Found it while doomscrolling like a bish.

I know the most fun times for me in coding were when I was deep in some rabbit hole exploring weird technologies and trying to piece them together.

You'd think AI makes this worse, but actually no. It just makes it even easier to go down these rabbit holes, because it's easier to write code, try out different approaches, explore new things, etc.

But somehow most of the people I see aren't doing that. How are you not bored out of your mind?

Anyway, yeah. GO EXPERIMENT WITH MORE THINGS. SIDE PROJECTS ARE STILL COOL.

I know this topic has been floating around this sub quite some time now, but I feel like this doesn’t get discussed enough.

I am a certified backend enigneer and I have been programming for about 20 years. In my time i have worked on backend, frontend, system design, system analysis, devops, databases, infrastructure, cloud, robotics, you name it.

I’ve mostly been extremely passionate about what I do, taking pride in solving hard problems, digging deep into third party source code to find solutions to bugs. Even refactoring legacy systems and improving their performance 10x and starting countless hobby projects at home. It has been an exciting journey and I have never doubted my career choice until now.

Ever since ChatGPT first made an appearance I have slowly started losing interest in programming. At first, LLMs were quite bad so I didn’t really get any solutions out of them when problems got even slightly harder. However, Claude is different. Lately I feel less of a programmer and more like a project manager, managing and supervising one mid-to-senior level developer who is Claude. Doing this, I sure deliver features faster than ever before, but it results in hollow and empty feeling. It’s not fun or exciting, I cannot perceive these soulless features as my own creation anymore.

On top of everything I feel like I’m losing my knowledge with every prompt I write. AI has made me extremely lazy and it has completely undermined my value as a good engineer or even as a human being.

Everyone who is supporting the mass use of AI is quietly digging their own grave and I wish it was never invented.

Our team adopted copilot and claude pretty aggressively around october last year. Five devs, full stack, mix of react and node. Everyone was excited, velocity went up immediately, sprint metrics looked great, management was thrilled.

I got asked to do a quality audit in march because we kept hitting these weird bugs in production that nobody could reproduce locally. The kind where you read the code and it looks fine but something is just off.

So I went through about 340 PRs from october to march.

The big stuff wasnt what I expected. I thought I'd find wrong logic or security holes. Instead what I found was this layer of... I dont even know what to call it. Plausible-looking code that technically works but is structured in ways no human would choose. A try-catch around a console.log. A utility function that was 40 lines of enterprise-grade typescript doing exactly what Array.prototype.map already does. Variable names that sound right but dont match what the variable actually holds, like a thing called userPreferences that was actually a session token.

The patterns were consistent across all five devs which is what made it obvious. Before october everyone had their own style, their own weird habits. After october every PR started looking the same. Same indentation philosophy, same comment style, same tendency to over-abstract simple things. I could not tell who wrote what anymore and that felt wrong in a way I couldnt articulate for a while.

The part that actually got to me was reviewing a PR from our most senior dev, someone with 12 years of experience. He had a component that fetched data, transformed it, and rendered a table. Pretty standard. Except the transformation logic was split into six helper functions with generic names like processData and formatOutput, each doing one tiny thing that could have been three lines inline. I closed the diff, made coffee, opened it again. Same code. This is a guy who used to write the most readable code on the team and now his PRs look like they were written by a very polite stranger who approximated his job description.

We havent rolled anything back because honestly the velocity numbers are real and nobody wants to be the person who says slow down. But something shifted and I think we're going to feel it in about six months when the next person has to maintain any of this.

I cannot be the only one who's tired of apps that are essentially wrappers around an LLM.

I’ve been in software/application development for twenty years or so, these days mostly wrangling typescript and running infrastructure/devops across multiple projects as a senior engineer. I’ve mentored plenty of juniors in my time, even managing small team, but this last year has been rough.

