There's a quiet trend emerging in 2026 that exposes a fundamental flaw in how we think about AI and headcount: companies that went all-in on AI to eliminate junior roles are now hiring junior engineers back — to babysit the AI.Let that sink in.The same executives who told their boards "we're replacing entry-level headcount with AI" are now running job reqs for engineers whose primary job is to clean up after LLMs, contain runaway token costs, and fix the technical debt that "vibe-coding" left behind. Turns out the savings weren't as permanent as they looked.The Budget That Wasn't Built for AgentsThe original promise was clean: AI compresses headcount, headcount costs drop, margins expand. And in the copilot era, where AI assisted humans rather than replaced them, it mostly held. A good engineer with Claude or Copilot genuinely does punch above their weight class.But then companies started building agents: autonomous systems executing multi-step workflows without a human in the loo

This opinion might not be popular, but a recent trip to Walt Disney World has convinced me that Disney Fastpass+ is great for Disney's bottom line, but is horrible for visitors to Walt Disney World. For those that aren't familiar with it, you can read all the details about it at Disney's site here.  The gist of it is you reserve a place in line for up to three rides a day to help shorten your wait time for those three rides.  Disney tries to sell it as allowing you to get on the rides you want with fewer lines, but honestly, it really doesn't deliver on even that promise. So why don' t I like it? Let's start at the beginning.  The planning stage. Fastpass+ can force you to plan months in advance when you don't know what that day will bring. You can book your fast passes 30 or 60 days before you visit (depending on if you're staying at a Disney Hotel).  At first, that sounds like it's a good thing.  You get to make sure before you even go that you'll be abl

Lately everywhere I look I read about the Microservice "tax".  Meaning when you implement microservices there are new dynamics involved that your company may not be accustomed to dealing with such as Additional operations overhead - Rather than just focusing on keeping one or two farms of servers up and running to a reasonable SLA you have to instead worry about as many farms as you have microservices.   Communication between services is slower than in process communications and have a higher risk of failure. Data consistency between services I completely agree with those problems, my problem isn't with the industry recognizing that there are differences with how your Microservices impact your business.  My problem is using the term "tax" to say that.  I can't think of a single instance where a "tax" is a good thing in any way shape or form.  From the time that we first understand what a tax is, we are conditioned to think that taxes are bad and somethin

One thing I've had to do a lot over the years is deal with a Monolith .  In some cases it was not a bad experience, in others it was pretty horrific.  Often Monoliths aren't an intended outcome, but unless you take explicit actions to isolate functionality as the code grows the code base will gradually grow into a Ball of Mud.  A codebase starts off as something small and focused, but then over time, it grows organically as new user stories are added to it.     As these new user stories are added the code is extended in a tightly coupled way and the Monolith can be an advantage to an organization.  It enables any of its people with the right skill set to make changes in any areas of the system.  This gives the organization a lot of flexibility in how it staffs projects, and speed in how it can effect change on its codebase.  it lets a company focus on getting the right solutions in front of i

Recently I was discussing about whether to use JSON or XML as the data exchange format for a web service.  I was surprised to hear that in today's environment my coworker wanted to use XML instead of JSON.  As for myself I pushed for JSON for a number of reasons. Now back when I first started coding years ago XML was just gaining in popularity.   At the time flexibility provided by the data structure was something new and incredibly useful.  Couple that with its ability to have defined schemas and transformations and it was a very interesting and powerful tool to use.  The first time I implemented web services in production I used XML for the requests and responses, and it worked very well.  After that I moved on and worked some SOAP services and again the XML worked really well. Then about a decade or so ago I was introduced to the idea of using JSON instead of XML.  I admit, at first I was resistant.  Why change?  XML worked well

I saw this post and felt sick to my stomach.  I can't believe that Disney is testing elminating a wait for any line.  To me part of a vacation is the ability to kick back and go with the flow, make things up as you go along.  I know with Disney there is a growing segment of the population that feels like its a once in a lifetime trip, and they want it to be perfect.  So they plan everything down to the last minute.   However these are also the type of people that come home and say Disney is a terrible place to go.  Once their finally laid out plans fail in some way either due to a kid being too tired to git up at the crack of dawn, or taking to long (in the parents minds) to eat their lunch, or a ride going down unexpectedly, or a lunch seating running late, or it starts to rain, or you get the idea...   Anyway once those finely laid plans break down these people just can't deal with the change and the whole day is ruined.   We experience th

Now before I get into this.  I first want to establish that I'm a Disney fan.  My family and I have seen/own all the Pixar movies to date (including Toy Story 3, reasons below), and enjoy them  The Incredibles is one of my top 10 movies to watch.  We go to Walt Disney World at least once a year (sometimes more), we belong to the Disney Vacation Club.  In short, we're only a Disneyana membership short of being feral Disney addicts. That being said i really don't undestand the hype around Toy Story 3.  From what I can tell its just a rehash of Toy Story 2 wth the major roles reversed.  In Toy Story 2 (TS2 from now on)  Woody is the one freaking out about his lot in life, and the rest of the gang is trying to make him feel better.  In Toy Story 3 (TS3) its the opposite, the whole gang is freaking out about their lot in life and Woody is the one trying to make them feel better.  So right out of the gate the overall plot of the movie has a s

Like all parents, my wife and I have been struggling with getting our kids to help out more around the house.  They're good kids and they do the chores when we ask them, but like most kids they aren't crazy about the whole thing. Then a few weeks ago I was reading Influencer: The Power to Change Anything and I got an idea.  I was reading the section on changing peoples behaviors and how its hard.  You know what, I get that, I've seen it first hand in my job over the years.  In one role in particular the people I worked with were gun shy about ever trying to change peoples behaviors because they've never gotten it to stick. The book talked about how you have to give them an incentive to change their behavior, one that appeals to their ethics, morals, and points of view while also interesting them enough to stick with it.  As I read about that I started thinking about how I could use this to help my kids do chores. Now I've also been a video gamer for years, and

I don't think I like this new version of Monopoly.  From what I remember about playing Monopoly as a kid half the fun was cheating.  And isn't that what a monopoly is really all about anyway? It was always fun trying to sneak out on not paying the rent when the property owner forgot to check, or slipping yourself an extra 50 from the bank when no one else was looking. Not to mention the fact for some reason that all seeing tower makes me feel like I'm sneaking through Mordor, Just saying.  

The latest game I've been playing is Magicka.  Its an action adventure game where you're a wizard running around you're typical medieval world casting spells. So what's the big deal?  Well there are a few great points to bear in mind. First there is the spellcasting system.  Essentially you're given a number of spell casting aspects you can combine for a spell.  First there are a number of elements (Fire, Earth, Lightning, Cold, Life, and Water), plus a couple of ways to enhance them (shield or arcane).  So you combine up to five of those and then specify how you want to cast the spell (as an AOE, on yourself, or as a projectile).   You can use your spells however you want.  Do you want to just blow things up from a distance?  Then create a fireball with lots of earth and fire.  Do you want to lure things in and do AOE damage?  Then grab some fire, lightning, and a little arcane for spice and anything close to you drops like a rock. &n