read_list
List of resources (any medium) that caught my attention this year (2025 edition). If curious check also:
- 1. JAN-2026
- 1.1. Prepare for That Stupid World
- 1.2. I Program on the Subway
- 1.3. Understanding Query Execution with the Analyzer
- 1.4. Your Supabase Is Public
- 1.5. Creator of Go Crashes out - YouTube
- 1.6. Legendary Game Dev Jonathan Blow
- 1.7. Assorted less(1) tips
- 1.8. Be Wary of Digital Deskilling - Cal Newport
- 1.9. I’m addicted to being useful
- 1.10. How I estimate work as a staff software engineer
- 1.11. Introduction to PostgreSQL Indexes ::
- 1.12. Bridges - by Kent Beck - Software Design: Tidy First?
- 2. FEB-2025
- 2.1. Opinion
- 2.2. A Step Behind the Bleeding Edge: Monarch’s Philosophy on AI in Dev – Somehow Manage
- 2.3. The future of software engineering is SRE
- 2.4. Generative AI and Wikipedia editing: What we learned in 2025 – Wiki Education
- 2.5. The gentle obsolescence - by Benn Stancil - benn.substack
- 2.6. When internal hostnames are leaked to the clown
- 2.7. (AI) Slop Terrifies Me – ezhik.jp
- 2.8. I Started Programming When I Was 7. I’m 50 Now, and the Thing I Loved Has Changed
- 2.9. Your Job Isn’t Disappearing. It’s Shrinking Around You in Real Time
- 2.10. AI makes you boring
1. JAN-2026
1.1. Prepare for That Stupid World
- https://ploum.net/2025-12-19-prepare-for-that-world.html
normalising the fact that “even if it is completely stupid, AI will be everywhere, get used to it!”
1.2. I Program on the Subway
- https://www.scd31.com/posts/programming-on-the-subway Creative use of time. Like Ryan Holiday’s suggestion to be extremely careful about interstinial/do-nothing time.
1.3. Understanding Query Execution with the Analyzer
- https://clickhouse.com/docs/guides/developer/understanding-query-execution-with-the-analyzer Something I’m learning by heart these days. Combining with https://roundup.getdbt.com/p/the-evolution-of-databases-w-wolfram
1.4. Your Supabase Is Public
1.5. Creator of Go Crashes out - YouTube
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9i3VTFxd_Q Prime’s contrarian take. +1
1.6. Legendary Game Dev Jonathan Blow
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vHfdUqLmPNU The only reasons why games may ever be interesting again and this is because of rants in The Future of Code podcast.
1.7. Assorted less(1) tips
- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46464120 Learning less!
1.8. Be Wary of Digital Deskilling - Cal Newport
- https://calnewport.com/be-wary-of-digital-deskilling/
- I keep coming to this concept, it’s memorable and somewhat valuable
1.9. I’m addicted to being useful
1.10. How I estimate work as a staff software engineer
- https://www.seangoedecke.com/how-i-estimate-work/ Sean again :) The standard way of thinking about estimates is that you start with a proposed piece of software work, and you then go and figure out how long it will take. This is entirely backwards. Instead, teams will often start with the estimate, and then go and figure out what kind of software work they can do to meet it.
1.11. Introduction to PostgreSQL Indexes ::
- https://dlt.github.io/blog/posts/introduction-to-postgresql-indexes/ Bookmarking for later, because we started PG managed service starting 2026. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rpBA13nQxAk
1.12. Bridges - by Kent Beck - Software Design: Tidy First?
- https://tidyfirst.substack.com/p/bridges important
2. FEB-2025
2.1. Opinion
2.2. A Step Behind the Bleeding Edge: Monarch’s Philosophy on AI in Dev – Somehow Manage
- https://somehowmanage.com/2026/01/22/a-step-behind-the-bleeding-edge-monarchs-philosophy-on-ai-in-dev/ Looking at what a quick smartphone adoption done to the genZ, I’m not adopting AI too quickly. Only where it sharpens the old skills.
2.3. The future of software engineering is SRE
- https://swizec.com/blog/the-future-of-software-engineering-is-sre/?utm_source=changelog-news robustness, robustness, robustness
2.4. Generative AI and Wikipedia editing: What we learned in 2025 – Wiki Education
- https://wikiedu.org/blog/2026/01/29/generative-ai-and-wikipedia-editing-what-we-learned-in-2025/ Bookmarking pangram.
2.5. The gentle obsolescence - by Benn Stancil - benn.substack
- https://benn.substack.com/p/the-gentle-obsolescence Interesting re-framimg and trashing the “Intern” frame around AI. Timely?
2.6. When internal hostnames are leaked to the clown
2.7. (AI) Slop Terrifies Me – ezhik.jp
- https://ezhik.jp/ai-slop-terrifies-me/ A series of journey(code) enthusiasts accepting the end of engineering as we knew it since the birth of hFortran. This is the end, beautiful friend.
2.8. I Started Programming When I Was 7. I’m 50 Now, and the Thing I Loved Has Changed
- https://www.jamesdrandall.com/posts/the_thing_i_loved_has_changed/ Another in the series of mourning/grieving and ACCEPTING the end of death of coding as the essence of software engineering. New chapter’s here. Death deserves grief.
2.9. Your Job Isn’t Disappearing. It’s Shrinking Around You in Real Time
- https://newsletter.jantegze.com/p/your-job-isnt-disappearing-its-shrinking The adaptation strategy is to use new technology as an enabler or doing things previously unforeseen. Not fight it. Not learn it. Kind of “Gas Town” move? Still, it’s too amorphous to spend time with, in my opinion. Rather, read the structure of scientific revolution by TS Kuhn again and other histories of technologicial revolutions. This is not the first time, it’s going to rhyme.
2.10. AI makes you boring
The AI Vampire. This was an unusually hard post to…
- https://steve-yegge.medium.com/the-ai-vampire-eda6e4f07163 On the dark side of Agentic Engineering, it being too exhausting. But is not everything in the amorophous/berserk mode?
How I Use Claude Code
- https://boristane.com/blog/how-i-use-claude-code/ A bit waterfall-y, but better than berserk. Waiting for AIAgile.