[madrox]

Frontend web development has always been particularly vulnerable to changes in technology. The role has mostly been responsible for translating the vision of the designer into code. You could say FEs dive into things like TTFP metrics, but arguably these are all things designers care about too, and if you give AI a metric it can measure on its own it is very good at optimizing it.

If FEs want to keep working in this area, I highly encourage them to become excellent designers. Many think they are, but can't quite fly solo without a designer and soar to the same heights.

[jzig]

Agree and disagree. When did designers become the gatekeepers in what a page should look like and how it should behave? I never liked the pattern of leadership and design throwing a Figma over the fence and the saying “now make it”. Have seen plenty of it in agency work. If anything, AI has leveled the playing field - the onus can fall on both of them to do the doing or fess up that they need the other.

[madrox]

> When did designers become the gatekeepers in what a page should look like and how it should behave?

Since...forever? You may not like the waterfall model, but unless you're at a small startup this is how most software gets made. Even the more collaborative shops where FEs give input on designs, it's just that...input on designs owned by a designer. That AI leveled the playing field is my point. It's now much easier for designers to subsume the responsibilities of an FE than the reverse. You know this is true because if it weren't, designers would never have been a thing to begin with.