this post was submitted on 13 May 2025
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Big brain tech dude got yet another clueless take over at HackerNews etc? Here's the place to vent. Orange site, VC foolishness, all welcome.
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Something like MS word has like 20-50 million lines of code. MS altogether probably has like a billion lines of code. 30% of that being AI generated is infeasible given the timeframe. People just ate this shit up. AI grifting is so fucking easy.
More code is usually bad code.
I thought it could totally be true - that devs at MS were just churning out AI crap code like there was no tomorrow, and their leaders were cheering on their "productivity", since more code = more better, right?
From that angle, sure. I’m more sneering at the people who saw what they wanted to see, and the people that were saying “this is good, actually!!!”
yeah, the "some projects" bit is applicable, as is the "machine generated" phrasing
@gsuberland pointed out elsewhere on fedi just how much of the VS-/MS- ecosystem does an absolute fucking ton of code generation
(which is entirely fine, ofc. tons of things do that and it exists for a reason. but there's a canyon in the sand between A and B)
All compiled code is machine generated! BRB gonna clang and IPO, bye awful.systems! Have fun being poor
No joke, you probably could make tweaks to LLVM, call it "AI", and rake in the VC funds.
way too much effort
(not in the compute side, but in the lying-obstructionist hustle side)
would I happier if I abandoned my scruples? I hope I or nobody I know finds out.
For some definition of "happiness", yes. It's increasingly clear that the only way to get ahead is with some level of scam. In fact, I'm pretty sure Millennials will not be able to retire to a reasonable level of comfort without accepting some amount of unethical behavior to get there. Not necessarily Slipp'n Jimmy levels of scam, but just stuff like participating in a basic stock market investment with a tax advantaged account.
So, basically, there’s no ethical existence in our society? That’s starting to sound like soviet talk. Ronnie Reagan will be hearing about this.
Don't worry, everything is fine ^Seize^ ^the^ ^means^ ^of^ ^production^
30% of code is standard boilerplate: setters, getters, etc that my IDE builds for me without calling it AI. It's possible the claim is true, but it's terribly misleading at best.
I guess their brains don't lift
Man. If this LLM stuff sticks around, we’ll have an epidemic of early onset dementia.
If the stories lf covid related cognitive decline are aue we are going to have a great time. Worse than lead paint.
“Oh man, this brain fog I have sure makes it hard to think. Guess I’ll use my trusty LLM! ChatGPT says lead paint is tastier and better for your brain than COVID? Don’t mind if I do!”
I'm on a diet of rocks, glue on my pizza, lead paint, and covid infections, according to Grok this is called the Mr Burns method which should prevent diseases, as they all work together to block all bad impulses. Can't wait to try this new garlic oil I made, using LLM instructions. It even had these cool bubbles while fermenting, nature is great.
That garlic oil will taste great with wild mushrooms, don’t buy them though, just ask chatGPT to make a list of mushrooms you can forage for free
Ah the book that made me change my mind on book bannings.
I've been beating this drum for like 4~5y but: I don't think the tech itself is going anywhere. published, opensourced, etc etc - the bell can't be unrung, the horses have departed the stable
but
I do also argue that an extremely large amount of wind in the sails right now is because of the constellation of VC/hype//etc shit
can't put a hard number on this, but .... I kind see a very massive reduction; in scope, in competence, in relevance. so much of this shit (esp. the "but my opensource model is great!" flavour) is so fucking reliant on "oh yeah this other entity had a couple fuckpiles of cash with which to train", and once that (structurally) evaporates...