AI is killing open source software. If we act now, it won’t do away with collaborative software development, but I do think it is changing open source software as we know it.
This was originally posted on YouTube as my daily walk, think and share. Below is the transcription.
Two recent events highlight why change is coming to open source software and why we should pay attention.
The $3 Billion Signal
OpenAI offered to buy Windsurf, an AI-powered software development tool, for $3 billion. That’s a lot of money for a software development tool, especially when OpenAI already builds AI tools and could develop their own. This signals that there’s significant money in AI-powered software development right now.
The “Not Dead” Disclaimer
Articles keep appearing—including from GitHub’s CEO—insisting that software development isn’t dead as a career. The fact that people feel the need to make this argument suggests AI is changing the profession enough to worry people about their future.
When a company pays $3 billion for what’s reportedly their second choice (they wanted Cursor first), and industry leaders repeatedly assure us that developers aren’t going away, the career and industry are clearly changing.
Since open source software is part of this industry, it will change too. And I think the change will be significant.
A Lesson from Architecture
History offers a useful parallel. Architects once spent their days at drafting boards, creating detailed building plans by hand. Drawing was the core of their work.
Then CAD software arrived in the 1980s. AutoCAD and similar tools could generate these drawings automatically. The architect’s role transformed completely. Instead of drawing all day, they focused on design, planning, and problem-solving at the computer.
Some architects welcomed this change, especially if they found drafting tedious. Others missed the hands-on craftsmanship that drew them to the profession.
The Same Thing Is Happening to Software Development
Software development is undergoing a similar transformation. Developers use AI to write code and solve familiar problems.
A CTO at a small startup told me he loves AI tools because they let him build prototypes and reach market faster. But he no longer writes code or algorithms or figures out solutions himself. Instead, he directs the AI tool like a project manager or architect.
This resembles what happens to successful open source developers. They start by writing useful code, but as others join their project, they gradually shift from coding to reviewing code, setting direction, and planning architecture.
AI is doing to all software developers what success does to open source developers—it turns them into maintainers.
What This Means for Open Source
If developers are becoming maintainers, what happens to open source software?
AI typically chooses which software and dependencies to use in a project. It selects the open source libraries. When problems arise, AI generates the fixes.
Will AI submit pull requests when it fixes bugs? This might actually improve things—AI could write better documentation, clearer comments, and more complete bug reports.
If projects also use AI for reviews, we’ll have AI contributing to AI-managed projects.
The 10-Second Problem
But AI’s speed might discourage contribution altogether. If AI can create software in 10-15 seconds, will anyone bother sharing that code? Why create a project when the next developer can generate the same solution just as quickly?
When I use AI for projects now, it responds so fast it seems impossible it could have processed my input properly. I dismiss these quick solutions because they feel valueless—why share something when everyone has equal access to generate it?
What We Need to Figure Out
If we want open source software and collaborative development to survive, we need to understand what collaboration means when AI provides answers instantly.
What should we share? The problems we want to solve? Our approaches to solving them? More complete software upfront? Should we distribute software freely even if the code matters less than before?
These questions need answers as software development changes around us.
What do you think? Drop your thoughts in the comments below.
Hey Stormy,
I think you’re correct on a number of points.
I’ve used AI every day in my software engineering for the last year or so, and I don’t think AI will displace human software engineers anytime in the predictable future, but it is changing the WAY we work and, done right, making us much more productive.
There are a couple things about AI in the software engineering domain that are sometimes overlooked. AI is good at solving “common” problems because they have evaluated many solutions to those common problems in their training models.
Most of the problems I get called on to solve are both complex singularly unique.
Even when decomposing a problem/solution to the smallest atomic parts, it is a time-consuming effort to learn how to phrase a request to AI in such a way that the desired results are produced.
I’ve tried things like feeding an AI tool a few thousand lines of poorly written (inherited) legacy code and asked the AI tool to refactor it into modular, professionally written Pythonic code. One of the most popular AI tools literally gave up after a couple of hours.
Another tool refactored the code, which ran, but it no longer produced any results.
So, I don’t think AI itself will replace todays developers – but developers that are competent in using AI tools to accelerate their work may.
As you suggested, there will be new opportunities for what we share. I find myself sharing the “recipes” that I give to AI to solve certain problems with my teammates. I spend the time up front to “train” our AI assistant in the problem domain and the specifics of the desired responses and then my team can use those “recipe” questions to get a much more accurate “first response” from the AI tool.
There are also many use-cases that AI can’t understand because they are as much art as science and AI tends to be quite literal. For example, I do a lot of Web API programming – sometimes a 404 response is actually a 404, but often it’s something else entirely – and the something else(s) needs to be detected and handled differently.
I also think there will be a place to share the results of AI coding. If you spend weeks iterating with AI on creating the fastest inverted index sorting algorithm for hash values – sharing the results (and the steps you took to get there) might be very useful to others.
Then I look at a project like WordPress and the massive ecosystem around it. AI could create a WordPress plugin for me – but could AI (in our lifetime) ever conceive of a product as rich and nuanced as WordPress?
Maybe Open-Source developers will just migrate to focusing on building the kinds of things that can’t be distinctly defined in a request to AI.
To me – it’s the CREATIVITY of Open-Source developers who look at a problem in a new and / or unique way and implement a novel solution. I doubt AI will be able to duplicate that discretionary process. I think intelligence and creativity are not synonymous.
From the movie “I Robot”
Detective Del Spooner: Human beings have dreams. Even dogs have dreams, but not you, you are just a machine. An imitation of life. Can a robot write a symphony?
I’m curious as to your thoughts.
Hope all is well with you and yours.
joe