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- Hacker News
- "Aggressively Against LLM Usage" is the wrong way to think of it.
If my hobby is running, I would refuse to use a car to do my morning loop. Not because I have anything against automobiles, but because that's not my hobby.
Also, the issue linked to isn't really about LLMs. It's about someone being a dick in an online community and being called out for it. They just happen to be using LLMs to be a dick, but that's not the main issue.
by jmull - A long time ago, I had to take an ethics class to get my Computer Science degree. One of the things that came up in the papers about calculating the statistical value of a life was that people care more about being more prosperous than their peers than absolute material wealth.
I think about that a lot: its not about material wealth, but status, something that if someone has more of you have less of. A lot of people are invested in their status in various communities, and are afraid to lose it or have it become meaningless.
I don't know what to do about that; no matter how wealthy we all are people are still going to want status.
by ahalbert4 - Well yes. That's why you see many westerners complaining about the cost of living even though all things told they have a good life.
I would modify this slightly though. I think there's an expectation of things getting better, and expecting to do better than your parents. I think that's where many of the modern issues around living standards come from. They aren't getting better (quickly enough).
by benj111 - You can summarize this roughly by comparing art for its own sake versus art for a purpose. If I need software for a purpose, I don't care how it is crafted, only that it is crafted well. But if I care about the art of code done well, then obviously the means matter.
I find that a lot of "pro-AI" folks are very much doing software for the ends (myself included) and in the past, we were happy with the "means" primarily because there was no other way. The "anti-AI" folks are, as mentioned, mostly in the camp of caring about the means equally with the ends.
Lots of nuance here, but those buckets seem to generalize pretty well (so far) in my experience.
- I was somewhat conflicted seeing the way the OSdev community responds to LLM usage.
I understand the conflict: the point of doing OSdev is that you're learning the low level hardware details and directly commanding the machine from the lowest level accessible. LLM usage is at odds with this.
But, on the other hand, the primary issue with OSdev on modern hardware is the complete lack of documentation for most hardware. A lone developer simply does not have enough time to reverse engineer from Linux or BSD drivers to achieve much hardware support. Plus, often you run into hardware quirks that are incredibly painful to debug and offer no real learning opportunity.
Recently I revived a ~8 year old modular kernel project I had written. It was at the point of being able to setup an x86_64 CPU, load some drivers and enter usermode. Using an ESP8266 board I setup a little debugging harness for a AtomicPi devboard I had laying around, and set it all up so Claude could control and upload code to it. It could read the serial port, ping the board over ethernet and power cycle it. From that point I let it work almost autonomously to implement a USB stack, finish the network stack, implement drivers etc.
It worked well, and for the most part I didn't care about the results. I don't have the time to commit to such a big project now and of course, the satisfaction of doing something myself (besides building the harness) was gone.
But a thing that stood out to me was, when trying to implement the ethernet driver, the chip in question did not have documentation, but it was known to be similar to another well documented chip. Claude was able to spend a few hours just trying different things, rebooting the board as needed until the differences were sorted out and it was able to ping the board. I feel this kind of application would be pretty relevant for even hobbyist communities like OSdev.
We all have limited time, and while LLM usage for everything certainly defeats the point, targeted usage for tedium that has very little value overall, should be acceptable, and I can't help but think lesser of devs I otherwise respect, when they insist on being dogmatic even when it doesn't contribute to the hobby.
by hgoel - Isn’t that the point of a hobby? To enjoy the path and not the result? To learn something new.
I understand using LLMs as tools to help you with your hobby, but I think when “Claude spends hours debugging it” it probably is no longer a hobby, but an outsourced job.
by fnoef - > targeted usage for tedium that has very little value overall
The entire point of the article was the hobby is ascribing value to that tedium that the LLM is removing.
by acedTrex - I'll agree as a 90% typist dev. There is a certain class of problems I've sovled for a dozen times. And as often forgotten. Mostly parsing. Recently, I had a local qwen just build data (from html) because I wanted to concentrate on the code that ingests it. Win win. In the end, I thought the python it used a bit verbose so I might return to it to flex some awk muscles, but in the moment, I could focus on the code I wanted to write.by poetaster
- The entire AI-pilled side-software development has a single goal: shipping as fast and as much as possible. The problem is that it’s not better code or a better product—it's just more
I can understand why people who aren't interested in "shipping daily" and are more interested in figuring things out are kinda annoyed by all the LLM noise
by xakpc - Imagine, if you will, wanting a narrow application to assist you personally in some side hobby, that is data driven but would take weeks or months to set up. Now imagine it's done in hours (and not even purely focused hours) and does everything you need it to do in an instantly verifiable and rewarding way. Imagine doing this on the regular for all of your various use cases. And then imagine not trying to sell or market that tool, as you dont care about that, you only care about solving problems and empowering yourself.
The vast majority of developers are like this, and as such, are silent about it. They aren't making production applications. They're making bespoke solutions and iterating upon them over time.
