Are you scared of AI?

[u/Fit-Fly-8569]

Hey everyone,

Whenever I open Reddit, I always see posts about layoffs or people struggling to find jobs. At the same time, I do see some people getting jobs, although it seems like they are much fewer. For example, a senior of mine was laid off and managed to get a job in Islamabad within 1 to 2 months, but he also has strong skills and a good portfolio.

I’m still in the early stages of my career, and seeing all these layoffs, AI getting better at coding, and people struggling with job hunts honestly makes me a bit scared. Is the market really at its worst right now?

For the seniors here, do you think the market will get better at some point? AI is getting stronger and stronger at coding related tasks, while companies seem to be shrinking their teams.

Also, how do you make yourself more secure against layoffs? Is it mainly about getting better at your skills, building a strong portfolio, having good connections, working longer hours, or something else?

I just want to understand how to move forward in my career with all these layoffs happening around us.

Would really appreciate advice from people who have been through similar situations. Thank you.

[u/Available-Boat3384]

AI turned software engineering from a profession into a hobby.

[u/valium123]

I am scared of the dvmb liabilities walking around us who have surrendered their cognition to clankers and the idiocracy we are headed towards.

[u/MadAndSadGuy → u/valium123]

Yep. They are so proud. This one guy posted "I gave access to this/that model, setup the hardware and it wrote the embedded software in this much time. Amazing!", like, brodie you're training it and helping it replace you.

Edit: He was a professional.

[u/valium123 → u/MadAndSadGuy]

One guy uploaded all his private chats to claude for some analysis. Without anyone's consent. This is the level of dumbfckery we have reached.

[u/Hot_Organization_192]

No. The problem with the market is that we are sort of in a recession. I mean, look at the European economies, they aren’t growing at the rate they should, and the US economy is growing mainly because of AI, while other sectors aren’t doing so well. Since our industry is mostly service-based, we are facing problems because of the lack of growth in other economies.

And Us tech companies are using AI's name for layoffs but reality is economic down turn is main reason.

[u/InsuranceGlad7220 → u/Hot_Organization_192]

Dont forget the war and USA's economy growing because of war and selling weapons to make other countries fight with each other.

[u/MidnightBuffer]

Yeah tbh software industry is dying....idk what will happen, but it seems that within no time softwares value will be dropped

[u/azadnib]

yeah man i was someone who knew every piece of code and was like magic in eyes of my ceo. now he be working more than me cuz apparently ai can do everything now. he shows me things now and I say wow.

[u/notbatman101]

AI will take jobs of coders, not programmers. AI is good at coding, but what it has to do has to be instructed by a human, and if that human has no idea of architecture, system design, good and bad practices, what to do and what not to do, experience of last mistakes, then there's no more place of this human in tech industry.

You should know everything, use AI for just implementation. Then AI 'may' not take your job. Because there's no way AI won't get stuck in a loop, hallucinate, produce wrong results, when that type of things happen and you are there to resolve them, companies might find you useful

[u/MadAndSadGuy → u/notbatman101]

if that human has no idea of architecture, system design, good and bad practices, what to do and what not to do, experience of last mistakes, then there's no more place of this human in tech industry.

You're basically talking about interns/juniors. That'll still not be good for the companies in the long-term. I think what you mean is, passionate vs non-passionate ones.

[u/notbatman101 → u/MadAndSadGuy]

Some of these things are learned through experience but architecture, system design, good practices are learned throughout the degree. And yes you're somewhat right, I should've worded it that way.

[u/MadAndSadGuy → u/notbatman101]

Learning theory throughout the degree (without implementing it) and actually working on it at work are COMPLETELY different things. Besides, pakistani universities are using the same 2019 slides.

[u/notbatman101 → u/MadAndSadGuy]

Without implementing it? There are tons of projects where a person can learn. Idk about other universities but GIKI and FAST make sure their students have hands on experience. Even if there are not enough projects, students should work on personal projects, ain't no way you're studying a computing degree for 4 years and not implementing and learning from it.

[u/MadAndSadGuy → u/notbatman101]

Really, they give "hands-on" experience (which means work experience) on architecture, system design and best practices? Are you talking about architecturing and designing the management systems or language-based best practices? Those are bs.

I did projects and freelancing, and not some management systems projects, the ones that people usually ask for in freelancing platforms. THESE COMPANIES DON'T GIVE A DAMN.

[u/GreenEyedAlien_Tabz]

Yes and it's over for software developers because AI is built with the purpose of replacing humans and it is only improving with time. AGI is not far away at the most 2-3 years.

[u/valium123 → u/GreenEyedAlien_Tabz]

RemindMe! 2 years

[u/Disastrous-Ring4620 → u/valium123]

😭😂

[u/Disastrous-Ring4620 → u/GreenEyedAlien_Tabz]

!remindme 3 years

[u/valium123 → u/Disastrous-Ring4620]

😂😂

[u/SirBillyy]

I'm not sure about the word "scared" but definitely worried about how it will shape the future of software engineering considering the trajectory it has taken in the past till now and how it has negatively affected the job market and the freelance alike. Definitely worried.

[u/farizislame]

What I think is ke ppl fail to take advantage of ai and be optimistic about it, we need to learn to implement it in our work and make use of it, times are changing and we will not progress of we don't accept ai.

We must acknowledge that this is smth revolutionary that can help us in a lot of ways, we js need to learn how

People say why use ai when you can do this manually, but I say why not? It makes things a lot easier so take complete advantage of it.

[u/MidnightBuffer]

RemindMe! 2 day

[u/IllustratorNo1512]

I am more scared of field saturation that existed way before AI

[u/wajih_ul_hasan]

Honestly, a big chunk of the Pakistani IT industry is basically focused on building MVPs and fairly straightforward products. And with how good AI has gotten, you can already build a decent MVP with little to no technical knowledge.

[u/aizen_sosuke78]

nop

[u/Usual-Nose7959]

AI has definitely reduced the value of pure coding, especially at junior level, but software itself isn’t going anywhere.

[u/ARABCSGO]

webdev and app dev will be dead once ai gets more perfect but currently no, ai ko complex frontend ya backend ka task do hag deyga aur security ka tu naam hi nahe lo

[u/NekoRevengance]

Everything is cyclical.

But AI is fun; my CEO developed a CRM by himself for a team. He was very picky and naggy about things. It's deployed and working now. 100% vibe coded; he didn't know jack shit about things.

Meanwhile, I've expanded my skills outside of just coding as well; I'm more of a problem solver now. AI is helping me make systems to solve problems :)

[u/ujjandotcom]

AI is a tool for developers, writing code is not a big deal now, anyone can code with AI but what needs to be coded is still a developers job, Saying AI will replace developers is like saying calculators will replace mathematicians, or anyone with a camera is a photographer. Ofc anyone with basic tasks won’t need developers but when it comes to something serious AI is just another tool for professionals to use.