The Big Picture

I was reading a tweet from DHH the other day. About AI. About the resistance. About developers digging their heels in.

And I get it.

If you’ve spent your whole life sharpening one tool, optimizing one process, climbing one ladder— anything that shakes the ladder feels like an earthquake.

The fear isn’t really about AI. It’s about scarcity. The illusion of it.

Somewhere along the way, a lot of engineers were taught—quietly—that their value came from knowing things other people didn’t. From gatekeeping. From arbitrage of information. From being the person who knew how.

But that was never the point. That was just the shortcut.

The real point was always the same: Did you create value for another human?

That’s it. That’s the whole game.

AI doesn’t erase value. It exposes where it actually lives.

We’ve been here before.

When YouTube showed up, everyone said, “Now anyone can be a star.”

And that was true. But also not the whole truth.

The people who already knew how to entertain— how to tell stories, how to hold attention, how to deliver something people actually wanted—

They didn’t disappear.

For them, YouTube was just another channel. Different rules. Same goal.

Provide value.

AI feels the same.

Yes, we’re going to see new people rise— people for whom AI is intuitive, native, obvious. Just like kids with touchscreens.

But if you already understand computers, systems, constraints— you’re not behind.

You’re ahead.

You know what a good system looks like. You know where things break. You know what scales and what doesn’t.

That means you can bend AI.

Be water, my friend.

Water doesn’t fight the system. It flows through it. Around it. Shapes it.

AI is just a tool. And if you already know how systems work, you know exactly how to use it.

If your entire identity is wrapped around a process— a framework, a stack, a corporate ladder rung— then yeah, this moment feels like a threat.

Because ladders don’t matter when the ground changes.

Where does my paycheck actually come from?

Not HR. Not the org chart. Not the sprint board.

It comes from value moving through the system. From users. From customers. From humans exchanging time, attention, and trust.

But instead, people retreat into microworlds. Tiny bubbles of Jira tickets and performance reviews. As if the corporation is the universe.

It’s not.

Zoom out.

This is one of the most exciting times to be alive and building things. The tools are exploding. The cost of creation is collapsing, subsidized by investors— giving away value far below its real price. The distance between idea and impact has never been shorter.

If you care about the whole— about what you’re actually putting into the world— AI isn’t scary.

It’s clarifying.

Stop defending the ladder. Start thinking about the value.

The big picture has always been there. Now it’s just harder to ignore.