I’m beginning to feel like the people who love vibe coding resent software engineers, the people who love making music with AI resent musicians, the people who love AI art resent artists. It’s more than not understanding what good is. It’s active pushback.
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@ben I think that people who hate AI are DEEPLY insecure and have based their entire personality on being better than other people at some skill that AI makes superfluous and that makes their ego feel ATTACKED
@ben Agreed. They're jealous they don't have the skills, so they play pretend with AI.
@ben let’s be fair though some software engineers are total dicks. I have had to work with people that were gatekeeping just out of sexism or arrogance. If people had that kind of experience I totally get how they want to have fun with stuff themselves while feeling they can finally create something.
@ben Like how some people are convinced all building contractors or garagists are out to scam them. As if people mastering a skill they don't themselves possess was an intolerable weakness.
@ben to give you a data point, I have been vibe coding a personal project lately, and I very much love code and being a software engineer. Also I'm a damn good one. I think things are much less binary than that.
@ben : and that's the GENEROUS understanding of it, imho.
@ben
Alternate theory: people just like fucking about with toys sometimes.
Other people have internal motives that don’t relate to you at all.
Alternate theory: people just like fucking about with toys sometimes.
Other people have internal motives that don’t relate to you at all.
This take is very ye olde highbrow/lowbrow split, as you’re essentially insisting that those who enjoy lowbrow culture must be incapable of appreciating highbrow culture, and resent their betters (lol, you?) who can.
You’re recycling an old false dichotomy, which has always been elitist garbage with eugenicist undertones.
@ben I feel at the base of this, is a vibe of spoiled entitlement.
The folks who envied those with creativity, but didn't bother to be interested enough to see the work put in.
The quick fix, rather than the frustration and joy of creativity. It's passivity, but wanting the adulation and rewards for passion.
Sheer spoiled entitled mediocrity with no space for the rest of us to find our own sparks of creativity as they choke our public spaces and steal our physical resources and our work.
@ben Oh, absolutely. A lot of AI boosting is about using it as a cudgel against people and/or activities the boosters are resentful of - out envy, lack of understanding, or just malice. It's a magic wand for "What if I was the only person in the world with agency?", which is an angry child's idea of living.
@ben if you can't do it, fuck you.
@ben I had a career in copywriting for a while, and a large part of it consisted in fighting off bean counters who thought "anyone can write." I suspect other creative endeavors are going this route with AI.
@ben I think it’s less resentment of the people than it is resentment of having to hire and pay people for their labor. It’s wanting all the spoils without having to be kind or generous to other people. Is it surprising that certain executives feel this way?
@ben Can't speak to coding but there is a strong element of "fuck you I'm just gonna take this from you" to generative AI for art and music.
@ben Vibe coders (context engineers?) are just the new script kids? Doing something on their own that they needed a skilled pro to do before? Using a spreadsheet for basic budget for free vs paying an accountant to do a much better, smarter, safer, maintainable version. When everyone can reach low hanging fruit, experts must find the unpicked parts or sell tools to extend the common reach. #vibecoding #ai #economics
@ben Those who can't do, steal ✨
@ben same reason republicans want to pretend they can do and know and control everything, they resent people who can govern. This is a general society problem right now… how have we so thoroughly taught people to be narcissists?
@ben There's a continuum here from the anti-intellectualism of (mostly right-wing) populism, the entitlement of "my internet-driven opinion matches your higher education", all the way to the sexism and racism of Xtian nationalist white supremacy.
People who have failed to achieve what the mythology of entitlement tells them they SHOULD have, are primed not for looking outward with confident curiousity about how to improve, but with anger and resentment at some who have what they don't.
@ben I hear you on this. But I also think, based on seeing A LOT of code in corp America, the majority of ‘software engineers’ in that category produce code worse than the bilge AI spews out, and often can’t even tell me what it is they’re building.
The ‘craft’ of coding software is indeed quite rare.
@ben While I'm still very unconvinced about the virtues of vibe coding, I have to acknowledge the testimony of several seasoned engineers who show no evidence of resenting the profession in general. So, dubious of the resentment premise.
@timbray Yeah, I think that’s an important nuance. There are people using it to speed themselves up, and there are people using it to avoid hiring people with the skills. I’m really talking about the latter.
@ben @timbray One of the things I noticed in recent years in large organizations and even in start-ups is the lack of understanding of coding / engineer maturity matrix. >10 years ago nearly everybody knew it. I’ve walked a few through this basic understanding as it was not only foreign, but also part of the problems they had.
The maturity: Scripter -> Coder -> Developer -> Engineer -> Systems Engineer -> System Designer
The system designer can come in from other disciplines as well.
@ben @timbray There’s also people using it to avoid ever developing the skills in the first place, which I think are the resentful vibe coders you’re referring to.
I’ve really resisted using it for coding until recently, but I’m starting to figure out some processes and I definitely think it can speed things up if you have the proper guardrails in place. Jury is still out… I like Kent Beck’s metaphor of it as a genie. Be careful what you wish for!
@ben "stupid competent people who've put in the hours to understand something and wield it competently, I'll show them: hand me that hand grenade and that chain saw..."
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