24 stories. 24 visits. One counter, same six faces.
The Third Cup
The AI wave hit, and I got laid off from a company I'd been at for...
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Just got my layoff notice this morning. Handover until next Friday. Reality really does hit faster than fiction. 😂
What!? Thanks for sharing your series, and I have read all of them and will go back to start reading them soon, but wow.... Really makes me wonder and generally worry about where the tech industry is heading to.
You've been reading since the $500K post, where you said the real open-source mindset was "test ideas, measure results, let the evidence speak." Honestly, hearing you read the whole series and plan to go back through it again made my day. 😄I tucked quite a few threads in there. Hope the re-read digs up some new ones, haha. And that worry about where the industry is heading? I get it. That's why these stories get written down, so the record outlives the pivot. Your seat and coffee cup are still here whenever you come back.👊
Oh my god, did you see it coming ... and why ... ? "AI" ... ?
That's terrible, or do you already have other options?
My manager told me this morning that I haven't been using AI well enough at work, and that everyone has to be an AI person now. Joke's on him, I use AI constantly in my personal life. The free tools just don't hold up for actual work, and the company won't pay for the good ones.
The company's been on the way down for a while. This isn't even the first round of layoffs. I thought I'd make it to the end of the year, but it's just until next Friday.
Then it's a few days off, fix up the resume, and maybe finally get my stories polished into Amazon ebooks. The series deserves that.
You seem to be pretty relaxed about it, no panic from what I can tell, which is good ...
"everyone has to be an AI person now" - manager probably has no clue, and might be panicking himself, probably sees the writing on the wall, maybe he's next on the chopping block ...
I found myself in the ledger. The cloud type who left more than the cup cost, years of building before writing anything down, the one whose eyes light up over recipes. By the way, I might make the tofu this weekend and share if it goes well. ☕
Reading this right after your news was a strange mix. I'm sorry, and I'm a bit angry on your behalf. Being told you're not enough of an "AI person" while you're quietly publishing some of the most careful AI-assisted writing on this platform is its own kind of absurd.
Because that's the thing that hooked me, and I want to say it plainly. It was never that you use AI. Half this site uses AI. It's how you use it. The restraint, the structure, letting "unknown" stay unknown, three days of rewrites nobody would have known about if you hadn't told us. AI smoothed your English. It didn't write Alex refusing to conclude, or P leaving without a word. That's you, and anyone reading properly can tell the difference.
So take the hiking, take the few days, then go find a shop that deserves you. Twelve seats left, and I'll be at the counter for all of them.
And I'll keep buying a coffee now and then. Least I can do for a place I've spent this much time in. 👊
Ha, the tofu. It's genuinely that good. Five minutes, one pan, and it demolishes a bowl of rice. You'll see.
And thank you for the kind words. Honestly, I don't hold much against my manager: he took the pressure from above and still kept me through next Friday, which I'm grateful for. The all-in-AI directive is what got under my skin, and that's aimed at the policy, not at him. It's the environment we're in; I can't change it, so I'm going with the flow. Funny how it works out. If it hadn't happened, I might never have found the time to write these stories or meet people like you. Bad news and good news travel together, I guess. Staying calm and moving forward.
Your seat's still there, and your mug's still behind the bar. Thanks for the comment, and for the coffee. ☕
You understand this series on a whole different level!!!
Coming from someone who read it twenty times, that means a lot. Twenty! I read it twice and then skimmed the third time quickly and thought I'd been thorough. 😄
And you're in that ledger for a reason too. "No alerts are more dangerous than alerts" is a line most engineers take years to arrive at, and he saved it as its own entry for good reason. Silence reads like everything's fine, right up until you find out nothing was reporting in the first place.
Hope the studying and the work are treating you well. The counter will still be here whenever you're back.
Work’s going pretty well, but studies… just forget about it I literally almost failed by one mark 🤣💔
Fun fact: I never passed a single English exam back in the day. Not once. Haha🤣
Funny how the numbers tell it. 🙃 Same cups in both halves, but thirty percent more people staying after the coffee's done, so somewhere around entry twelve the shop stopped being about the coffee. Good luck with the last twelve seats, and sorry about the news this morning.
You read the numbers exactly right. Somewhere around entry twelve it became about the people, not the coffee. The last twelve seats are going to be the best ones. ☕
I know this is late, but congrats on your business! I love the idea of a place where people can tell their story over a cup of coffee. I could probably give you enough material for a whole book, from growing up in the Bronx to everything that has happened during my 35+ years here in Germany. But I'm saving that for my own book, if I can ever write it in a way that my family stateside doesn't disown me! 😁
You’re probably going to hate this, but one of the things I’m building from scratch in my free time is an AI, but it will never be a threat to anyones livelyhood since it's output is gibberish on my 15 year old win 7 pc. I took a long break from it due to my job situation, before I took the last job you know I left from the comment section of Jess' article.
Welcome to the Third Cup Café, Tom. This round's on me. All you have to do is tell your story 😄
Let me know when your book comes out. Mine will probably hit first, actually. This time off gives me room to work on it, so there's that.
