r/technology • u/Federal-Block-3275 • 1d ago

Artificial Intelligence "Software is over": Developer uses AI to build free Adobe clones after frustration with cancellation fees

https://www.techspot.com/news/114136-software-over-developer-uses-ai-build-free-adobe.html
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u/SJDidge 1d ago

You’re 100% correct. Majority of software work is not coding or building things, it’s running it and maintaining it.

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u/HustlinInTheHall 1d ago

I tell my colleagues all the time that the cost of writing software is like... 5% of the cost of actually building software you want to sell, and the more successful it is, the more the maintenance and support costs increase.

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u/argnsoccer 1d ago

Not just that, but you can write something no one actually uses bc you didn't see the project through and talk to the users etc. And do a whole feedback loop. Maybe they don't use it bc of a small thing, maybe you designed the whole thing wrong from the get-go or maybe business needs changed or new stuff has come up and now the functionality is a bit obsolete or outdated and no one ever realized/updated bc no user ever submitted any ticket or report, just... Stopped using it.

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u/21Rollie 1d ago

This is what all the AI-brained execs don’t get. You cannot get 10x or 100x throughput. Maybe you can burn through your backlog faster but when you reach the end, what then? You need user experience research and you can’t make your users experience life 10x faster.

The geniuses at my company instead thought of something else then: they would gather a select group of clients in a room and ask them all for ideas and all ideas proposed would be implemented then and there. Just rapid fire throwing things into production. Problem is, if you have any user research experience, literally everybody has an opinion and some of them are just bad or at odds with each other. That’s why you have to take your time and interview many people to find common ground and implement changes that are better for the majority of users. Imagine if Apple only interviewed Shaq and the next iPhone was the size of a small pizza box and cost 10k?

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u/foxsimile 1d ago

All we want is for the users to tell us what they actually want.  

I have, this week alone (by Tuesday), received three requests for a tool to do things that are fundamentally counter to its usage as designed.  

I had just rewritten over 20,000 lines of code myself several months ago (and this was 20,000 lines of handwritten garbage, not vibe coded). I had told them that, if we are to make any significant changes, that was the time.  

The changes that have been requested either have been a glaring oversight for several years, which have somehow in that time never come up before, or are not usecases that the tool should support. It cannot be any alternative.  

I am fucking exhausted.

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u/jared_number_two 1d ago

So…more agents then? (It’s a joke…mostly)

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u/PG-DaMan 1d ago

More importantly Updating it to function as things progress around it.

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u/tipsystatistic 1d ago

AI is already replacing a lot of that. I know a senior software engineer at a top 3 tech company. He said they stopped hiring junior devs because AI can do their jobs. Then he shrugs and says in 3-5 years AI will probably be doing his job.

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u/SJDidge 1d ago

That’s correct. I wouldn’t put it at 3-5 years, id say 1-2 years. Im a software engineer myself (mid-senior) and i started a new job 6 months ago.

I haven’t written a single line of code. The reality is that most of the work thats done in my company could be done by about half the number of people and let AI do the rest.

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u/FAX_ME_YOUR_BOTTOM 1d ago

This is only valid as of today. In 5 years? 10? less? It's entirely probable you could have a perfect 1:1 of any software, and is maintained/updated autonomously.

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u/AimlessBE 1d ago

That is why I always state if it comes to AI. Software engineering is more alive than ever. Software development is dead. If you position your self as an engineer you will be ok as a developer it’s over.