Open source veteran André Staltz says farewell to programming: AI has killed the craft
johnlindquist · x · 2026-09-11
Well-known open source developer and reactive programming evangelist André Staltz published a long-form post declaring that 2026 is likely the last year he writes code by hand — and possibly one of the last he reads it — closing out a two-decade-plus career.
- He started with game dev in 2001, got serious with K&R's "The C Programming Language" in 2004, and became known for open source libraries and conference talks.
- His core argument: with every frontier model release, the likelihood of AI slop keeps dropping, and the economic case for typing code line by line "is vanishing — have vanished."
- He isn't sad: he now coordinates "an entire team of myself equivalents" from his phone or by voice, and enjoys the productivity boost.
- He calls for an intentional pause — "a minute of silence" — treating programming as a dead craft rather than dismissing his journey as merely the inefficient pre-AI era.
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