Software engineers need to grow up, at the turn of the century when software was starting to remake the world, they developed an enormous conceit and started believing that the world revolved around their work and they were going to shape it.
It doesn't. The world revolves around economics and politics, just like it always did. It took a decade or two for established institutions to catch up and re-assert control, but catch up they did. In the end that 10-20 years was so brief that in a few generations it'll be entirely forgotten.
Now during that time who knows? Maybe software engineers could have held their ground and used their leverage to influence the political and economic system and turn it into something better. Did they do this? 99% did not. Instead, they coveted cushy jobs at Big Tech where they gave up their freedom and their ability to disrupt anything in exchange for security, and resigned themselves to trying to sound smart in blog posts where they produce grandiose but ultimately sophomoric opinion articles about their industry. No one with actual power could care less about these articles as they follow the rules of power, not the rules of engineering. They own the IP. They decide what "owning IP" even means. Their economy of IP is essentially one of monopolies. That is why everything is basically shit. Read Zero to One and perhaps a few chapters out of Wealth of Nations. The full explanation of "why our software isn't 10x better" will be laid out for you in a weekend.
The software engineers gave up their agency for a salary. Hey, that's fine. That's what 99% of all engineers in human history did. They've gone to work for a government or a big corporation, and let the guys with power keep making the rules. You just did what other engineers did because you ultimately needed to pay bills, take care of your families, etc. You're no different. But software engineers, pretending you are is getting old.
The rebel path where you actually make your own shit is still there. You can start a company. Or a nonprofit. You can donate your time toward building, marketing, and lobbying the government for something better. Because god knows all three of these are needed in spades. Without evidence of that though, honestly I'm tired of software engineers proclaiming something new from Big Tech is going to change the world. It's not. Innovation alone will solve nothing. The guys in charge have put their feet down and you work for them now. A revolution will be required in a pretty literal sense of the term to change this. Using the latest Anthropic models harder isn't going to do shit.
I'm an engineer too. Let's grow up already. Let's either get serious about our conceit that tech can improve the world, or let's resign ourselves to being just like every other engineering profession in the world, getting paid well to obediently build what the investor class tells us to build. You can't have it both ways. Choose your destiny and accept it.
(Fyi - serial bootstrapped open source adjacent founder here, and I made my own decision 15 years ago, one way or another, I'm dying free.)