Yesterday I was chatting with a friend. I mentioned a project I've been working on recently—using AI to reduce hardware TCO (Total Cost of Ownership), automated tuning, and remote operations.
He suddenly said: "Aren't you making yourself a public enemy with this?"
I was taken aback.
He explained: A large company with hundreds of people originally had an entire team dedicated to performance testing and tuning. Now you write a piece of software by yourself, stuff a few Agents into it, and get all the work done. Aren't you basically stealing jobs from those hundreds of people? Then there's the operations team—originally they opened tickets and followed processes, but now Agents handle everything automatically. Their KPIs have completely vanished.
After hearing this, I had a different thought.
Large Companies Have Become a Liability
The processes, systems, and organizational structures accumulated in the past are not moats in this AI transformation—they're baggage.
A small team of three to five people can say "let's try this" and make the decision on the spot. A week later, they're already using the top-tier models.
What about large companies? They need pilots, approvals, have to consider fairness—who gets to use it and who doesn't? Will others have complaints? Back and forth for two to three weeks, and maybe only one or two people are in the pilot.
How Much Difference Can One Week Make Now?
Using the best models, one week of productivity could be worlds apart. Not to mention two or three weeks.
I suddenly realized something: everyone has been leveled.
One person, three to five people—they use the same tools as ByteDance or Google. The gap isn't as big as imagined. More importantly—no one knows how to collaborate right now. One person runs incredibly fast, but how do the people behind keep up? How do they coordinate? No one has figured this out yet.
This is precisely the window of opportunity.
FOMO Is Not Unfounded
In one or two months, someone will inevitably figure out an optimal organizational paradigm, a process for creating value. By then, if you're starting from zero, how much time will you spend exploring and gelling the team together?
I used to think that "can't wait" anxiety was a bit excessive. Now I understand.
Trillion-dollar-level value—the puzzle is already 80% complete. What's left is for a small team to spend some time and execute it well.
At a time like this, waiting even one second longer is a waste.
I never understood why so many people would leave perfectly good positions and high salaries to start businesses. Now I get it—that feeling of "about to realize some grand vision" makes you feel that waiting even one more second is a waste of time.
Not because of personal gain or loss. But because some societal value truly cannot wait.
Your First Step
So I also want to say: go try AI coding. These capabilities aren't hard to acquire right now. It gives everyone a relatively equal opportunity to ride this wave.
Miss it, and it might really be gone.