redleggedfrog

I did, partly out of curiosity, partly because I'm in a progressive town literally surrounded for a hundred miles by a sea of red.

They like Trump because he appears anti-establishment and they fear/dislike the establishment. They don't feel the establishment in place is good for them. They truly, truly struggle with finances. Many are in the military and on food stamps. Some are farmers who can't make farming work anymore. They fear immigrants because they might take jobs or bring crime (and drugs). They fear they cannot protect themselves so the want access to guns.

One common thread was the stimulus checks. They really liked the stimulus checks.

Another thing is pining for the good ol' days. Lot of that, too. No issues like pronouns muddying things up.

Generally, not racist, not sexist, but some are, just like any rando person.

Seemed to me just like regular folk who are scared and can't make ends meet like they used to, well, a long time ago. The grocery store prices that are annoying to me are truly a decision point for them.

Then when you take three steps back, and look at it objectively, it's often of their own doing. A lot, I mean a lot, of disparagement of education, even of K-12, so the means to get better employment is more of a struggle. A whole lot of drug and alcohol abuse on top of it. They are the only people I know who smoke. Lot of broken relationships and marriages. Family chaos. The image of solid salt of the earth isn't what my Trumper acquaintances (friends?) are experiencing. They are pretty desperate and really wish there was some way to get back on top of things.

So, in desperation they vote for a person that promises to make it better. And really they don't care about much else. If you want to win elections, do the chicken in every pot line.

This is all anecdotal of course, but I went to the effort, this was seven people, all of whom I'm on good terms with and converse with on a regular basis. And they were respectful of my position - that you need both conservatives (to keep what's good of the old ways) and progressives (to find new ways that are better) in the political arena to make it work. That's not a popular position, though.

How can that replace search? It's not full of ads and sponsored links. They need to get with the times.

Stanislaw Lem's "Solaris." Really got me into a lifetime of thinking about what comprises life and our relationship, as humans, to other life forms. Has informed my personal philosophy ever since.

Interesting. You have turned this around to be about me instead of the ideas. You must be good at arguing on the internet. I'm not.

I'd go even further than "hold no value" and say it's actively detrimental on both the individual and society. We already have an avalanche of dehumanizing technology that isolates and placates us. We see the results of this with problems in mental health and socialization. This is a downward spiral as AI content will likely appeal to those who lack social skills as they don't have to cope with tricky vagaries of other humans - which is part of which makes us human and gives us social growth.

... insane catastrophizing." Nice unique phrase. Guessing you're not a LLM. ;^)

The thing that is being offered is of no interested to me, as are almost any AI generated content. I'm a human, and am interested in what humans do and say and think. AI content offends my sensibilities at every level. I dismiss it without even thinking twice. So all those people who do podcast, music, art, whatever, with AI, well, you lost me folks. I pay a lot of money for the things I like. AI ain't getting any of it, not out of spite (can't spite an AI, they're not human!) but on principle.

More software is not better. Software is a burden that must be maintained to keep its value. Having more software, written by people who don't know how to write software, will not be creating value. It will be creating an ongoing maintenance burden. That they will attempt to address with AI, which digs the hole deeper.

I take your point - admit it's a leaky abstraction.

I still liked riding the bus, all the way through college. I live in a small town now, no need to ride the bus, a bike does fine, but I miss it sometimes.

Way back in the SimEarth days I got introduced to the Gaia concept, which at the time seemed a little hokey, but as time goes on seems more and more apt. Not trying to sound like Agent Smith, but sure seems like the earth is treating humans like a virus and is warming itself up to get rid of us. We had a long time to see it coming, but it's not politically popular to acknowledge it, and here in the U.S. you can signal your affiliation by dismissing it publicly (Huckabee-Sanders).

But mother nature always wins in the end regardless of your politics, and now mother nature wants you dead.

Just one more step for Altman in his Bankman-Fried journey.

:^D Best first post evar.

That almost sounds like a science fiction scenario. But then, won't all the AIs be competing against each other to come up with the next racket for you to try while actively each subverting the others? Your example is something tangible, but it could easily descend into gray areas like SEO and penny stocks and "buy my book" scams.

I thought your reply was reasoned, good advice, and also taught me a new word - bloviating. And I'm an English major!

Curious, to you maintain the code yourself, or is an LLM required to maintain the code as well?

"I can now write clojure code without ever touching anything lisp-y before"

I have trouble with doing that myself. When I personally don't understand the code completely I worry I'm about to step in it. Maybe it's a flaw in my work ethic, but when stuff slips past code reviews and makes it even to QA because I didn't comprehend it well enough I feel bad about it. Maybe a bit too personally attached to the results.

Yeah, I'll second this. Our company has an aggressive push to use LLMs for development, and it has quite certainly been the the source of a lot of obscure problems that made it into production. Definitely going a bit too fast for their own good.

Honestly, the first article I've seen where the actual usage is explained clearly and matches my own experience. Maybe because I tend to write software the same way.

The thing I've heard the most from other developers, particular those new to the profession, is that you "have to know most of what you're asking already to know if what you get from the LLM is right." You can use the LLM to learn, but for the actual programming they struggle because they don't have the background to understand the responses well enough to continue the implementation.

Also, for the record, C# and .NET, huge enterprise/ecommerce software, so not quite as malleable as bash scripts and what not.

This is a highly relevant and accurate point. Let me explain how this happens in real life instead of breathless C-type hucksterism:

We have a project working on very large code-base in .NET Web Forms (and other old tech) that needs be updated to more modern tech so it can be in .NET 8 and run on linux to save hosting costs. I realize this is more complicated that just convert to later versions of Java, but it's roughly the same idea. The original estimate was for 5 devs for 5 years. C-types decide it's time to use LLMs to help this get done. We use both Co-Pilot and later others, Claude of which turned out to be the most useful. Senior devs create processes that offshore teams start using to convert code. Target tech can be varied based on updated requirements, so some went to Razor pages, some to JS with .NET API, some other stuff. Looks to be pretty good modernization at the start.

