Cu(m^2)ulative

The vanishing first rung: How AI is hollowing out entry-level jobs

For generations, careers have begun the same way.

Sep 15 • 

Karim Fanous

1

August 2025

Competing in a world of AI abundance: How to win when code has no value?

Economics begins with scarcity.

Aug 28 • 

Karim Fanous

6

The first generation of programming directors

When I wrote about the last generation of programmers, I ended with a thought:

Aug 18 • 

Karim Fanous

7

1

The last generation of programmers

At the dawn of the industrial loom, few weavers realized they were witnessing the end of their world.

Aug 4 • 

Karim Fanous

7

2

July 2025

Platform vs. Product

Why platforms win, and what product startups can do about it

Jul 7 • 

Karim Fanous

7

June 2025

Securing AI Agents: Lessons from microservices & Zero Trust

This post is a little different than my usual ones.

Jun 10 • 

Karim Fanous

The end of (human) coding: What happens when AI writes all the code?

Over the past two weeks, I’ve been using OpenAI Codex extensively—and the experience has been nothing short of profound.

Jun 2 • 

Karim Fanous

3

April 2025

Shipping fast and staying clean: How to tame tech debt in a high-growth startup?

There’s a moment in every startup’s life when the code starts creaking.

Apr 21 • 

Karim Fanous

2

March 2025

Battle of the LLMs Part 2: Can they code and judge themselves?

In the first experiment, I tested whether LLMs could act as code reviewers, asking them to define a rubric for high-quality code and then critique a…

Mar 18 • 

Karim Fanous

2

Battle of the LLMs: Evaluating LLMs as code reviewers

A year ago, GitHub Copilot was the best AI-powered assistant a developer could get.

Mar 12 • 

Karim Fanous

3

1

January 2025

Scaling engineering teams: Building career ladders

One of the most common challenges engineering leaders face as their organization grows is creating a clear, fair, and scalable career ladder.

Jan 27 • 

Karim Fanous

4

1

December 2024

Why did Microsoft give GitHub Copilot away for free?

AI-powered code completion tools like Github Copilot, Tabnine, Amazon Q, cursor and codeium have been all the rage over the past year or so.

Dec 26, 2024 • 

Karim Fanous

2