Code is a commodity

The most expensive, and important thing in software used to be the code itself. Now the code is cheap, abundant, and fast to produce. That shift changes what matters. I used to think that it was important for me to learn programming languages, and understand how the computer works. But now I’m not so sure.

Why code got cheap

Three forces converged:

• FOSS erased the cost of building common components.
• Large Clouds (AWS/GCP/Azure) collapsed the cost of running them.
• “AI” (OpenAI/Anthropic) collapsed the cost of writing new code.

When the marginal cost of “more code” starts approaching ZERO, you stop optimizing for code production and start optimizing for everything around it.

What still isn’t a commodity

Code is now like steel: essential, but not differentiating on its own. The differentiation is in:

• Choosing the right thing to build (we’re still trying-out things like OpenClaw).
• Shipping at the right time.

The danger of cheap code

When code is free, waste explodes:

• Low-quality features and “spam” proliferates.
• Complexity accumulates faster than it is paid down.
• Engineering teams are made to ship more without learning more.