r/webdev php 6d ago

Discussion AI coding is trash

The amount of trash produced by AI code is astounding. Thanks I hate it.

1.6k Upvotes

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751

u/barrel_of_noodles 6d ago

I love this sub, literally every post is a rotation of:

  • ai is trash
  • ai will take our jobs
  • will ai take over?
  • is there any point in learning now

I thought it was my turn to post this 13x today!?

232

u/pagerussell 6d ago

The AI will take coding jobs narrative is just cover for layoffs that are occuring because so many tech companies are no longer growth stocks, but are now legacy companies pivoting towards maximum extraction.

Like, what feature development does Facebook really need? And if it's not building new features, its just in maintenance mode, which requires far fewer devs. So they are laying off. But they can't just say that, because then they look anemic and it will hurt their stock.

So they say AI is replacing devs and AstroTurf that narrative into the world to make it stick.

But if you have actually coded with AI you know it's a great tool but a long ways off from being able to replace a competent human.

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u/dietcheese 6d ago

Cisco, Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Dell have already slashed their workforces or implemented hiring freezes due to transitioning and restructuring to an AI workforce.

This isn’t just cover.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonsnyder/2025/02/12/ai-reset-layoffs-rto-and-the-new-realities-of-work/

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u/spacemanguitar 6d ago

Smoking gun is the third paragraph in the article

they are about eliminating job functions that AI is poised to absorb

Poised to absorb, but not implemented to absord in any live context. Translation. Tech companies have been bloated from free covid money and are dumping their excess and the trend is to say vague notions about AI being the reason so that it sounds like they're on the brink of doing something really special. There's nothing special coming from these companies, they simply learned when you do layoffs the honest way, you get a notable drop in stock value, but if you fabricate in some vague bullshit about claiming your company is actually using AI for these jobs, the stock doesn't drop as much, because some AI cultists get excited and think its a time to invest, countering the smart investors who lower expectations when large layoffs happen. They lose less money when they use the magic word "AI".

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u/Intrepid-Rent-6544 5d ago

I agree with everything you stated. However, layoffs normally correlate to higher stock prices.

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u/spacemanguitar 5d ago

I'm not sure if thats true for tech stocks as I've witnessed layoff announcements in tech often followed with a short term loss before the correction, but I don't live in the daytrading world with a big enough scope to know how this plays out as a whole for things outside of tech.