A stranger on Stack Overflow helped me through a war zone
If we do not stop to help each other, what do we become?
Jeff Atwood shares a reader's letter about how random strangers on Stack Overflow helped him finish college while deployed during the 2013 Zamboanga siege. He contrasts that human connection with LLMs, which give answers but not the feeling that someone cares. Atwood warns that as AI hollows out online communities, we risk losing something essential — and asks what we become if we stop helping each other.
An LLM would have done exactly what I wanted back then. But would it have given me what I needed?