As long as you stay on your local system and dont browse the web or any modern apps.

It's fun if you're running Linux.

Humans are the CNC machines in your analogy here. Basically we are left to clean up after the sloppy material inputs to get reasonable outputs. It's just that techbros don't believe that is (or at least will ultimately be) necessary and that AI can do this step.

The jury is already in on current tech (techbros are wrong), and still out on coming tech in this space, but it seems very unlikely (past experience with tech bros says they are hype machines and full of shit).

So what we land on with AI acting as the CNC is this pseudo facade where the furniture it cranks out looking OK from a distance, up close it's pretty garbage but while everyone is starting (or forced) to sit on the chairs, it looks like they aren't really load bearing...

now... apply this to IT, Medical, Financial, Military and any other serious application and you don't have to wonder why people are concerned anymore.

All the frontend frameworks like RoR and hearing how the startups were built on them was awesome. It just seemed more creative since schools were still teaching java etc. the good times ended and capitalism does it's thing again.

Let me give an example that matches my own discouragement and might also explain yours.

In the middle of last century, the woodworking industry that created fine furniture started experiencing a shift. Due to the sudden explosion of wages and wealth and population in the late 40s to 70s, products had to be made faster and cheaper.

One method was to lower the quality of inputs. Plywood instead of hardwood. Then fiberboard/chipboard instead of plywood.

We see the same system in play now, with AI automation and it’s gratuitous hallucinations. It is essentially garbage materials in order to save time and money.

But another method was also in automating the work. Whereas before craftsmen used hand planes and chisels, newer craftsmen used electric shapers and planers. And later, CNC machines stepped in to produce delicate and complicated designs in a fraction of the time - and frequently even more precisely and more cleanly - than anyone with a carving chisel could do.

And that is the part which is NOT being effectively duplicated in IT.

Sure, AI can automate the work, but instead of maintaining quality, said quality of work is also taking a nosedive in tandem with the quality of materials.

And that is what is discouraging me six ways to Sunday. It’s garbage on both sides of the coin, and not just one. There is no part of the equation in which I can still take pride in. It’s all depressive, disgusting slop that I would be ashamed to put my name to.

I was where you were a few months ago. It's an awful feeling and I've been obsessed with computers for 28 years. This has been exceptionally difficult for me. I had a really rough year end where I was working on recurring critical defects for weeks. I caused most of them (proximate cause) but the state of the industry itself is what placed me in an impossible position where I was having to make things of poor quality that nobody likes.

Technology itself is not the problem. There is nothing inherently wrong with AI. The way it has presented itself to the world is because of greed and a feeding frenzy. The way it is and works now makes it a bad tool. A tool that does a good job 80% of the time is garbage. It's being shoved at us with little regard for us and the consequences.

But I am hopeful. I am using AI for my personal projects. It's not really a choice for me. For many years I've tried to get people to work with me on something; anything really. But it either didn't happen or fizzled out very quickly. These are ideas that I couldn't execute on my own, and now I can.

So there is a way to find opportunity in chaos. And this is the phase we are in.

I can also see positive things coming out of this. I've seen quite a few total newbies who switched to Linux who said they would have been stuck without AI and given up.

The failure of this massive experiment will become the basis for new innovation. We should be perplexed at where we are now, considering how windows forms apps were easier to build 15 years ago than a basic web app is now. We accumulated a lot of complexity without our productivity increasing, instead we are in desperation trying to throw money and "compute" at the complexity.

AI kind of feels like asbestos to me. Too useful to ignore and too harmful to embrace. But I really think that from some unexpected corners we might see a new era for technology emerging. I am optimistic.

Same. :/

I try to be as low tech as possible now. Most tech these days feels like it's trying to exploit me in every way it can.

The third? 

I like to think your edit was changing it from "omg shut up."

Its not fucking fun to be on the computer anymore. They changed it and now it sucks. It used to be so cool

• Conner O'Malley

Wait until you get TPS Reports.

Microcontroller projects, CAD, and 3D printing were my model train. They got me away from the keyboard warrior parts while still feeding my love for tech and building things.

Honestly building a Voron kit felt like the first time I built a PC, where you know enough to do it but learn a lot along the way. It was great.

That can be a dangerous line of thought …..

Started thinking of my legacy and

• I’m divorced
• I’ve been bad at keeping up with friends
• I’m unlikely to have grandkids and am estranged from my only niece
• I live far from my family
• my kids can’t afford to live in my town
• I won’t be able to leave a house or other inheritance
• even if one of my kids has kids I’m not sure I can run around with them anymore

Everything I’ve done has no lasting value. I’ve always loved tech and can fix the problem of the day but a year or two later that’s no longer relevant

omfg shut up

Time to buy a 3D printer and escape out of the computer out in the real world

Yeah, that feeling has lingered for years, and is now out in force

Id take it for minimum wage if there was a job here just to be doing something new and interesting.

This is my story too. I hate what tech became, so I tried to pivot careers. I did a few other things, but due to a long list of reasons, I’m back doing tech work. I’m no longer help desk or working directly for an IT department. More of an in-house advisor and consultant with light sysadmin work.

I used to brew my beer and now I build and use 3D printers. The physical world is more interesting to me than all those extra numbers today’s processors can crunch.

I got laid off and now I'm working as a Door guy at some local bars. Im poor but happy.

It will become a more specialized, niche knowledge. It's similar to cars. In the 1950s, it was extremely common for regular people to know how to fix their own car. But as cars became more reliable and complex, fewer and fewer now know how. There's still a definite market for mechanics and mechanical engineers, but it's a specialty line. You go to college, or generally go through a manufacturer's training program.

What's going to change are the expectations and expertise going in. When Microslop wants new developers, or support staff, or whatever else, the candidates aren't going to be (as) familiar with it going in. They won't be able to meaningfully apply their knowledge of similar systems and products.

They'll have to bring back extensive company-led training programs.

This will apply to every large tech company, regardless of field. In your networking example, it would probably be run by Cisco, which isn't too different from how it is today.

At this point tech is a hostile malevolent force.

I would love to leave tech. Desperately. But I feel that I have no other real skills, and I have a mortgage that I need to pay and a house to maintain. I do have savings, but it would probably only last a year at best.

I would love to do something outdoors. Like, maybe for WA state's park services. But I've heard that's super competitive and next to impossible to get into without first volunteering for years.