This is not a proper quarterly review. It’s a month late and quite honestly, I did not want to write it. But who cares? I wrote something. This is about the impact of AI on my work and my perception of it.

How AI has impacted my work and my perception of it

The first time I took a bullet train was probably on a TGV. I was expecting some kind of wild ride but to my surprise, it felt calm and stable. By then I had flown quite a few times, but you can’t really use birds to compare your speed at that height. Looking outside the window, cars on the highway seemed slow in comparison to our 300 Km/h. I asked myself: Why would anyone drive a car instead of riding on a freaking bullet train?

Until now, I always kept AI usage in check. But only in the past months I started feeling like I’m moving at 300 Km/h. I was reluctant. In my mind, I had to write the code to earn the merit of building a successful product.

To be fair, my obsession for enforcing a certain code organization and coming up with an elegant architecture built the basis for what I have right now. It is coherent, it feels mine. But sometimes, less and less so.

Now I prompt, it builds. I point the LLM in the right direction and articulate requirements, it builds.

I know what you are going to say next. MORE SLOP. I assure you it’s not. It writes so coherently that sometimes I can’t really identify if it was coded by my hands or by AI. Especially with the latest frontier models, I often get caught saying: This is exactly how I would have done it. But wait.. didn’t I do it? Isn’t AI just a tool and am I not the one in control?

I’m the kind of person that immediately forgets details once they are not needed anymore. I used to look at some of my past projects and be all proud. Dude, this came out great. That proud self pat on the back in my own thoughts. Will I be able to do the same with this and other projects?

I often read discussions and comments on sites like Reddit and Hacker news. But I’m a lurker. I sometimes discuss with people in my mind without writing a reply. I often find that either I don’t have much to contribute to discussions, or that I might be wrong. If I’m right, someone else already said it. And I dislike repeating myself and others.

Many comments on the subject of AI reflect exactly this very same feeling: We are insecure that AI will take away from us the merit of our creations. Many of us have been building stuff for so long that we feel we have earned the merit of being good at it.

Now AI is a threat. How come anybody can build shit now? Do you know how many freaking nights I have spent coding so these motherfuckers would come and steal it from me when training their models? I hear you.

And I still love it. Oh am I glad I don’t have to obsess anymore over code blocks using the same nomenclature, sequence or following a certain convention because I was too tired to notice it while writing it. Or copying and pasting stuff around and modifying just to make sure it comes out coherently. Or coming up with boring code that I can write as easily but still takes away my mental energy.

But what about the jobs? People are losing their jobs! Are they really losing it because of AI? I don’t mean to be unsympathetic to someone that lost their job. But I never believed in the premise of just having a job. Wherever I worked, I always ended up claiming responsibility. And that’s what distinguises us from AI. AI cannot be responsible. It only reflects our actions. Yes, it can automate work and make it cheaper. But maybe it will also push or even free us to take the next step.

AI is doing what it’s supposed to do. But only because I’m the one responsible. I built the basis. I said no. I pushed back. I told it to do it another way. I was the one that edited the code when I felt AI couldn’t do it. I pressed the button and bled out of my nose.

But man, now anyone can build stuff! Look at how many are vibecoding their way up! Don’t you think it’s unfair? I say: GREAT! We need more. And maybe the variety will make us all build up our collective taste and realize that simply being able to build does not make it good. That craft and skill are still correlated.

Now I find myself polishing a lot more because it requires less energy on my part. I can finally do everything I would like to do if I had the energy to do it. But don’t get me wrong. I still get literally wasted by the end of the day. It’s like a bus ran me over. But I freaking love it.

I love creating and building things, but I have been choosing to delegate more and more.

I love coding, but now I choose to code what I think it’s worth coding.

If you love driving, that should be the reason you freaking drive the car.

ZERO AI WAS USED TO WRITE THIS FREAKING POST.

Disclosure: After publishing it I fixed typos and decided to change the wording of the paragraph about jobs.