Building in the age of AI

I don't know where to begin. Early on in the AI age, I was so excited by the possibilities. I wrote about My vision for a better future where I imagined a utopia, and, well, I don't know if I believe we the people will benefit from AI for much longer.

I started building software at the age of 12. I loved it so much, the power to have an idea, a vision in my mind, and make it into something I could touch, feel, and that would improve my life that little bit. It was hard work. I had coding sessions until 5, 6, 7AM sometimes. I would stay up with the power of caffeine that my mom would make for me, I'd go out for some junky snacks early in the morning with my grandfather after a night of coding. I'd sometimes get stuck on problems, and it'd take me days, weeks, at times months to find a good solution. Talking to other people helped. I spent a lot of time on IRC, where people would help you live, and you'd feel this sense of gratefulness and this desire to give back.

When I made something, I would often go and show my parents, because I spent time, mental effort, and I likely solved many problems along the way and learned new things, and at the end, I had a thing I could show other people. They often did not know what it took, but people knew I was skilled and I had a capability that was valuable. Wanting to make software meant learning to code, and learning to code was not easy. It was frustrating, puzzling, at times infuriating. Sometimes I'd get an urge to chuck my laptop out the window. But then, one day, it just "clicked". I could think in code, I could imagine how a specific kind of software, at a specific kind of scale, would be architected.

I spent the last 5 years building a browser extension that interfaced with millions of websites. It involved solving engineering challenges that had me tearing my hair out, and when I figured out certain challenges, I was literally jumping up and down. "I GOT IT, I FKING GOT IT!!!!"

Reminiscing like this fills me with nostalgia for a simpler time, a time that now feels like magic and memories.

Building software used to be special. It used to be fulfilling, it used to involve "an honest days work". It exercised my brain even when it kept me from exercising my body.

Now? I don't know.

Building software in the age of AI, in November of 2026, is nothing special. You will likely not even write a single line of code. You might not even LOOK at a single line of code. "Vibe coding". I don't know if I wanna laugh, or cry.

It feels like something special has been stolen from me. From us.

Yes, more people than ever can make software now, and, you know, I think that's alright. I love that more people can solve their own problems, improve their life, or save money by building apps that work how they need them to work, without hefty SaaS fees being paid monthly.

The software industry did kinda go overboard with SaaS.

But having a dozen parallel coding agents, delegating even code reviews to AI "agents", building in hours what would otherwise take days, makes me wonder, do my fellow software engineers enjoy work like they used to? Does it fulfil them in the same way? Does it scratch that itch in just the right way? Or are we ending up with mental atrophy, with molasses forming in between our thoughts, laziness becoming endemic?

I still build software, and I use AI to do it for me. Recently, I got a 3d printer and some circuit boards, because making things I can literally touch and feel is more fulfilling, it brings me much more joy, that software no longer does.

I don't know if I have a point I'm trying to make here, or any tidy conclusions. Any nice rows to wrap up my confused thoughts with.

It's been a lot to adapt to, and it keeps evolving day by day. Day by day, more and more of our work gets taken over by AI, at higher and higher levels of abstraction and complexity. When this all ends, will there be anyone left who could still write a line of code by hand? Maybe I ought to start coding on pen and paper.

Our industry is in turmoil, software engineers being the first ones displaced by AI.

While we march blindly towards this future we're told is "inevitable", I want to stand up, put my foot down, and say: "WAIT! LET'S THINK THIS THROUGH." Maybe things aren't as "inevitable" as AI elites tell us. Maybe our own labour, our own sweat and tears and joy and sorrow, maybe our late nights, lifetimes of work, our eureka moments and half baked ideas, maybe using them to replace us is not ok. I know I didn't spend all those long nights to feed this machine that takes my joy out of what I once held dear. Did you?