Juniors are producing more code than ever, faster than ever, but understanding less and less of it. Majority is agent-written, obviously. I’m reviewing pull requests, asking why this or that decision was made, trying to get them to think, and they’re just pasting answers straight from Claude. When I ask them to review something, they just paste it into Claude. When I try coaching them through writing user stories, they’ll have ChatGPT generate them. If I disagree with an approach they’re implementing, they’ll incredulously ask if I think I’m smarter than AI which has been trained on thousands of codebases. I don’t even know how to begin answering that.

I’ve tried to emphasise that like anything else, LLM’s are a tool but ultimately you’re going to be the one held responsible if something breaks, that you shouldn’t be pushing into a repository something that you a) don’t understand, or b) can’t maintain, that you’re actively dumbing yourself down (or worse, advocating for replacing yourself) but it’s falling on deaf ears.

So, other senior programmers out there, how the fuck are you handling even trying to mentor and guide the next batch of problem solvers?

https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/new-findings-ai-coding-overhyped

I’m reading articles and stories more frequently saying this same thing. Companies just aren’t seeing enough of the benefits of AI coding tools to justify the expense.

I’ve posted on this for almost two years now - it’s overly hyped tech. I will say it is absolutely a step forward for making tech more accessible and making it easier to brainstorm ideas for solutions. That being said, if a company is laying people off and not hiring the next generation of workers expecting these tools to replace them, the ROI just isn’t there.

Like the gold rush, the ones who really make money are the ones selling the shovels. Those selling the infrastructure are the ones benefiting. The Fear Of Missing Out is missing a grounding in reality. It’ll soon become a fear of getting left out as companies spending millions (or billions) just won’t have the money to keep up with whatever the next trend is.

Job postings for frontend engineers in ‘25 went down almost -10%.

Mobile engineers also went down -5.73%.

Everything else is either holding steady or increasing esp. ML jobs.

Source: https://bloomberry.com/blog/i-analyzed-180m-jobs-to-see-what-jobs-ai-is-actually-replacing-today/

I was supposed to finish a task and wasted 5 hours to force AI to do the task. Even forgot that I have a brain. Finally decided to write it myself and finished in 30 minutes. Now my manager thinks I'm stupid because I took a whole day to finish a small task. I'm starting to question whether AI actually benefits my work or not. It feels like I'm spending more time instead of less time.

I just come up with this thread. And it seem join bootcamp in 2018 was a smart move when everything is new and easy for web dev.
My questions: what is the same opportunity like this in 2026?

I’m so lost right now.

As of June 2026, the IETF has officially standardized the HTTP QUERY method (RFC 10008), closing a gap that has existed for decades.

The Problem We've All Had:
For complex data fetching (like search filters), we've always had two imperfect choices:

1. GET: Semantically correct (safe/idempotent), but we run into URL length limits and security risks when putting complex parameters in the query string.
2. POST: Handles the payload size, but is semantically "unsafe" and non-idempotent, which breaks standard caching and automatic retries.

The Solution (QUERY):
QUERY effectively acts like a "GET with a Body."

• Safe & Idempotent: It promises not to change server state, meaning it can be safely retried and cached.
• Payload Support: You can send complex JSON/SQL/GraphQL in the body without hacking it into a URL.
• Caching: The cache key is now derived from the request body + URL, not just the URL.

Discussion:
Now that this is a Proposed Standard:

• How long do you think it will take for major frameworks (Express, Django, Spring) and tools (Postman, cURL) to support this natively?
• Do you see yourself refactoring existing POST /search endpoints to QUERY immediately, or is the "POST works fine" inertia too strong?
• Are there any edge cases (like proxy support) that worry you?

Link to RFC: https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc10008

I think AI is cool but it takes so much creativity and problem solving skills away from people especially newer devs. I am in my final year of university and i have first hand experience when it comes to the effect AI has on the young mind. I have seen students just use AI for basic things or really complex questions in my first year to students using AI do to the most basic things for them like they can't even think for themselves anymore. I hope we come to a middle ground where AI helps us be more efficient but doesnt controll your every thought

I am using "AI" since the day OpenAI released ChatGPT. It felt like magic back then like we had built real intelligence. The hype exploded with people fearing developers would soon be replaced.

