Be the outlier blog.

src/pages/blog/be-the-outlier.mdx

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+---
+layout: "@/layouts/global.astro"
+title: "Your Job Now: Be The Outlier"
+author: kixelated
+description: Embrace the median and be the outlier. Not MoQ related, but advice for software engineers instead.
+cover: "/blog/be-the-outlier/narwhal.png"
+date: 2025-06-07
+---
+
+# Your Job Now: Be The Outlier
+
+I've been [working on a startup](/application-first) for the last month.
+I'll have an MVP very soon, but until then, I thought you could use a short LinkedIn cringe post.
+
+## Median Pilot
+Humans have been operating machines for a while now.
+We use them for all sorts of things, from mass producing bobbleheads to flinging us through the air in a metal tube at a speed that I'm still very uncomfortable with.
+They're fantastic, and we're going to keep utilizing machines more and more until we meet some fiery end.
+And that's my job as a software engineer.
+
+We've always aimed for the median.
+You want a car that drives straight.
+You want 2+2 to equal 4.
+You want the metal tube in the sky to stay level in the sky.
+Outliers are identified and eliminated.
+
+LLMs continue that trend, doing an amazing job slurping up the internet and finding a (rough) median.
+We don't want hallucinations.
+They're the outliers that models are getting better at filtering out.
+Every day models get more and more accurate, and more and more homogeneous.
+
+## Outlier Pilot
+Our job now is to introduce outliers.
+
+AI is getting extraordinarily good at generating *boring* code.
+There's nothing wrong with boring code.
+Boring code flies a plane.
+Boring code collects a paycheck.
+But boring pilots are the first to be automated.
+They don't add value, and a pilot that doesn't add value is often just a liability.
+
+If you want to make something special in `current_year`, then you need to learn *when* to introduce outliers.
+You have to ignore the AI sometimes not because it's wrong, but because it's too boring.
+In a sea of fish, you want to be a narwhal.
+Sure, the horn doesn't make a whole lot of sense and they're a boring shade of gray, but they are undeniably unicorns.
+
+My humble advice is to vibe code...whatever that means.
+Absolutely hit tab on the boilerplate and non-consequential stuff.
+Automate the boring parts so you can spend more of your time on other things.
+Choose some components to be the outliers so your application is *different*.
+It doesn't matter if your outliers are "worse" than the median, they'll still stand out.
+
+For example, I used ChatGPT to spit out a [pretty good controls UI](/watch).
+I was going to do the same thing for my new project, but I realized, "fuck that".
+I don't even like emojis, why am I copying that style?
+Is it because every `README.md` does it, or worse, because ChatGPT *loves* emojis?
+
+- 📌 A bullet point list.
+- 😄 With an emoji in front of each line.
+- 🔥 Is super easy to do.
+- 👴 But gets old fast.
+
+I'm not an artist, but the least I can do is draw a narwhal instead.
+That's my outlier, and you'll remember it.
+
+<figure>
+	![Narwhal](/blog/be-the-outlier/narwhal.png)
+	<figcaption>Damn, that's a good narwhal.</figcaption>
+</figure>
+
+
+## The Skeptics
+One last note for the software engineers who don't want to vibe.
+I know you exist, I see the complaining on Reddit.
+
+Look, I'm not trying to sell you anything.
+I'm not founding a startup marketing itself as "Cursor for X" and collecting my riches.
+I've been doing live video for a decade now, I like it, and it's nice being an expert at something.
+
+But, if you're not using tools like ChatGPT, Copilot, Cursor, etc., in your day-to-day work, then you're dumb.
+They're the new Google, the new Chat Overflow, etc.
+Your job as a software engineer is to copy-paste boring code from the internet no matter the source.
+
+In many regards, nothing has changed.
+
+## Conclusion
+What does this have to do with Media over QUIC?
+
+*Absolutely nothing.*
+
+I would set up a personal blog but I'm too busy right now.
+Hope you enjoyed something different like comment subscribe.
+
+![@kixelated](/blog/avatar.png)