AI Coding May Prevent Expertise: Friction Builds Taste and Mastery
addyosmani · x · 2026-08-26
Addy Osmani shared Lars Faye's article "AI Coding will Prevent Expertise," arguing that friction is essential for building taste and mastery, and tools that remove it may also remove what made us good enough to use them well.
The article notes that the vast majority of developers seeing the most benefits from these models are those with years or decades of experience. Novices entering the field around the time of LLMs lack this longevity but are often guided to accelerate using coding assistants that require a history of expertise to wield effectively. This creates a scenario where a novice needs expert-level skills to leverage the tools and keep pace, creating a "skilled orchestrator paradox" where the skills to manage agents are the same ones that can be diminished by using them.
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