--- title: Simon Willison’s Weblog | daily.dev description: AI coding agents have dramatically reduced the cost of writing code, disrupting long-held engineering intuitions about trade-offs in planning, refactoring,... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3 twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Simon Willison’s Weblog | daily.dev og:description: AI coding agents have dramatically reduced the cost of writing code, disrupting long-held engineering intuitions about trade-offs in planning, refactoring,... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3 og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/YpCurXoB3.png og:image:alt: Simon Willison’s Weblog og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Simon Willison’s Weblog **[Hacker News](https://daily.dev/sources/hn)** · 4 min read · 1 upvotes · 1 comments ## Summary AI coding agents have dramatically reduced the cost of writing code, disrupting long-held engineering intuitions about trade-offs in planning, refactoring, testing, and documentation. While generating code is now nearly free, producing *good* code—correct, tested, documented, maintainable, and secure—still carries significant cost and requires developer judgment. The piece argues that engineers need to develop new personal and organizational habits to adapt, including reconsidering previously dismissed features or improvements by simply firing off an async agent prompt to see if it's worth pursuing. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Community discussion Top comments from developers on daily.dev. **@feketegy** · 0 upvotes > Coding isn't cheap with AI agents either, it's just most people didn't found this one out yet. ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AI should help us produce better code - Agentic Engineering Patterns](https://daily.dev/posts/ai-should-help-us-produce-better-code---agentic-engineering-patterns-pjgeflk15) · Lobsters · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Managing the Hidden Overhead of AI Software Engineering](https://daily.dev/posts/managing-the-hidden-overhead-of-ai-software-engineering-odnh0uxvl) · DEV · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [The silent death of Good Code](https://daily.dev/posts/the-silent-death-of-good-code-arepifee8) · Hacker News · 10 upvotes · 2 comments - [I Miss Writing Code](https://daily.dev/posts/i-miss-writing-code-yxc7ryasd) · iamluminousmen · 0 upvotes · 1 comments --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Simon Willison’s Weblog","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3"},"datePublished":"2026-02-24T04:12:04.178Z","dateModified":"2026-02-24T04:12:21.816Z","description":"AI coding agents have dramatically reduced the cost of writing code, disrupting long-held engineering intuitions about trade-offs in planning, refactoring,...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--CxzD6vbw--/f_auto/v1722860399/public/Placeholder%2005","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--CxzD6vbw--/f_auto/v1722860399/public/Placeholder%2005","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Hacker News","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Hacker News","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/hn","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},"commentCount":1,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":1},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":1}],"keywords":"","timeRequired":"PT4M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Hacker News","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Simon Willison’s Weblog"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/simon-willison-s-weblog-ypcurxob3","comment":[{"@type":"Comment","text":"Coding isn’t cheap with AI agents either, it’s just most people didn’t found this one out yet.","datePublished":"2026-02-24T08:04:01.818Z","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/YpCurXoB3#c-AfLwlWedz","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"George","url":"https://daily.dev/feketegy","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--YeiBYVuL--/f_auto/v1743758421/avatars/avatar_dR92D50hh"}}]} ```