"AI" in Tech

I think it's fairly easy to guess how "AI" is going to affect the tech industry even after just a few months of people actually using it to try to do things.

There are basically two categories of tech work: stuff that's already been done and stuff that hasn't been done (much) if at all. The stuff that's already been done is obviously "easy to do", because there's a template for it that exists already. In my experience the tech industry became saturated with available "off the shelf" tools by around 2010, so by now 85% or more of tech work is just "systems integration".

The stuff that hasn't been done before, either by anyone, or by a company, or an individual developer is generally more difficult, but the work tends to be more focused and outcome oriented and I think necessarily better, meaning less buggy and janky.

"AI" does the stuff that's already been done. It can spit out endless reams of things that have already been done, like web GUIs.

"AI" fails horribly at niche, novel, or weird things; it will barf up code that's simply incorrect. An inexperienced person will take the code at face value and will have a hard time even trying to determine why it doesn't work.

The template-like code that's generated by AI will be even more janky than the "developer as integrator" code that tech has been churning out for more than a decade. The "novel" code it spits out just won't work at all.

Both these things are worse outcomes than just slogging along with the status quo methods of software development. To me it seems obvious the world will be better off with less tech/electro-mechanical stuff in general. It seems like the equivalent of tail fins on cars in the 1950s; it's kind of a weird fad and status symbol posturing. However, the tech industry is run by people who chase trends and who believe each other's bullshit.

Some managers in tech will grasp the limitations of "AI". Others will go pedal to the metal because they're lemmings. Their companies will go flying off a cliff and crash and burn hard.

I think all this is part of a bigger picture reshuffling of the economy as well. The totally financialized western economies are reaching their logical conclusion with the lifespan of the boomers who created these fucked up things.

Practicality, pragmatism, reliability and value are going to replace the era of bullshit and scams little by little. That's the next "big wave".