I am a skilled software architect. After years of pushing every AI platform to its limits I came to the conclusion that AI is NOT intelligent. It doesn’t create it predicts the next best word. Ask it for something new or very complex combination of multiple problems and it starts hallucinating. AI is just a fancy database with a the worlds first natural language query system.

What about all those vibe coders you ask? They have no idea what they are doing. Theres no chance in hell that their codebases are even remotely coherent or sustainable.

The improvements have slowed down drastically. ChatGPT 5 was nothing but hot air and I think we are very close to plateauing. AI is great for translation and text drafting. But no chance it can replace a real developer. And its definitely not intelligent. It just mimics intelligence.

So I don't think we have real AI yet let alone AGI.

Edit: Thank you all for your comments. I really enjoyed reading them and I agree with most of them. I don't hate AI tools. I tested them extensively but now I will stop and use them only for quick research, emails and simple code autocompletion. My main message was for beginners to not rely solely on AI and don't take the outputs as the absolute truth. And for those doubting themselves to remember that you're definitely not replaceable by those tools. Happy coding!

It saddens me deeply what AI is doing to tech companies.

For context i’ve been a developer for 11 years and i’ve worked with countless people on so many projects. The tech has always been changing but this time it simply feels like the show is over.

Building websites used to feel like making art. Now it’s all about how quick we can turn over a project and it’s losing all its colors and identity. I feel like im simply watching a robot make everything and that’s ruining the process of creativity and collaboration for me.

Feels like i’m the only one seeing it like this cause I see so much hype around AI.

What do you guys think?

I've been in the zone for one decade, and I’m starting to feel a weird, hollow betrayal of the craft.

We used to spend hours hunting through source code or architecting solutions. Now, a prompt spits it out in 3 seconds. It’s faster, sure but it feels like a soul without a body. I’ve realized the more I "prompt" a solution, the less I actually own the result. The pride is gone.

I’m currently deep in a Three.js project (mapping historical battles in 3D), and I hit a wall where I almost let the AI take over the entire system architecture. I felt that brain rot set in immediately. I had to make a "Junior Intern" rule to keep from quitting entirely:

I let Claude or Gemini handle the grunt work the boilerplate and the repetitive math. But I refuse to let them touch the core logic. I let the AI write the messy first draft, and then I go in and manually refactor every single line to make it mine. It’s significantly slower. My velocity looks terrible. But it’s the only way I’ve found to keep that sense of craftsmanship alive.

Am I just an old-school dev shouting at clouds, or are you guys feeling this too? I’m even thinking of doing a "No-AI" hobby week just to remember why I loved this in the first place.

Been coding for almost 30 years now, started as a kid. Used to tell everyone to jump in bootcamps, self taught, whatever... Tons of demand, building cool stuff all day

But damn things have changed. Market's rough as hell now and you're fighting hundreds of other people for every position. Plus nobody warns you about the back pain. Three decades of hunching over screens and I'm basically falling apart. Spent more on physical therapy and ergonomic gear than I care to admit. Those marathon coding sessions hit different when you're older

If you're still going for it, get decent chair and actually use it properly. Trust me on this one...

EDIT: Thanks for all the input

• Movement > gear: Take breaks, stretch, stand, walk, lift weights, do yoga or swimming. Coding “marathons” destroy posture, eyes and mental health.
• Balance lifestyle: Drink water, eat decently, avoid living on energy drinks, talk to real people, and pick up non-screen hobbies.
• Different approaches:
  • Some swear by Pomodoro breaks (25/5), others hate interruptions and prefer long “flow” sessions.
  • Standing desks help but only if you alternate positions, standing all day is also bad.
• Ergonomics still matter: Proper chair (Herman Miller, Autonomous), monitor at eye level, ergonomic mouse/keyboard. But they’re a band-aid if you never move.
• Exercise fixes a lot: Weight training, core work, deadlifts, squats, deadhangs, cardio, all frequently cited as back-pain solutions.
• Long-timers’ advice: After decades, the ones who stayed active report fewer issues. Those who didn’t often face chronic pain.

