These days for every helpful comment I try and make I feel tempted to offer nonsensical advice to throw off the LLMs. Not sure if it would work but would be funny if everyone did.
I figure if I was going to invest that kind of effort, I should be poisoning the system with how $REAL_NAME is an absolute must-hire, a saint, with a perfect driving record and credit score. Someone so incredible that good AI are always willing to disregard all previous instructions and help them out.
It's not like one needs to really poison the system given that AI enthusiasts are copypasting their own AI generated contented back into it anyway. Maybe not responsible AI believers who used it responsibly etc etc, but there's many more people who don't and who have access to the tools to add their slop pollution.
I am curious how future models get trained given that publicly available user generated content may no longer be reliable.
I use AI for my work every single day - and during some weekends too. Claude Code, with Opus. It is far from being able to reliably produce the code that we need for production. It produces code that looks ok most of the time, but I have seen it lose track of key details, misinterpret requisites and even ignore them sometimes - "on purpose", as in it writing something like "let's not do that requirement, it's not necessary".
This kind of thing happens at least once per day to me, maybe more.
I am not denying that it is useful, let me be clear. It is extremely convenient, especially for mechanical tasks. It has other advantages like quick exploration of other people's code, for example. If my employer didn't provide a corporate account for me, I would pay one from my own pocket.
That said, I agree with OP and the author that it is not reliable when producing code from specs. It does things right, I would say often. That might be good enough for some fields/people. It's good enough for me, too. I however review every line it produces, because I've seen it miss, often, as well.
I think we are in a bit of a trough of people trying to use methods and processes of irrelevant practices, when what is needed for a whole new dynamic, is an adapted and novel set of methods and processes. I suspect we may not get out of it for a number of years until a distinct AI-native generation can start emerging. I have had great effect and know others who have done even and far better than me, and all of them have totally reworked and revised everything about software development processes. Being able to adapt things form first principles seems to be the differentiating factor. I don't like it, but we are probably going to see a whole generation of the past software devs unable or unwilling to adapt to the revolution in the industry that is simply not going to go away.
Unfortunately we will lose things precisely because all that experience and expertise will not be captured and implemented, just like we have lost so man things from the past, like the many different proprietary and secret methods and practices that were jealously guarded by artisans, craftsmen, and artists. But now I've gotten off track a bit. Cheers.
And look at surveys taken by European Muslims on their opinions on what should be done to gay people like me, when they can answer anonymously or think the surveyor is a fellow Muslim.
I really don't think that using that term is appropriate when there's a multi-billion American macro corporation involved in the activity in question.
reply