit tests. Which you won’t be brave enough to put on the internet.
- satvikpendem 3mo ago
  Many people do however.

honr 4mo ago

AI does change the equation. It frees a solo developer to focus more on the big picture. BUT... with the current generation of AI agents, I think you are still right. You still need a second (or ideally more; I'd say 5) developer(s) to get enough perspective to have solid plans and roadmaps. So, while I currently [mostly] agree, I think the / a next generation of agents might take that over a threshold and make solo development close enough to the equivalent of current 2-dev work to meaningfully change the equation. Furthermore I think that does not even need new models; I think current models with better "harness / tooling / system prompting / skills / etc." (whatever you may call the text files describing important procedures), might be able to fill most of that gap. Obviously work that needs more than 2 devs planning might take even longer to fully solve with 1 dev + multiple agents, if ever. My current mental model is that humans can very well think about and walk the boundary of problems, while [current] AI agents can fill the inside to some extent. If a problem has inherent "multi-dimensional boundaries", it might be hard for a person to imagine and walk it well to guide the agents. And I think most of the interesting problems fall in this category.