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Code Is Cheap Now. Software Isn’t
(chrisgregori.dev)
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this post was submitted on 12 Jan 2026
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Programming
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I think you are vastly overestimating the level that statement is pitched at. The overwhelming majority of people dont even know how a for loop works. However they can ask an LLM to write a script to change this list of files with inconsistent numbering conventions and put them in a consistent order. That's the level of spreading out the ability to program that we are dealing with.
Basic scripting is hardly programming, and it's been available in various user-friendly forms for quite a while...
Problem is that most people do seem to treat LLMs as if they could replace a well trained engineer. Including middle managers who want to cut costs at all price.
And those people who think LLMs will replace software engineers any time in the near future are wrong. But it can still be the case that LLMs are democratizing coding ability to those who otherwise wouldnt have it while at the same software engineering as a discipline isnt going anywhere.
Its not just basic scripting either, often when people start coding in earnest their programs are just a huge pile of statements connected together with if statements and mutating global variables. and LLM can help show best practices like encapsulating logic into functions and isolating side effects.