I’m a software engineer for Microsoft. Which is a job I DID honestly enjoy quite a lot until whatever the hell’s been going on lately.
Like imagine you’re an architect and you get pulled in to help build a house. And it’s a pretty well-engineered house! You can recognize and appreciate this and contribute the same standard of quality.
Until the guy who controls all the money shows up one day and says houses are NO good anymore. People want a BOX for the AI to live in. And actually start tearing down walls and ripping out the electrical and plumbing because the AI doesn’t work with all that. Just make it a BOX for the AI.
So you do what they say and rip out things you’re proud of and smash holes to drag all the AI through. But the AI is constantly changing and no one knows who you should ask to understand the shape the house needs to be to fit the AI. And the people who do know are probably too busy getting their necks breathed down by members of leadership who are paid millions a year to tell you to just do whatever ChatGPT does. So your team gets dicked around with unclear instructions given with absolute urgency. Also every 6 months they lay off 3% of the company so you walk in one day and Bob who’s worked here for 25 years is just gone.
Also the AI is supposed to get good enough at building houses to replace your job. Maybe. It doesn’t actually do that but the guy who controls all the money is hinging all that money on convincing other people that’s true.
I miss house.
