> People spoke in a particular way, say 60 years ago, that left very little room for interpretation of what they meant. The same cannot be said today.

Surely you don’t mean everyone in the 1960s spoke directly, free of metaphor or euphemism or nuance or doublespeak or dog whistle or any other kind or ambiguity? Then why are there people who dedicate their entire life to interpreting religious texts and the Constitution?

> third-parties who can make all sorts of decisions based on a made up story about who I am, my preferences, my values and whatnot

You're going to be presented with ads and preyed on by marketing no matter what. The "made up story about who you are" is just even more imaginary the less they know about you. You'll simply be presented with less-targeted ads.

Then, respectfully, what is the point? Does the trillions-of-dollars AI industry exist to support a few hobbyists building niche products to scratch their own itch? I thought the promise here is increased productivity, presumably in the economic sense.

There seems to be a lot of hype, and has been for years, but I’m not seeing it materialize as actual economic output. Surely by now there should be lots of businesses springing up to capture all of this value created by vibecoded software.

Where are these small businesses and startups? The software economy should be booming, right? I’m not seeing it.

Fellow New England -> Colorado transplant. It was pleasantly shocking for me too how much chattier and friendlier people are in Colorado. But now I've lived in Colorado long enough that when I go back to visit New England, it's shocking how cold and taciturn people are there. Conversations with strangers rarely get past "How ya doin?" "Fine and you? "Fine, thanks."

I do appreciate how direct people in the northeast tend to be, and sometimes miss that aspect of the culture.