(also published on LinkedIn)
I’ve just read three more breathless, credulous takes about how February 2026 is recapitulating February 2020 - which as we all know, is when the end of knowledge work began!
No, actually, the argument is that we’re on an exponential curve of the world changing, a la COVID, and only our CEOs can see it. We must prepare, say these takes. Start scrubbing those groceries for the AI-pocalypse.
There has been a sea change in AI model development, notable to most people who use AI coding agents on a regular basis. Automating certain knowledge asset production tasks is more imaginable than it was a year ago. But still, as most people who use these tools daily know - there are limits, and working around them still requires human expertise.
Let’s posit, though, just for a moment, that the predictions are all right: coding is over; it’ll all be done by machines going forward.
If that’s true, I want you to imagine a much better world.
- the end of enshittification?
If anyone can wake up and make an app to meet their needs, then why are we subjecting ourselves to dehumanizing, privacy-violating technologies? The argument for enshittification is that growth must come from somewhere: and therefore, you must become the product.
If you can write your own version, why accept an experience that doesn’t prioritize your needs?
- the rise of data privacy?
We’ve long since accepted that it’s too complicated for people to maintain their own data and their own systems. You must, they say, move your data to the cloud.
Yet the rise of OpenClaw / Clawdbot / etc shows that there’s an enormous demand for keeping your data local. If AI can solve any technical problem, why not pick up some open source local cloud framework, grab yourself some commodity server hardware, and never hand your data over again?
- the return of the open web?
When I was young, teens would build their own blogs and websites, customize them using CSS an HTML, and connect them in massive networks by URL alone. When the winning social networks came along, these networks were destroyed - and we were told in the process that website technology had simply become too complicated for end users to maintain. If everything they’re saying about AI is true, then the power to take back your web experience is in your hands. Why not build that instead?
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Human needs have stayed roughly the same through hundreds of thousands of years, and through many fundamental upheavals in technology. Let’s use the knowledge of the needs of our communities today to build a world that actually prioritizes people. Demand security, responsibility, and privacy from your applications - because you now have the power to build your own if they won’t build it for you.
And for the people who can only imagine a world in which money continually accrues to them as they build a fleet of AIs to do their bidding? I respectfully request that you log off, and let the rest of us build something so much cooler.