and it's all being shut down.

the UK Online Safety Act creates a massive liability, and whilst at first glance the risk seems low the reality is that moderating people usually provokes ire from those people, if we had to moderate them because they were a threat to the community then they are usually the kind of people who get angry.

in 28 years of running forums, as a result of moderation I've had people try to get the domain revoked, fake copyright notices, death threats, stalkers (IRL and online)... as a forum moderator you are known, and you are a target, and the Online Safety Act creates a weapon that can be used against you. the risk is no longer hypothetical, so even if I got lawyers involved to be compliant I'd still have the liability and risk.

in over 28 years I've run close to 500 fora in total, and they've changed so many lives.

I created them to provide a way for those without families to build families, to catch the waifs and strays, and to try to hold back loneliness, depression, and the risk of isolation and suicide... and it worked, it still works.

but on 17th March 2025 it will become too much, no longer tenable, the personal liability and risks too significant.

I guess I'm just the first to name a date, and now we'll watch many small communities slowly shutter.

the Online Safety Act was supposed to hold big tech to account, but in fact they're the only ones who will be able to comply... it consolidates more on those platforms.

The more I speak with fellow engineers, the more I hear that some of them are either using AI to help them code, or feed entire projects to AI and let the AI code, while they do code review and adjustments.

I didn't want to believe in it, but I think it's here. And even arguments like "feeding proprietary code" will be eventually solved by companies hosting their own isolated LLMs as they become better and hardware becomes more available.

My prediction is that junior to mid level software engineering will disappear mostly, while senior engineers will transition to be more of a guiding hand to LLMs output, until eventually LLMs will become so good, that senior people won't be needed any more.

So, fellow software engineers, how do you future-proof your career in light of, the inevitable, LLM take over?

--- EDIT ---

I want to clarify something, because there seems to be slight misunderstanding.

A lot of people have been talking about SWE being not only about code, and I agree with that. But it's also easier to sell this idea to a young person who is just starting in this career. And while I want this Ask HN to be helpful to young/fresh engineers as well, I'm more interested in getting help for myself, and many others who are in a similar position.

I have almost two decades of SWE experience. But despite that, I seem to have missed the party where they told us that "coding is not a means to an end", and realized it in the past few years. I bet there are people out there who are in a similar situations. How can we future-proof our career?