I'm amused by all the flags this article has. It reinforces this belief that "vibe-coding" isn't something that evolved organically, but was forced. I wouldn't go as far as to call it "astroturfed", I believe it was a spontaneous emergence, but otherwise it feels like an effort by a disproportionately small group of people desperately trying to make vibe-coding a thing for whatever reason.

it's definitely more organic than you think. I know smart productive people doing it as purely a 0 to 1 thing.

This is quite possibly one of the most disturbing things I've seen in awhile.

Sure, for fun and one-off private apps this is fine, but the second that some buzzed-on-the-sides haircut guy thinks this is the way, the chaos will rival a Hollywood disaster movie.

>"The practice defies the belief in the software industry that software engineering demands great skill."

But actual software engineering does demand great skill. What "vibe coders" are doing isn't engineering. It's not even programming. It's like calling yourself a chef when you microwaved a frozen meal.

Not even programming? That’s even better!

Great engineers know that code is 10-20% of the whole solution to a problem and it doesn’t matter too much. Code is not an asset, it’s a liability.

>Code is not an asset, it’s a liability.

Then AI generated code is a time bomb. Maintainability? Who needs that if you can sell the company quickly enough, I guess.

Always has been! Not sure what AI changes here.

It encourages developers to not worry about understanding the code they write. At least now, there's someone around (typically) who can figure things out.

But as more developers rely on AI and their skills atrophy, if entire products are being built with AI, eventually no one will exist who can fix the software when it breaks. Not only that, but anything that requires knowledge outside the training of the AI will be impossible (or at best, extremely difficult/costly) to implement.

You’re right, my point is for most software it doesn’t matter. I can envision some software not even checking code in to source control, just prompts, in essence jumping to a higher level of abstraction, just like we don’t analyze what the v8 jit does to js when it emits machine code. (There are some who do, and no doubt there will be people who will look and/or care, just like there will be software that needs to be written in an exact way in assembly today.)