alt Hacker NewsI use Chinese models, even smaller local ones, for much more than pair programming. If we are talking about deepseek v4 flash, which is basically a frontier model, it is much more capable than the local models I run on my MacBook Pro. The only issue really is finding the right harness.
I do have a way of correcting through redundancy, though. If you are just vibe coding, you need to use the most capable model you can find and even then it might not be good enough.
> If you are just vibe coding, you need to use the most capable model you can find and even then it might not be good enough
I mean, this proves my point. Better models enable you to get more done. With Fable, 80% of the time, I no longer have chat with an agent over the details of a PR. I give it an outcome and it gets done. This means I can work on much more with the limited time I have.
And I don't see this ending. When better models come out that take that from 80% to 99.x%, I will have that better model manage teams of other models and move up the abstraction layer.
If models get even better than that, perhaps I stop reviewing PRs entirely. Maybe normies can start using agents to build real things.
Unless your business doesn't have many problems to solve and isn't in a competitive environment, it will benefit from using the best models.