Why AI conquered software first, and what that tells us about which industries are next.
On AI and building your own GIS software
Of the thousands of essays over the past two years surrounding AI and its implications are some very thought provoking ones with enormous implications for GIS. Some of the essays are around the the…
AI is Creating Peak Software, Media is the Best Analogy
Let's learn more about the world's most important manufactured product. Meaningful insight, timely analysis, and an occasional investment idea.
"Code was never the hard part" is an insult to all programmers — Senko Rašić
The software development profession is in the midst of upheaval. Nobody knows how the AI revolution will play out in the end, but it is c...
Presentations — Benedict Evans
Every year, I produce a big presentation exploring macro and strategic trends in the tech industry. New in May 2025, ‘AI eats the world’.
The New Software Lifecycle
I co-wrote a Google whitepaper about how AI is changing the software lifecycle. I'm not going to summarize the whole thing. Instead, here are the handful of ...
The third golden age of software engineering – thanks to AI, with Grady Booch
The third golden age of software engineering – thanks to AI, with Grady Booch
Impressions from visiting OpenAI, Anthropic, & Cursor
A peek into where software engineering is headed from inside the sector’s leading AI labs. Agents running in the cloud are a major trend, while coding harnesses are spreading beyond the craft
The Real Reason We Still Need Software Developers in the World of AI
The dream of AI churning out perfect production-ready code doesn’t hold up against the reality of modern software development.
The Scaling Era: An Oral History of AI, 2019–2025
An inside view of the AI revolution, from the people and companies making it happen.
Why AI hasn’t replaced software engineers, and won’t
Coding agents as normal technology
How building software is changing at Anthropic
A deepdive on what’s changed in how the leading AI lab makes software. Ever more code review and testing is done by AI, two-pizza teams very much alive, and more. Details from inside of Anthropic
Code Was Never the Asset - The Phoenix Architecture
Why AI makes the hidden economics of software unavoidable
The Scaling Era: An Oral History of AI, 2019–2025
An inside view of the AI revolution, from the people an…
On AI Coding and Its Discontents - Cal Newport
Back in January, I received a note from a senior software engineer in Silicon Valley. He described himself as an AI skeptic who became converted ... Read more
The Evolutionary Ecology of Software: Constraints, Innovation, and the AI Disruption
This chapter investigates the evolutionary ecology of software, focusing on the symbiotic relationship between software and innovation. An interplay between constraints, tinkering, and frequency-dependent selection drives the complex evolutionary trajectories of these socio-technological systems. Our approach integrates agent-based modeling and case studies, drawing on complex network analysis and evolutionary theory to explore how software evolves under the competing forces of novelty generation and imitation. By examining the evolution of programming languages and their impact on developer practices, we illustrate how technological artifacts co-evolve with and shape societal norms, cultural dynamics, and human interactions. This ecological perspective also informs our analysis of the emerging role of AI-driven development tools in software evolution. While large language models (LLMs) provide unprecedented access to information, their widespread adoption introduces new evolutionary pressures that may contribute to cultural stagnation, much like the decline of diversity in past software ecosystems. Understanding the evolutionary pressures introduced by AI-mediated software production is critical for anticipating broader patterns of cultural change, technological adaptation, and the future of software innovation.
