https://www.thisamericanlife.org/801/transcript

Thirty years ago, you had an OS and you installed applications. No problem.

Later, you had to build and use apps on the internet, an infrastructure that is susceptible to DDOS attacks, government firewalls, and other security risks. Still fine, sort of.

Now, you not only have to build apps on the internet, you also have use LLMs to build apps to remain competitive with other developers. Future (human) maintainers of your code might not properly understand how it works, and if the providers of the LLMs screw up or go rogue, you are properly fucked.

There is a dependency/technology stack debt that is creating risks that need to be acknowledged.

I find it to be very true after almost 30 years in the working world, and I always keep it in mind wherever I work.

https://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/iron.html

"Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people:

First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers, launch technicians, and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.

Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers' union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.

The Iron Law states that, in every case, the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules and control promotions within the organization."

But what does an anon-free internet even look like? Is it even possible? Or will all online content eventually be considered untrustable and worthless? You can see a world where newspapers (online or otherwise) make a comeback simply because of the need for a trusted gatekeeper (which is what I imagine made them valuable in the first place). It's wild to think about.

This is bad logic. A presidential pardon at least exposes the corruption, and exposing the corruption is more important than a prison sentence.

https://www.merkley.senate.gov/wp-content/uploads/End-Predic...

For the plebeians (like me), I think hand-coding skills will always be relevant and necessary.

Free software ultimately has time on its side. As long as a project has enough mindshare to keep its momentum, it really is unstoppable in the long run.