How I Use "AI"
type: NewsArticle
description: Large language models (LLMs) are not overhyped, citing a year of consistent personal use that has made them 50% faster at coding. They provide concrete examples of using LLMs to build webapps, convert code, automate tasks, and replace web searches for debugging and learning. The post aims to ground the conversation by focusing on current, practical productivity gains rather than speculative future capabilities.
date published: 2024-08-01T00:00:00+00:00
date modified: 2026-05-19T22:10:58+00:00
language: en
is accessible for free: true
article body: I don't think that "AI" models I hate this word. It's not AI. But I want people who use this word, and also people who hate this word, to find this post. And so I guess I'm stuck with it for marketing, SEO, and clickbait. (by which I mean: large language models) are over-hyped. Yes, it's true that any new technology will attract the grifters. And it is definitely true that many companies like to say they're "Using AI" in the same way they previously said they were powered by "The Blockchain". (As we've seen again, and again, and again, and again.) It's also the case we may be in a bubble. The internet was a bubble that burst in 2000, but the Internet applications we now have are what was previously the stuff of literal science fiction. But the reason I think that the recent advances we've made aren't just hype is that, over the past year, I have spent at least a few hours every week interacting with various large language models, and have been consistently impressed by their ability to solve increasingly difficult tasks I give them. And as a result of this, I would say I'm at least 50% faster at writing code for both my research projects and my side projects as a result of these models. Most of the people online I find who talk about LLM utility are either wildly optimistic, and claim all jobs will be automated within three years, or wildly pessimistic, and say they have contributed nothing and never will. So in this post, I just want to try and ground the conversation. I'm not going to make any arguments about what the future holds. I just want to provide a list of 50 conversations that I (a programmer and research scientist studying machine learning) have had with different large language models to meaningfully improve my ability to perform research and help me work on random coding side projects. Among these: Building entire webapps with technology I've never used before. Teaching me how to use various frameworks having never previously used them. Converting doze…
publisher: Web Pulse
keywords: large-language-models, artificial-intelligence, machine-learning, research, developer-tools
citation: CreativeWork