Phil Calçado
@philcalcado.com
Headed engineering for companies w/ either millions of users but no revenue or millions in revenue but no users.
Last week’s post about companies claiming they’re more productive than ever while delivering about the same as ever ended up being a tongue-in-cheek Rorschach test.
Silicon Valley - Pied Piper's product
YouTube video by Scott Olson
www.youtube.com
January 12, 2026 at 12:42 AM
Last week’s post about companies claiming they’re more productive than ever while delivering about the same as ever ended up being a tongue-in-cheek Rorschach test.
Coding agents and vibe coding have enabled teams to write more code in the last six months than in the past ten years!
And yet the pace of shipped features and the actual value delivered feels the same as ever.
So… wtf is all this code y’all writing?
And yet the pace of shipped features and the actual value delivered feels the same as ever.
So… wtf is all this code y’all writing?
January 9, 2026 at 1:14 PM
Coding agents and vibe coding have enabled teams to write more code in the last six months than in the past ten years!
And yet the pace of shipped features and the actual value delivered feels the same as ever.
So… wtf is all this code y’all writing?
And yet the pace of shipped features and the actual value delivered feels the same as ever.
So… wtf is all this code y’all writing?
Haven’t had to miss BJJ yet this year—2026 has started off than 2025 already
January 7, 2026 at 1:11 AM
Haven’t had to miss BJJ yet this year—2026 has started off than 2025 already
Did I...just DoS Verizon?
January 6, 2026 at 8:43 PM
Did I...just DoS Verizon?
The problem with AI is that it tastes like stevia. I will not be taking questions at this time, thank you
January 2, 2026 at 10:10 PM
The problem with AI is that it tastes like stevia. I will not be taking questions at this time, thank you
Using Claude Code to write Ruby feels like spending 70% of your time trying to exorcise DHH’s ghost from the shell just to get some minimal modularity.
December 23, 2025 at 3:13 PM
Using Claude Code to write Ruby feels like spending 70% of your time trying to exorcise DHH’s ghost from the shell just to get some minimal modularity.
Spec-Driven Development is a lovely new buzzword, right up until you remember LLMs are systems optimized to cheat their way into satisfying arbitrary constraints.
December 15, 2025 at 1:02 AM
Spec-Driven Development is a lovely new buzzword, right up until you remember LLMs are systems optimized to cheat their way into satisfying arbitrary constraints.
Turns out Slack and code reviews were missing one very specific emoji reaction. I present :sad-dijkstra:
December 13, 2025 at 6:08 PM
Turns out Slack and code reviews were missing one very specific emoji reaction. I present :sad-dijkstra:
December 10, 2025 at 5:13 PM
Now I really want to see what changed in that ToS…
December 6, 2025 at 12:31 AM
Now I really want to see what changed in that ToS…
You either die a Web 2.0 hero, or live long enough to be acquired by Bending Spoons.
December 3, 2025 at 1:37 AM
You either die a Web 2.0 hero, or live long enough to be acquired by Bending Spoons.
When IBM’s CEO drops a “and here’s the catch” in his interview with @reckless.bsky.social and your brain immediately thinks “this dude is AI?”
December 1, 2025 at 2:01 PM
When IBM’s CEO drops a “and here’s the catch” in his interview with @reckless.bsky.social and your brain immediately thinks “this dude is AI?”
AI engineers are being built by people whose only professional experience is solving coding puzzles competitively, to replace people whose only real professional skill is solving coding puzzles in interviews. And to be fair, they’re really good at that.
November 29, 2025 at 10:07 PM
AI engineers are being built by people whose only professional experience is solving coding puzzles competitively, to replace people whose only real professional skill is solving coding puzzles in interviews. And to be fair, they’re really good at that.
Teen Vogue in 2016
The Verge in 2025
The Verge in 2025
Everyone underestimates how entertaining I find these interactions
November 27, 2025 at 12:17 AM
Teen Vogue in 2016
The Verge in 2025
The Verge in 2025
Base44 guy on a podcast:
— Salesforce, Atlassian… just a UI on a DB. People will build their own
— Funny, those guys told me they built their own internal Base44 in-house in 3 months
— Look, anyone can build a vibe-coding app… they just don’t get our platform’s complexity… like async jobs!
— Salesforce, Atlassian… just a UI on a DB. People will build their own
— Funny, those guys told me they built their own internal Base44 in-house in 3 months
— Look, anyone can build a vibe-coding app… they just don’t get our platform’s complexity… like async jobs!
November 24, 2025 at 2:53 PM
Base44 guy on a podcast:
— Salesforce, Atlassian… just a UI on a DB. People will build their own
— Funny, those guys told me they built their own internal Base44 in-house in 3 months
— Look, anyone can build a vibe-coding app… they just don’t get our platform’s complexity… like async jobs!
— Salesforce, Atlassian… just a UI on a DB. People will build their own
— Funny, those guys told me they built their own internal Base44 in-house in 3 months
— Look, anyone can build a vibe-coding app… they just don’t get our platform’s complexity… like async jobs!
For a small-ish neighborhood, Carroll Gardens really punches above its weight in random recognizable people who live around here. There’s a wealth of internet-famous comedians, a few tech household names, and the occasional actor just like buying bread.
November 21, 2025 at 9:36 PM
For a small-ish neighborhood, Carroll Gardens really punches above its weight in random recognizable people who live around here. There’s a wealth of internet-famous comedians, a few tech household names, and the occasional actor just like buying bread.
In hindsight, letting the ducks type was a mistake.
November 17, 2025 at 5:28 PM
In hindsight, letting the ducks type was a mistake.
SLOs are a psyop designed by big tech to nerdsnipe smaller companies into arguing about outages, “availability,” and whether a chair is even a chair, instead of shipping anything.
November 13, 2025 at 4:40 PM
SLOs are a psyop designed by big tech to nerdsnipe smaller companies into arguing about outages, “availability,” and whether a chair is even a chair, instead of shipping anything.
when you work in a monolith, need to stack PRs, and that one PR everything else was rebased off is finally reviewed
November 12, 2025 at 6:42 PM
when you work in a monolith, need to stack PRs, and that one PR everything else was rebased off is finally reviewed
Corporate email inbox these days is either a million irrelevant notifications or that one HR email that, if you miss it, they cancel your health insurance and legally declare you dead.
November 5, 2025 at 5:09 PM
Corporate email inbox these days is either a million irrelevant notifications or that one HR email that, if you miss it, they cancel your health insurance and legally declare you dead.
My new favorite way to be passive-aggressive when someone says some stupid shit is to start with: “You are absolutely right!”
November 5, 2025 at 2:27 PM
My new favorite way to be passive-aggressive when someone says some stupid shit is to start with: “You are absolutely right!”
What phase of the bubble is it when JetBrains is wheatpasting AI ads in a sleepy Carroll Gardens corner. someone’s about to switch IDEs on the walk to get fresh mozzarella from Caputo’s?
November 1, 2025 at 3:13 PM
What phase of the bubble is it when JetBrains is wheatpasting AI ads in a sleepy Carroll Gardens corner. someone’s about to switch IDEs on the walk to get fresh mozzarella from Caputo’s?
OH: We send a lot of stuff to Datadog, but mostly money.
October 27, 2025 at 5:22 AM
OH: We send a lot of stuff to Datadog, but mostly money.