The AI Revolution, Revisited
Two years ago I wrote AI. Am I Worried? My answer was “not really” — with an asterisk. I admitted I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little concerned, and I wrote one sentence I’ve been thinking about ever since: AI wasn’t advanced enough yet to write complete, functioning code, “and when that happens, you better believe I’ll be using it.”
Well. It happened. I’m using it. And the verdict is in: I shouldn’t have been worried.
The hesitation
I’ll be honest — with my development background, I was hesitant to even like AI, let alone lean on it. When you’ve spent years writing every line yourself, handing any of it over feels wrong. But here’s the reality of 2026: a developer who doesn’t actively use this tool falls behind — in capability and in turnaround. It stopped being optional somewhere along the way.
The “Elementor” symptom
Sure, AI can build entire websites now. But most of them have what I call the “Elementor” symptom: one quick look and — for some reason you can’t quite name — you can just tell the site was made by AI with little oversight. Same bones, same safe sections, same nothing-decisions everywhere. It’s the page-builder problem all over again, just faster: the tool isn’t the issue, the missing human judgment is.
What AI is actually for
True developers can turn themselves into powerhouses with this tool. Let AI take care of the boring-but-easy stuff. Use it for brainstorming, or to break down an animation you want to understand before you build your own. It’s all about efficiency — so you can spend your time on the part of the job you’re great at, or the part you actually enjoy.
Personally? I’m a damn fine UX/UI designer and developer. And now that I have a trained AI spinning up site skeletons, setting up rules, and generating the bulk of content, I get to spend my time bringing sites to life — sites that truly do stand out from the competition. The site you’re reading is the proof: hand-coded, no CMS, with the AI doing the heavy lifting and me making every call that matters.
The honest part
AI isn’t going to take my job. It’s made my job better and my work far more efficient. But there are real downsides, and people are right to be uneasy about them. AI is, without a doubt, taking people’s jobs. We’re also seeing things nobody expected — laws being passed to protect people’s work, whole industries renegotiating what a human is for. It’s still a very volatile environment, and nobody really knows how it ends.
Will a rogue AI — rushed out the door by cough cough just to keep up with the competition — bring on the collapse of modern society? Or will everyone end up with all the free time in the world because AI handles most of the work? It comes down to how we use it, and staying smart while we do.
So, was I right?
In 2024 I closed that post hoping I’d be retired before AI could do my entire job. Turns out the better outcome was hiding in plain sight: it still can’t do my whole job — but it does the parts I never loved, and I’m better at the rest than I’ve ever been.
Am I worried? Less than ever. But I’m paying attention.