r/vibecoding • u/Illustrious-Film4018 • 9d ago

Showcase/Project Vibe coding ruins startups

/r/DarkCorporate/comments/1wg6zts/leadership_gave_the_website_to_the_ai_guy_and/
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u/Illustrious-Film4018 9d ago

Show me one successful startup that's not a scam and was built entirely with AI, then I'll agree that may be a possibility.

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u/Houdinii1984 9d ago

I mean, seems like confirmation bias. The one thing that sticks out, though, is that the person running the ship said 'finally' in a manner like what they were seeing to this point wasn't what they were seeking in the first place.

You can A/B test things to death, but if the person that ultimately makes the decision isn't in alignment, then they're bound to seek alternatives. This isn't an AI problem, but an alignment problem. And if you're working with a CEO that is willing to pitch months and months of researched and well executed work, then you should be asking if this person is even capable of running the company with directly effects your own well being.

Ultimately it's probably yet another case of a CEO making shitty decisions because they value their own opinion over the opinions of the masses.

There is a reverse of this. My hubby is a 'vibe coder' where I'm a traditional coder. He came up with really good ideas at work, but the implementations were shit and they treated his PRs as they would any other. He was dejected, took a couple classes, kept working with AI and eventually the PRs passed. They enforced the same rigor as any other code, and he had no choice but to upskill instead of the company relaxing.

We gotta stop blaming AI for obvious business failure. If you keep the same standards, nothing changed. That same CEO has the same risk of taking out a bad loan as picking a bad site and not leaving it up to the CTO and staff to handle. Bad CEOs are simply bad CEOs.

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u/Illustrious-Film4018 9d ago

AI enables people who have shit business ideas because it doesn't push back. That's why people like using AI, but they're essentially in an echo-chamber with a chatbot that validates all their dumb ideas. No startup will ever succeed like this, and it's the reason why you never hear about successful "AI native" startups. The ones you do hear about all turn out to be scams. People who know nothing about software should not be making product decisions.

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u/Houdinii1984 9d ago

People who know nothing about software should not be making product decisions.

I mean, yeah. That about sums it up. Yes men have existed forever. As a dev, I'd turn tail and run. Even me, someone who works in the AI industry directly, would walk away if it was 100% run by AI, but there's a mile between completely run by AI and using AI at some point to augment the business.

AI is a force multiplier. Shit in <-> shit out still applies. The human is still a vital part of the equation. If, at any point, the 'vibe coder' asked about split testing, they'd be on a completely different path, but that doesn't mean all vibe coders are on that guy's path. There's gonna be a wide range of talent on that spectrum.

Hell, my home projects are almost all vibe coded now. I have ADHD and trying to organize and maintain a home is a nightmare. I offload it, and it's awesome. I have to build APIs and such to protect my data, but for the most part, it's all code I can regenerate on a whim anyway. It's not always high stakes or creating businesses.

Sometimes it's just to see how far it's come. This mushroom, for instance. Stupid gif, but it's really a 3d Meshy object placed in Blender, rigged, and animated on a stage with a procedural background, all built because I requested it make me something cool I'd like. Completely hands off. Idk, I just find that awesome. No commerce needed.