gg2
Fuck it, make it anyway
Archived — this story has rotated out of today’s deck. It is kept here in full.
The gist
Software developer Joel Auterson published the essay "Fuck it, make it anyway" on September 11, 2026.
It describes a motivation crash he ties to generative AI's effect on makers' work.
Background
Auterson runs a tiny indie game studio called Bearwaves and is also a published poet. In the essay he says he "crashed out this week" — an implosion of resolve and motivation — and attributes it to generative AI and "the ongoing devaluation of the work of artists and makers." He wrote it to record his thought process "in case anyone else is going through the same thing, especially, probably, sadly, future me."
How it unfolded
- Sep 6, 2026A TikTok discovery page titled "Im Gonna Do It Anyway" posts the line "Be the one who says, 'F*ck it—I'm gonna do it anyway.'"
- Sep 7, 2026An Instagram reel posts the text "Fuck it, we're all gonna die anyway." alongside "I'm too busy building it, learning, growing, figuring it out, and making it work."
- Sep 9, 2026An Instagram post reads "FUCK THE ODDS. DO IT ANYWAY," urging readers to set goals so high they scare you and then do it anyway.
- Sep 11, 2026Joel Auterson publishes the essay "Fuck it, make it anyway" on joelotter.com.
- Sep 12, 2026A Hacker News submission of the essay, posted by user JayOtter, sits at 5 points and 13 minutes old at capture.
Who’s saying what
- Author
- Auterson says he does not enjoy programming with a code assistant: "It isn't fun for me, the output doesn't feel like mine, and I take no pride in what it produces."
- Author
- He says "every programmer I know has basically gone insane over the last couple of years" and calls it "the most turbulent time to be a software engineer I can remember."
- Author
- He adds he can't blame anyone who has gone along with AI tools, since "peer pressure is very real, and LLMs are genuinely very capable at code generation now."