Somehow purists think there's something wrong with the process of that. I say there's something wrong with them, perhaps on the spectrum of OCD. With a tinge of arrogance or narcissism thinking their applications are all of the purest order and construction, testaments to architectural beauty and edge case handling. With a tinge of fear and cope as so much of their identity is caught up in being a smart coder rather than a smart engineer.
If you are a software developer and don't see the value in and heavily utilize agentic tools, you are a poor engineer. Not every coder has the mindset of an engineer, but a coder should be able to recognize and understand a powerful tool when they see one instead of letting their emotions and irrationality take the wheel
by jatora - Well of course, if you enjoy writing software as a hobby then you value the experience of doing it, and you value the skill involved. You probably want a community of like minded individuals who all write code by hand, and where LLM use would be considered cheating.
That seems as natural as being against doping in sports or marking cards in poker.
None of this is anything against LLMs or AI assisted coding in general, even though the people involved probably have strong feelings about it given their preferences. It’s just the preferences of particular people and communities. Seems reasonable to me.
- Yeah, it's just how you see programming in your perspective.
It's like lifting weight. Obviously, machines lift weight much better than human for a long time. But people still trains for strength or aesthetics. Even if machine can lift much larger weight and more efficiently, some people still care about how strong they are.
A machine can lift much more weight obviously is not the excuse for them to stop training.
Programming is just the weight lifting for your brain/mind. Even if LLMs can solve all coding problems perfectly, there will be people who still want to program all by hands, for training their mind, or simply enjoying the process. And there will be people care about how good you are at solving a problem with programming.
LLMs being able to code does not mean you no longer need the ability to code.
Cars do not mean you no longer need the ability to walk.
by drcxd - Programming is nice because you have lots of different scales of structure to think about, and your program slowly comes together. You see it improving over time as a result of your efforts. You also build your skills and learn. It’s really a nice activity.
AI systems basically change that whole formula. I’m not sure how people get joy out of constantly vibe coding new projects. It feels like binge watching Netflix shows. I feel like there’s no material value in my 50th vibecoded demo since everyone in this world can vibecode now. Sure I’ve got my custom todo app which is nice, and my custom game plug-in with some neat features for the game I like, and a few other custom apps. Those are mildly useful to me. But every second I spend vibe coding something that’s supposed to be a success for others is just invaded by the thought that even if this thing is any good, someone with real capital can just direct a future AI at it to take it from me, so I’m not really gaining.
So I think I’ll just stick to using AI occasionally, without letting it ruin the programming activity I love by spoiling it. Due solely to AI, I don’t expect I’ll ever do anything in my life which will impact another person. That’s a personal tragedy, but in a sense I was going to die anyways and so will everyone else, so it doesn’t really matter.
by GPerson - > I’m not sure how people get joy out of constantly vibe coding new projects.
What? It's the simplest thing in the world. You get the product. Isn't that the point of all programming? You want a thing and you speak a magic incantation and then you have the thing, to keep and use.
> even if this thing is any good, someone with real capital can just direct a future AI at it to take it from me, so I’m not really gaining.
This kind of sounds like you're writing code for social credit. Like, you don't actually want the thing, you want to be "the person who made the thing". If you want the thing for its own sake, nobody can take it from you and what somebody with capital does on their own services does not harm your use one whit.
- Have you seen what most people do for jobs all day? They do repetitive brainless things, not always new and interesting work. For all of those people, doing this is at least something you do sitting down alone in an office and so they will be queueing to do this.by vasco
- > Programming is nice because you have lots of different scales of structure to think about, and your program slowly comes together.
Programming is nice cause of this for you. Other people have other preferences. When I got my first LED to blink, I wasn't thinking about the elegance of my code. Same for when moved sprites or made a async stateless compute system for MATLAB analysis. There are people who are driven by the artifacts they produce. That's just how our brains are wired I guess, outcome oriented. I see nothing wrong in that.
Btw, I feel like there is this view that all people using agents are the apocryphal "vibe coders". That is just not true. The process of creation remains the same. Break it down into smaller pieces. Work those pieces till a piece it done. Make sure it all comes together. People seriously using these agents are not writing "implement gta6. Make no mistakes".
- In the past I’ve experimented with many different programming paradigms. I think my AI coding benefits from that experience. I want to find new paradigms to write extensible, modular systems with AI, a problem that is still open. One thing I’ve learned is that when implementing a complex system, no paradigm eliminates the need to write lots code (covering many ugly edge-cases) tests, which previously required lots of boring, slow work, but AI is very good at that so maybe can make it less boring and faster.
- > I’m not sure how people get joy out of constantly vibe coding new projects. It feels like binge watching Netflix shows.
I get joy out of it because it solves actual problems I have that I don't have time to solve manually, or don't want to. E.g. I just recently had Codex add a mechanism for two-level virtual desktops because I wanted groups of them. An hour later I had two-level virtual desktops in my wm that worked exactly how I wanted it, with support for it in my desktop switcher. I could write it myself, but why would I? I love writing code for various projects, but sometimes I just want the outcome.
by vidarh - >I’m not sure how people get joy out of constantly vibe coding new projects. It feels like binge watching Netflix shows.
