If you've shopped for RAM or a new SSD lately, you've probably felt a sting. The same 32 GB DDR5 kit that cost a comfortable amount a year ago now costs noticeably more, and that 2 TB NVMe drive you had your eye on keeps creeping up in price. This isn't your imagination or a supply chain blip — 2026 is witnessing one of the most dramatic memory price rallies in the industry's history, and it all traces back to one thing: AI.
Imagine sitting at your desk, but instead of staring at a blinking cursor and manually typing out lines of code, you feel more like an orchestra conductor. You aren't writing the notes anymore; you are guiding an entire crew of AI agents.
That is precisely the shift software creator Peter Steinberger highlights in his work. Rather than casual "vibe coding," he calls his approach agentic engineering. He barely writes code by hand anymore; instead, he designs systems, establishes the core architecture, and lets AI agents handle the boring plumbing work.