Engineering perspectives from the field
Perspectives on engineering leadership, Rails modernization, and building software that can't afford to break.
Both OpenClaw and Gas Town imbue LLMs with an agency that stirs strong emotions. One side expresses wonder at what's now possible. The other expresses fear at potential downsides. Both deserve serious attention.
If we stop bringing new people into the profession, software engineering doesn't evolve, it atrophies. A field that can't regenerate itself doesn't get more efficient; it simply disappears.
If your team adopts AI and suddenly produces 160% of what they did before, congratulations. You're keeping up. You are not winning.
We're treating AI like a faster compiler for the same ideas we've always had: ship more features, write more CRUD, reduce headcount. The result? Marginal gains and a ceiling on ambition.
For the last three years, almost every conversation in the software world has revolved around AI. But after 20 years working inside engineering organizations, the real transformation happened quietly, starting in 2020.
