An nameless reader shared this report from the San Francisco Commonplace:
About an hour into my assembly with the undisputed hackathon king of San Francisco, Rene Turcios requested if I wished to smoke a joint with him. I politely declined, however his provide hardly shocked me. Turcios has constructed a fame as a cannabis-loving former skilled Yu-Gi-Oh! participant who resells Labubus out of his Tenderloin condo when he is not busy attending almost each hackathon taking place within the metropolis. Since 2023, Turcios, 29, has attended greater than 200 occasions, the place he is received money, software program credit, and clout. “I am all the time hustling,” he stated.
The craziest half: he does not even know the way to code.
“Rene is the unique vibe coder,” stated RJ Moscardon, a buddy and fellow hacker who watched Turcios win second place at his first-ever hackathon on the AGI Home mansion in Hillsborough. “All of the engineers with prestigious levels scoffed at him at first. However now they’re all doing precisely the identical factor….” Turcios was vibe coding lengthy earlier than the approach had a reputation — and was regarded down upon by longtime hackers for utilizing AI. However as Tiger Woods as soon as stated, “Successful takes care of the whole lot….”
As a substitute of vigorously coding till the deadline, he completed his initiatives hours early by getting AI to do the technical work for him. “I did not write a single line of code,” Turcios stated of his first hackathon the place he prompted ChatGPT utilizing plain English to generate a program that may convert any tune right into a lo-fi model. When the organizers introduced Turcios had received second place, he screamed in celebration…. “I spotted that I may compete with individuals who have levels and fancy jobs….”
Turcios is now recognized for with the ability to construct something rapidly. Companies attain out to him to contract out initiatives that might take software program engineering groups weeks — and he delivers in hours. He is even began working workshops to show non-technical teams and skilled software program engineers the way to get essentially the most out of AI for coding.
“He grew up in Missouri to folks who labored in a global circus, taming bears and lions…”