When a professional engineering survey starts using language about addiction, the signal matters.
The Pragmatic Engineer's Part 2 survey of 900 engineers includes a section in which respondents describe AI tool usage as a slot machine, mention disrupted sleep, talk about dopamine highs, and use the phrase "just one more prompt." One product engineer called it addictive and said it happens most when they're tired, which is exactly when judgment is worst.
I recognise the pattern because I live it. Late evening Claude Code sessions where the task is done, but the agent suggests a related improvement, and each prompt makes the next one feel obvious. The feedback loop is faster than my ability to decide whether the next prompt is worth running.
The pricing model feeds this in a way I don't think is intentional, but it is real. Start at $20 and hit limits mid-task, which feels like losing your streak at a machine. Upgrade to $200, and suddenly the ceiling is higher than your actual need, so you use more because the capacity is there. The survey found 15-20% of respondents regularly hit limits, and frustration drove most upgrades.
A director of engineering in the US and AU described the feeling directly: a huge dopamine rush from doing in hours what used to take weeks.
That rush is real. I've felt it building, Claudish, and our internal tools. The question I keep coming back to is whether the rush correlates with output quality or just output volume, because in my experience, those diverge around 9 pm.
How do you know when to stop prompting?
#BuildInPublic #AI