AI Is Killing the Traditional Programming Tutorial, and One Educator Explains Why
Programming Tutorials Are Dead
Rob, who sells programming education, argues that the classic tutorial model—build a clean sample app and let readers adapt it—is dying. Coding agents can now inspect your actual repo, implement changes, and run tests, making the translation step obsolete. He points to Chris Oliver's GoRails, which will have fewer new customers in 2026 than its first year, as evidence. The fix: education must provide judgment, tradeoffs, and agent-ready execution layers, not just static steps.
The tutorial tells you what worked in its environment, and you figure out which parts survive contact with yours. You were always the integration layer. Coding agents changed that.
- ChrisMarshallNY
One thing that LLMs will give us, is the ability to make really interesting and exciting tutorials. We can do that by hand, now, but it's a lot of work. I know of which I speak. I've been doing tutorials forever, but they haven't been particularly popular. Part of that, is that I'm pretty bad at self-promotion, and having that eau d'expert scent about you, is a big selling point. I really don't waste much time, trying to convince people that I have something they want, so they don't want it.
That part will still be necessary. I suspect LLMs can help polish and optimize self-promotion, but that also means everyone else will be doing it, and the competition is likely to be stiff.
- bitbasher
Strange… I have purchased more technical books this year (and read them) than the last five years combined.
- swid
I would not pay for something so obviously extremely AI generated. If your sales are slipping, I don’t think this helps.