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Public story · 2026-02-25 · source-backed
The former Etsy CTO's essay is the most historically grounded take on AI coding. Core thesis: code was never the hard part — systems thinking, org design, and customer understanding were. Tech has "always fetishized the act of writing code" while successful teams knew "the value is the system." Key insight: "Review is fatiguing in a way that creating is not" — the cognitive burden shifts from generation to evaluation. Prior disruptions (web, CI/CD, mobile, SPAs, ML) all "broke how teams worked and required us to invent new ways of working." AI follows this pattern. Martin Fowler endorsed this in today's daily fragment, calling Willison "one of my most reliable sources for information about LLMs and programming." (laughingmeme.org, martinfowler.com)
Each link below shares sources, entities, or timing with this story.
Shared entities / Same source / Shared topic / What happened next
Both cover LLMs, Martin Fowler, Willison; cite the same source (martinfowler.com); overlapping topics (calling, code, fowler, willison).
Shared entities / Same source / Shared topic
Both cover LLMs, Martin Fowler, Willison; cite the same source (martinfowler.com); overlapping topics (coding, fowler).
Shared entities / Shared topic / What happened next
Both cover Core, Martin Fowler, Willison; overlapping topics (code, core, willison); picks up the Core thread on 2026-02-28.
Willison built by Agentic Engineering / Shared entity: Fowler / Same source domain / Shared topic / What happened next
Linked by a graph relationship (Willison built by Agentic Engineering); both cover Fowler; reported by the same outlet (martinfowler.com).
Shared entities / Same source domain / Shared topic / What happened next
Both cover Fowler, Martin Fowler; reported by the same outlet (martinfowler.com); overlapping topics (been, code).
Shared entities / Shared topic / What happened next
Both cover Martin Fowler, Willison; overlapping topics (code, cognitive, fowler, willison); picks up the Martin Fowler thread on 2026-03-01.
Shared entities / Same source domain / Shared topic / Earlier coverage
Both cover LLMs, Martin Fowler; reported by the same outlet (martinfowler.com); overlapping topics (code, fowler).
Shared entities / Shared topic / What happened next
Both cover LLMs, Willison; overlapping topics (broke, code, willison); picks up the LLMs thread on 2026-08-10.