Posted by platevoltage 19 hours ago
Ask HN: I just talked to an AI-obsessed client, and I need a shower afterwards
I just had a talk with one of my first ongoing clients, who sort of helped me kickstart my freelancing "career". He is one of those people who has a broad understanding of the tech out there, and what its capabilities are, but is not a programmer. He wanted to show me, and get my opinion on a restaurant management app that he's been using Lovable to develop. Admittedly, a lot of it is very impressive, and he has obviously become very good at using these tools. Part of that scares me, but I've largely accepted the reality that my skillset has to expand beyond being a React code monkey (wish is not what I am, but you get the point). I've always been a curious generalist, so picking up new stuff comes easily, and I'll manage.
Anyways, here's the part that feels really gross. He's working on a feature that does some automated marketing using Higgsfield, so automated slop posting. Also a feature that consumes reviews from vendors, and he intends to use agents to post reviews as well.
I'm 43, I managed to convince my parents to get AOL when I was 12. I made a Geocities site at 14. I've been obsessed with computers and the internet for my entire life. I'm also an artist who had a somewhat successful run as a touring musician, much to the detriment of my career growth (not much money in Punk).
I feel the hobbies that I've been nurturing for my entire life are being destroyed by people who have finally found an entry point that requires the smallest amount of effort. We are literally watching the dead internet happen in real time, social media turning into a AI slop gallery, AI music topping the charts, and I just had a one-on-one conversation with someone that just doesn't care, because they get to feel creative for possibly the first time ever.
How are you all dealing with this?
When you are starting out, you will tend not to get the best clients.
It’s ok to outgrow a client.
It's been amazing to participate in a hobby-turned-profession for the last two decades or so. But did we get into it because it was easy? No. Technology, computers, Internet, was a new world, full of excitement, mystery, and exploration. There may have been no immediate ROI in learning how to set up a Geocities site, but it was the gateway to HTML, programming, and eventually led to, what I hope has been, a rewarding career.
The industry isn't being "destroyed" by AI, that started happening with PE and MBAs long before, or maybe it was fucked from the get-go, and we've been very lucky to have had well-paying jobs for typing strange things into a computer. But now that it's easy for the non-tech commoner to do it, we're upset? Fishy NIMBYism something something.
I went through a similar disillusionment phase for a few months as I tried to apply my old thinking to this new era. I had to just let the AI agents own the line-level, function-level, and even class-level responsibilities, while I focused on the file names and writing good prompts. Naming is everything in computer science, as they say.
On personal projects, I'm executing on things that were out of reach before (or required extensive research), like (re)learning hardware, writing RTOS firmware, PCB design, etc. It's my learning PHP3/VB phase, and I love it. What matters now, more than ever, is to have good taste.
Give it time for the mindset shift to happen. Take a break, if you can. You won't miss anything anyway, a few new models, harnesses, and workflows will have appeared, and they take about 5 minutes to understand. So the differentiating factors between you and the next pleb are your fundamentals, good taste, and creativity.
Be like water, etc.
My rant wasn't really about the industry being destroyed. I really don't care about the industry, I care about the craft. I care that we are watching the dead internet happen in real time, and that it's being accelerated by LLMs. I live a scrappy lifestyle and can figure out ways to earn money if I can't do this anymore, I just don't like seeing the death of creativity.
Each advance in technology lowers the threshold of entry into any hobby or profession. And the people who "paid the price" or "did it the hard way" resent people who find a way to crowd in without all the suffering and sacrifice. It's a very valid feeling. It won't stop innovation, however. We're just stuck in the middle of the transition phase and it's going to be a bumpy ride.
sound vaugely familiar?
> they get to feel creative for possibly the first time ever.
They're experiencing what you experienced at 14. And, no offense, your Geocities site that you made at 14 was probably not very good.
Now, there is still a difference, because people had to deliberately go to your site, and what this guy is doing is more like polluting a commons. That is a problem. AI makes it much more of a problem, because it becomes much easier to spew lies (or just slop).
I think what's going to happen is that we're going to develop better slop senses (eventually). There will be a return of gatekeepers, because keeping slop and lies out will be more valuable than letting new things in.
Disagree. Not about the site being not very good part, that much was obvious. What I disagree about is that they're experiencing what I did. I think the equivalent would be someone who's never programmed anything, making it through their first 3 weeks of coding bootcamp and seeing something they made appearing in their web browser for the first time.
That's what's scary isn't it?
There are people with more good taste and creativity than you.They actually built careers with it.
And that's who you need to catch up to now.
Or you can dig I guess and be an artisinal programmer. There's honour in that ,I hear. Just no paycheck.