alt Hacker NewsYes, I'm not buying this story about layoffs due to AI. It's a convenient excuse, which these companies seem to be getting away with too.
And something else I don't get about these AI related layoff announcements: if AI was a productivity boost wouldn't you hire more engineers and technical staff to capture the value? Or else you're basically saying "we're a tech company that has no idea what to do with more super-engineers".
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At this point, I truly do not believe there is anything that could happen that would convince HN that LLMs reduce demand for engineering labor hours.
There are diminishing returns to more engineers. Also hiring more is like investing with leverage. You might increase EV but also increase the chance of going bust if things go poorly.
Reading only the parts of the post that are not about AI does not instill the sense that Mr Armstrong is the kind of person who would hesitate to say that people are let go because the company wants/needs to save money.
This assumes they had a deficit of engineers pre-AI. What if they had as much as they needed?
The layoffs being "due to AI" is usually about freeing up the budget to build a couple datacenters and buy GPUs. And they have to layoff 14% of their workforce because they are buying those GPUs at many times the normal price thanks to the zeitgeist.
They aren't saying that they don't know what to do with the AI productivity boost, but rather they think it worth taking a huge productivity hit right now so they can invest in the future. Whether their vision of the future is realistic...