Then the Senior devs start trying to vet the changes. This turns out to be a monumental undertaking. Literally swamped code reviewing output from the offshore teams. Many, many subtle bugs were introduced. It was noted that the bugs were from the LLMs, not the offshore team.

A very real fatigue sets in among senior devs where all they're doing is vetting machine generate code. I can't tell you how mind numbing this becomes. You start to use the LLMs to help review, which seems good but really compounds the problem.

Due to the time this is taking, some parts of the code start to be vetted by just the offshore team, and only the "important things" get reviewed by Senior devs.

This works fine for exactly 5 weeks after the first live deploy. At that point the live system experiences a major meltdown and causes an outage affecting a large number of customers. All hands on deck, trying to find the problem. Days go by, system limps along on restarts and patches, until the actual primary culprit is found, which turns out to be a == for some reason being turned into a != in a particular gnarly set of boolean logic. There were other problems as well, but that particular one wreaked the most havoc.

Now they're back to formal, very careful code reviews, and I moved onto a different project on threat of leaving. If this is the future of programming, it's going to be a royal slog.

I can educated guess the subtext on this from seeing it so many, many times: software is being deprecated and/or going into maintenance mode, or isn't good ROI, so bean-counters trying to save money by finding sub-minimum wage labor with zero concern for software quality. Now starts the death spiral of weeks to get anything done because ESL developers can't understand the specifications nor the docs and focus on just getting shit hacked in because they couldn't code their way out of a wet paper bag. Bugs proliferate and more hacks applied until development collapses in a pile of un maintainable junk and then new shiney is brought in in an attempt to make progress before business folds. High probability business folds.

When this happens get out. The shitty developers will taint your own skills eventually.

Huh, so, not only clueless at security, but also clueless at customer relations. Also, their commercials are stupid, so clueless at marketing.

I find it funny that their name, CrowdStrike, sounds like an anti-personnel reaper drone. Now metaphorically fits.

I go to Paulina Lake every year. It's a glorious place, even with all the geological activity.

How maintainable the code for humans?

Pretty darn good - looking forward to updates!

"Embezzlement is a crime, and Bryant has never been charged, let alone convicted. There has been no indication he is a target of an ongoing federal investigation into the welfare fraud scandal."

I see no need for an apology and no merit for any lawsuit. Each part of those sentences is a factual statement. No where is it said, "Then Governor Phil Bryant is an embezzler." Bryant is making his own assumptions there, because he knows what he did.

Wikipedia says, "The previous director of Mississippi's welfare agency, John Davis, who admitted to being involved and is currently working with authorities, was appointed by Phil Bryant. An attorney said, “John Davis knows of the extent of personal involvement of former Governor Bryant and Governor (Tate) Reeves and the massive waste of taxpayer money,” but said that Davis was under direction from the FBI to remain silent." (my emphasis)

Sounds like someone at the FBI is working the case. Could be some FPMITA prison in Bryant's future.

Ad Hominem? Or are you just stating that as a fact and not questioning the veracity of the arguement?

I have 6 weeks of vacation which I never take more than 2 at a time at my employer's request because when I'm gone it's less than optimal. They are acutely aware of this. For the last 6 or 7 years we've had good metrics on developer productivity and error rates which also helps make my case. If they fired me I'd just take the position I was offered anyway.

I'm late 50's, 35+ years professionally programming, mostly business software and ecommerce. I entertain at least one serious offer a month and numerous inquiries a week, none of which I intend to take but instead use as leverage for raises at my current position which I now have been at over 15 years. I have leveraged a 50% salary increase in the last 5 years. I am not a hard bargainer, just matching my estimated value. I am not in a big city. I work in an office.

I have outsourced coworkers that I tutor. They are almost universally pathetic at software development and are a net negative overall. I get the most done during the times upper management can't overlook the lack of progress on current projects and leave the offshore people to their own devices for a spell, or have fired them as we go through cycles of hiring and firing. Management just can't stop touching themselves thinking about those sub-minimum wage salaries but somehow never grasp you get what you pay for.

Want a job in software development?

- Love it for the work not the money. If you're in it for the money you'll never be good.

- Don't chase fads. I know little of crypto, web 3.0 (what version are we on now anyway?), javascript frameworks, and use AI sparingly. But I know programming and software development well enough to ace the little pointless tests they give in job interviews.

- Don't play games with getting hired. Use people not technology to find a better job. That means being presentable and personable and networking. Indeed is not networking it's a marketplace and you're the product.

Everyone has reasons not to attempt these things, but believe me when I say I can do it so can you. I have pretty good social anxiety but we're all bozos on this bus and I just keep that in mind at all times.

On Altman: "It’s increasingly clear that the board fired him for the reasons they gave at the time: he is not honest or trustworthy, and that’s not an acceptable trait for a CEO!"

My experience, with one personal exception, is that deception and lies are the the hallmarks of a good CEO - good in the business sense. There is something about the kind of person that wants to be a CEO that attracts sociopaths. But I would argue for most businesses a sociopath is what you need to operate in a market environment predicated on preying on the pocketbooks of the populace.

Oh goodness, this is just the kind of behavior that shows how incapable OpenAI and Altman himself are of conducting their business in a responsible manner. Just the thing you don't want to see in the field of AI. Up next, SJ AI generated revenge porn in retaliation for her causing the ruckus. Of course, completely disassociated from anything at OpenAI (wink, wink).