Value extraction

I'm tired, boss.

It seems like everybody, everywhere you look, is directly doom-peddling about artificial intelligence, or sharing somebody else's doom-peddling about artificial intelligence.

Everybody is telling you that software engineering is going to be gone in the next 12 months.

Everybody is saying that mass job loss is coming any day now.

Or at least, it seems so, right? —

But who are these doom-peddlers, actually?

Anybody peddling these things is trying to extract value from you. If you look close enough, they gain from you thinking that artificial intelligence is going to somehow ruin you — unless you buy.

These peddlers, 9 times out of 10, run companies that sell artificial intelligence, and they want you to buy what they're selling. And unfortunately, fear is a great motivator to buy.

"Software engineering is obsolete! Boost your team's productivity today with 12 autonomous agents that can commit 1,800 times a day without your supervision — no need to read the code! Subscribe now!"

Sounds familiar, right?

"SaaS is dead! Write your own Salesforce in a day! Subscribe now!"

Totally realistic.

"Code is now for the machines! Subscribe today and let our proprietary agents plan, write, and review everything — so you can relax!"

As much as they peddle its demise, software engineering is still a skill.

As much as they peddle it, SaaS is not dead.

As much as they peddle it, craft is not going away.

It's easy to become worried, seeing people say this everywhere, day in and day out. But realize how much money is flowing through the space right now. And realize these peddlers are performing value extraction 101 — create urgency, instill fear, offer a solution.

This whole thing reminds me of crypto a few years ago. Everywhere, day in and day out, you heard that the world's monetary system was going to collapse and that you should buy $SHITCOIN as a hedge against disaster (or to get rich). Same peddlers, different topic.

These peddlers gain from being as hyperbolic as possible. They're capitalizing on the Gold Rush of the New Age. They don't care about creating value. They want to extract value while they can.

These peddlers aren't prophets, they're salesmen.

If there was ever a time for the programmer's fabled 'bullshit detector' to start going off, it's now. The hyperbole has become hyperbolic.

I'm not saying artificial intelligence isn't amazing — it absolutely is. But it's not going to destroy everything yet, and you don't need to buy a chatbot to hedge against your impending doom.

Extract less, create more. And nix the hyperbole.