(5) Software Will Stop Being a Thing – Utopai
March 16, 2026
A thoughtful essay made the rounds recently, arguing that AI-assisted coding splits the software world into three tiers. Tech companies at the top, where senior engineers review what AI produces. Large enterprises in the middle, buying platforms with guardrails and bringing in fractional senior expertise. And small businesses at the bottom, served by a new kind of local developer, a “software plumber” who builds custom tools at price points that finally make sense.
An unspoken assumption in all the conversation about the impact of AI on software engineering is that we will continue to develop software artifacts, apps if you will, just more quickly, more efficiently, more cheaply.
But perhaps, as the author argues here, that won’t be the case.