It's just power fantasy. It's amazing the first couple of times but as it wears off and becomes the new norm you forgot how being the one who decides which thing does what feels like.
Luckily (or unluckily?) the industry only cares about the end result, and flushes out people who used to reward for their passion and dedication naturally.
by Thanemate - What’s missing here is an understanding of the negative effect the rise of AI has had on programming communities overall: both the decrease in positive engagement as people have moved from discussing things and helping one another online to chatting with AI, and the increase in negative engagement. The amount of low-energy abandonware being “shared” into these communities makes it really hard to filter out the signal from the noise.
So at least in my experience, it’s not about gatekeeping as much as it’s about keeping the experience bearable for the existing hobbyist community.
by gbjcantab - > So at least in my experience, it’s not about gatekeeping as much as it’s about keeping the experience bearable for the existing hobbyist community.
Keeping the experience bearable BY gatekeeping. That is the point, gatekeeping is not inherently a bad thing. It's a required thing in many circles.
by acedTrex - It was like this with cryptocurrency to a lesser extent too. Suddenly lots of people pretending to have technical background and explaining what a Merkle tree is.by frollogaston
- To be fair, the decrease in discussion and helping one another online has also decreased some significant amount of negative engagement in the form of nonsensical arguments and frustrating ways of responding to questions (e.g. the biggest complaints with stackoverflow).by hgoel
- A hobby is something you enjoy the process of doing, not just the end result. Everybody likes a clean home, but cleaning is rarely a hobby. LLMs expedite achieving the end result. Take from that what you will.
- > LLMs expedite achieving the end result. Take from that what you will.
It's an age-old debate in every hobby.
Some people are in it for the process. Others are in it for the end result, which is what they want to use or play with.
In woodworking there are some circles who will sneer at you for using certain power tools instead of hand tools. I do think it's more impressive when someone makes something entirely with hand tools. I don't have all the time in the world to work on a project, so I'm going to use the power tools when I can.
Some people care a lot about impressing others with how they made a thing. Some times that's appropriate, like if there's a competition for hand-made or human-written something. Other times, nobody cares. They're getting together to enjoy the end result, not the artisanal process used to make it.
by Aurornis - My hobby is making things. I used to make them with a screwdriver and a hammer and a handsaw. Then I bought a drill and got some screwdriving bits, an a pneumatic hammer and an arm saw. Now I can build things much much faster.
Similarly I've made lots of software projects. Over the last 15+ years I have over 250 github repos, the majority of them no one but me will be interested in but I had fun making stuff. LLMs let me make stuff faster just like the power tools. I'm still enjoying making stuff. I still direct, I still decide what to make, I still decide features, iterate on UX, etc, but at several X the speed of before. Loving it.
by socalgal2 - I enjoy molding hyper specific software across my whole eco system of tech through prose with LLMs. Iterating over time to hone the right solutions based on very abstract reactions to the results I get. I would consider this a hobby because it costs me money and I get no value out of it outside of the act.
I also woodwork and I remember this discussion there between hand tools, power tools, and CNCs. It's all the same hobby just different entry points and doing it the least automated way doesn't make your work more or less than anyone else's.
by hectdev - I think for those of us who got into software initially for the end result -- being the only way for the thing in your head to ever exist -- enjoying the engineering part was a nice, incidental surprise.
So while LLMs solve the technical implementation side, there's still upside since now we get to materialize the dang thing we were setting out to build in the first place.
Though there's a huge sense of loss since so much of our skills and identity and time and value were devoted to the engineering side.
by hombre_fatal - This is not strictly true.
I enjoy optimizing code to the point of obsession, but I can't find economic (daily-job) justification to spend time on this. Lately I've had several extremely productive and enjoyable sessions that go like this: - I run Claude on my desktop PC, explain the problem, and let it explore the code around the problem and build a test harness so it can run experiments - I ask it to run experiments and try things; at that point I can leave my PC and continue over my phone in brief stolen moments here and there, over the course of many hours - it comes back with results; I ask it to try new things based on those results - after multiple rounds of this, I have explored a vast search space I could have never had time to do myself - I ask it for an implementation of the most promising path; this is usually something simpl-ish (on the order of 50-100 LOC, not huge new systems) - I return to the PC and do something between polish the implementation and redo it fully manually - partly because I enjoy it
This is something I can see myself do for fun in areas I care about, not for money and reasonable business objectives for my day job.
by unsigner - Yeah, in my experience, the people that got into software engineering because of the money are absolutely thrilled with how LLMs are changing the industry. They mostly just liked getting results and LLMs are great for that.
The people like me that sort of just stumbled into this career as a result of spending the evenings of our youth trying to get the computer to do interesting things don't seem to have as much appreciation now that the LLMs are taking over the fun part.
by ryandvm