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600 points antirez | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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dakiol ◴[] No.44625484[source]
> Gemini 2.5 PRO | Claude Opus 4

Whether it's vibe coding, agentic coding, or copy pasting from the web interface to your editor, it's still sad to see the normalization of private (i.e., paid) LLM models. I like the progress that LLMs introduce and I see them as a powerful tool, but I cannot understand how programmers (whether complete nobodies or popular figures) dont mind adding a strong dependency on a third party in order to keep programming. Programming used to be (and still is, to a large extent) an activity that can be done with open and free tools. I am afraid that in a few years, that will no longer be possible (as in most programmers will be so tied to a paid LLM, that not using them would be like not using an IDE or vim nowadays), since everyone is using private LLMs. The excuse "but you earn six figures, what' $200/month to you?" doesn't really capture the issue here.

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ls-a ◴[] No.44630173[source]
Programming on/for Apple has never been free. So it's not a surprise to some engineers. You're right that programming might become the way of Apple in the future. However, I think engineers should rejoice because AI is the best thing that happened to them.
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1. asadotzler ◴[] No.44631337[source]
I paid ~$600 for my first Windows compiler, over a grand in today's money. But I didn't have to keep paying every month forever to be able to code at all. Take Claude or whatever away from a vibe coder and they're completely dead in the water.

Apple's fee is like that Visual Studio purchase I made, a fee that lets me compile for their platforms. It's not a subscription without which I can't code anything at all.

Creating a new dependency on monthly subscriptions to unsustainable companies or products is a huge step away from accessible programming of the last 50 years and one that should not so casually be dismissed.