Dan Kim

My LinkedIn timeline today: The Engineering Manager role is dead Wake up call for engineers — clean code doesn’t matter, only results Gonna be fun to come back to those posts in a couple years

I can’t believe I have to say this, but just because some dude says they shipped something in a week using AI doesn’t make it true (or good).

Building a full stack webapp entirely using Jetbrains frameworks and Kotlin has long been a dream of mine.

Pretty much every company has AI bros, we know that.

I’ve heard a version of the phrase “This isn’t what I signed up for” a few times this week, from vastly different folks in tech.

Well made software products and well run product companies will make it through the AI hype cycle, no problem.

Starting a post with anything remotely like “I’m in the top 1% of AI users…” is not the flex you think it is.

The three phases of execs with AI brain rot: Wow, look at how powerful these hammers are.

Laying off engineers, designers, and PMs because you think AI will replace them is a real “tell me you know nothing about AI without telling me you know nothing about AI” moment.

Manage your people and company better and you won’t have to blame AI for layoffs.

When I was an IC engineer, I learned a lot by reading pull requests.

This is gonna sound old man and “back in my day” but I genuinely long for the days of brevity.

Literally anyone can use AI to blindly make a thing.

I like the premise that engineers are “lazy”, understanding that it’s very much a virtue and compliment when used appropriately.

I sent this out last Friday, and now after a week has passed where I was AI-ing a lot, it feels even truer.

This is wildly helpful yet hadn’t heard about it til now.

I don’t know what is says about me and/or the state of tech in general but I absolutely LOVE, LOVE, LOVE plaintextsports.com.

Along with some broader points about responsible AI usage, Fastmail CEO Bron Gondwana reminds us how important email is.

Worth a reminder: everyone you work with is going through something outside of work.

Trust me, when someone signs up for your service, nobody wants 50 emails in the first week explaining all the amazing things it does.

Please never change Dropbox, you’re still BY FAR the best at file sync and file management.

It’s well known that multitasking is a myth and that constantly jumping around wastes more time than it saves, but now we’re supposed to “orchestrate” like 17 different agents at once and expect amazing outcomes?

When I block an AI hype bro on LinkedIn (“I’ll teach you how to 10x your engineers with AI!”)

Good one by Nathaniel Fishel on hype bros locking in on AI vanity metrics: The winners will be the ones with the discipline to measure what matters: Does the user’s life get better, or did we just make our repo bigger?

I’m still pretty new at my current gig and it’s reminded me that the hardest thing to figure out in any new role, especially as a manager, is knowing out how much to get involved, what to change, what to keep, and maybe most importantly when to just stay…

Say it with me for the people in the back (aka, those stuck in the AI slop hype bubble): WRITING CODE HAS NEVER BEEN THE BOTTLENECK.

It’s such an odd but kinda fun feeling to be the old, grizzled, experienced dude in the room.

It’s like, cool to listen to Weezer again?!

I’m not a doomsdayer but there’s something very cool about someone taking the time to package up terabytes of human knowledge in case an internet disabled apocalypse hits, and wrap it up nicely in an open source app.

This entire post about when and how to slow down in the age of AI by James Stanier is full of great stuff, including this: If the decisions that precede execution are flawed, AI will faithfully implement those flaws in a way that looks like fully featured…

I’m pragmatic and a tech nerd, so I’m not gonna sit here and say I don’t use AI tools.

An astute observation from M.G.

For all these stories about AI creating 500,000 lines of code and 90% of an app in 10 minutes, where are the follow up posts about the meaningful, measurable outcomes it created?

This is the tech bro bullshit worldview we’re up against.

I know it’s not serious but I’m still proud of my 0%.

Some of the smartest, most thoughtful people I know in tech are extremely skeptical of AI.

We literally can’t go a week without a mass layoff, this time by Epic.

At the risk of sounding corny, as a grizzled (but experienced) old dude, I can tell you with great confidence that your values – what you believe way down deep – is the best thing to help you navigate your career choices.

There are people in 2026 talking about how many lines of code they shipped with a straight face.

Just read an AI hype post saying their vibe coding got them 90% complete on a project.

Funny how all these over the top “AI is changing everything!”

Still mulling over the Block layoffs, and one thing that caught my eye was how many folks who were let go were there for easily 6, 8, even 10 years or more.

Then I took that context map - I have never written a line of Terraform in my life - and spent 40 minutes with an Al to generate roughly 80% of the correct answer.

Emily Gorcenski on Bluesky: “But guess what—they all require you to still be a good software developer.

You Can’t Prompt Your Way to Judgment by Dr.

John Miller on LinkedIn writes: You can run 20 parallel codex threads.

Kind of hilarious to see a company make a big deal about how rigorous they are about hiring, but also have the same role open for literally a year in a market flooded with candidates.

This conversation on AI with Anil Dash is so good.

This post by Naoko Takeda on their experience with the Block layoff (not being laid off but leaving anyway) is hardcore.

Instant block for anyone who even remotely attempts to piggyback on the Square/Cash App layoffs to advertise their product.