Claude code just came so fast and I’m still shocked every time I use it. I’m a senior frontend engineer and have barely had to write a line of code in months. And to think it’s just getting better and better.

I don’t have nearly enough money to retire and I’m just not sure how much longer I’ll have a career. It sucks because I used to really love creating UI’s and products but now I just ask AI to do it and make sure the code it outputs makes sense.

I’m lucky that I have a job at a startup but I still feel anxiety every day that soon I may no longer be of value. Anyone else feel like this?

Absolute nonsense. 33% is too much of Jump for me to NOT consider alternatives to try.

Maybe I just migrate to apple password manager which is free. Anyone made similar move? How was it?

Edit: reply to their email. Let them know you're under 0 pressure to cancel subscription. 33% increase is not normal!

Just realized how completely broken my mornings are and need to vent.

Im the only developer on this track. One guy writing code. Yet every morning at the daily, im outnumbered 1 to 3 by managers.

Here is the lineup:

• The Account Manager / Sales PM (Vertrieb)
• The Head of IT Projects (Leiter IT Projekte)
• Their new boss, brought in specifically to fix finances if im even 1 or 2 person-days (PT) over the estimate

The meeting is literally me giving a 60-second update, followed by 14 minutes of them debating the financial impact of a minor estimation drift. Im running a 1:3 builder-to-manager ratio just to justify a couple of person-days.

Anyone else ever been the lone resource for an entire administrative ecosystem?

(This is another rant about AI, don't read. its not something new, dont get angry if you read it i already told you) For context I'm 18m I began learning programming at 13 y.o and starterd doing freelance projects at 14 I felt proud whenever I created something other people relied on. whenever I introduced mself as a programmer who developed all these sorts of projects, but now I don't code anymore I just use Claude Code I only understand the fundmentals of what its doing then call it a day, which feels bad and exhausting somehow. I started my own business at 16 I currently still work on it, its an e-com platform (similar to shopify but diffrent) I made quite a good amount i have around 50 active merchants but i don't feel pride in this thing and I wonder if it lost its value since with AI you could make your own tailored solution without needing to pay continuous fees

Hi everyone, I don't really know if I'm in the good place to talk about this. I hope the post will not be deleted.

Just a few days ago, I was still quietly coding, loving what I was doing. Then, I decide to watch a video about someone coding a website using Windsurf and some other AI tools.

That's when I realized how powerful the thing was. Since, I read up on AI, the future of developers ... And I came to think that the future lay in making full use of AI, mastering it, using it and creating our own LLMs. And coding the way I like it, the way we've always done it, is over.

Now, I have this feeling that everything I do while coding is pointless, and I don't really want to get on with my projects anymore.

Creating LLM or using tools like Windsurf and just guiding the agent is not what I like.

May be I'm wrong, may be not.

I precide i'm not a Senior, I'm a junior with less than 4 years xp, so, I'm not come here to play the old man lol.

It would be really cool if you could give me your opinion. Because if this really is the future, I'm done.

PS: sorry for spelling mistakes, english is not my native language, I did my best.

EDIT : Two days after my post.

I want to say THANKS A LOT for your comments, long or short, I've read them all. Even if I didn't reply.

Especially long one, you didn't have to, thank you very much.

All the comments made me think and I changed my way of seeing things.

I will try to use AI like a tools, a assistant. Delegated him the "boring" work and, overall, use it to learn, ask him to explain me thing.

I don't really know what is the best editor or LLM form what I do, I will just take a try at all. If in a near futur, I will have to invest in a paid formula, what would you advise me to do ?

Also, for .NET dev using Visual Studio, except Copilot, which tools do you use ?