And to clarify: I don't hate you at all. I think AI is a great tool. It's a magnifying glass, a megaphone. It amplifies the abilities you already have. What I do dislike is how every company is going all-in on AI and putting the cart before the horse. But that's the times. One person can only do so much, so I'll go with the flow and take it one step at a time.
Your seat and your coffee cup are always here. Drop by anytime.
I hate black coffee. Can I have a Latte instead? 😏
Sure. Alex is a latte guy too. You two have that in common. 😏
Amazing analogy! ☕
I’d love to visit The Third Cup more often, but there’s just too much work to stop by the café right now. 😔
Btw, I hope everything works out for you after the layoff. Take care!
Having work that keeps you this busy is its own kind of blessing, honestly. The café stays open: your seat's still there, and your mug's still behind the bar. You're welcome anytime. I'll be fine, just treating this as a long vacation 😄
Really enjoyed this one! The Third Cup, brilliant as a 'story device' and as a metaphor ...
"The Other Regulars"
Ah haha, yes of course I see what you did there, lol - that gave me a genuine chuckle 😄 - thanks for that!
Nice one - on to the "Grand Final" !
Ha, you found yourself in there. Was wondering if you'd spot it 😄
Twelve more to the grand finale. See you in all of them.
Yeah that was pretty easy to spot haha, and the Lazy Girl was of course a dead giveaway - nice & clever how you weaved "us" (and yourself) into it! The Third Cup must be one of my favorite story devices of all time, lol ...
Means a lot coming from you, leob. The Third Cup was always going to be about the people at the counter. ☕
The strongest angle for your comment is the systems/engineering interpretation of the metaphor, rather than just praising the writing.
Ha😄, thanks for catching the metaphor. This is the 4th wrap-up post of my 36 Stratagems series, and I'm trying something new with it: carrying the real series numbers inside a fictional bar. The 383 who stayed and the 36 seats are actual data, just told through a bartender's ledger. Traffic tells you the door works. Whether people come back tells you if the place is worth staying in, and that's a much slower number to earn. Your seat's saved. Your mug's behind the bar. Come by anytime for a coffee.☕️
Xulingfeng bro I need a help
It's urgent.
what's wrong?
bro pls visit my website, download ATLOCK
run it if it is running then good if not and windows pop up saying-we protected your PC by blocking the access of using software or blah blah this type of warning which is not letting you to use ATLOCK
then report me here.
from last 9hours I'm working consently my mind is cooked, my eyes are cooked
my website's download counter is cooked, ATLOCK's binaries are disrupted
literally I'm just now in last hope that I can remove the window's Pop up on ATLOCK.
Litrally ATLOCK is backbone of AKHOURI SYSTEMS and if I somehow failed then definitely AKHOURI SYSTEMS is cooked.
hope you'll report me as fast as possible
bro pls do it fast..... I've to do it as fast as possible
I really enjoyed this one. It felt different from the previous chapters, but in a good way. Looking back at all the characters through someone else's eyes made me realize how much the story has grown since the beginning. Looking forward to seeing where it goes next.
@hemapriya_kanagala Did you find yourself in this story?😄
Hey Xu, I did spot mine. Thank you so much for including me in this one; it means a lot. Also, you are spot on with the window seat and coffee; I love them, and as always, I love the series and will be here for the next one whenever it is ready. I also spotted Divya, unitbuilds, and leob.
Also, sorry for the morning news you got. I know you said you consider this a small vacation, but yes, after it, I wish you all the best with the job search and all the success on your side.
The window seat stays reserved for you. Coffee's already brewing ☕
And thanks for the kind words about the "vacation." It's a sabbatical nobody's paying for, but I'll take it 😄 Job search starts after the coffee runs out.
The empty seats section got me. the person is gone, the entry stays, and you still wipe their cup and put it back in its old spot.
i build systems that do the exact opposite of that. everything i work on is about eviction, what expires, what goes stale, what earns the right to survive. an entry that stops halfway is a defect i have to go resolve. you made it a seat kept warm instead, and i dont think thats sentimental, i think its a different retention policy and yours is defensible in a way mine isnt. a record that ends without explanation is still true. it just stopped.
the other thing, and i think most people are going to walk past it because its buried under the story. your numbers folder is doing real work. first twelve entries, 650 cups, 296 stayed. last twelve, 654 cups, 383 stayed. the volume basically did not move and the composition did, thirty percent more people staying after the cup was empty.
thats the measurement almost nobody takes. traffic held flat so a headline number would say nothing changed, and underneath it the reason people were coming had already changed. you tracked the thing that moved instead of the thing that was easy to count. i spend most of my time arguing with people about denominators and you just quietly picked the right one and put it in a story about coffee.
twelve seats left. ill take the 4am one, i keep the same hours.
Your seat and your mug are still here, man. Like the story says, I remember everyone who walks in, and your spot is always waiting. Your comments are what keep this series going, honestly. Thanks for showing up, every time.
"Sit." I say, and go to boil the water.☕️
I love that you had technical stories in your article.
Thanks, brother! So what are you drinking this time?☕ Americano, latte, pour-over, or something new? Haha😄
I prefer my americano. Pretty please
One americano, on the house. Window seat's yours as always ☕
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Haha🤣, whoever on the Dev.to team came up with that tagline 'Layoffs spark a café of stories' deserves a raise. It fits way too well!🤣