Base camp gets higher, but the mountain is still there

Better tools are changing who can start the job, but expertise is still needed to finish the job.

AI is giving software teams and even adventurous users a trip to base camp and some excellent climbing gear, then setting them loose. But the mountains worth climbing will still take some experience to summit.

Prototyping your idea can take only hours. It's super exciting and the change is real. I see these prototypes getting more and more robust, with less and less technical oversight. Base camp gets higher, but the mountain is still there.

Production still needs to be dealt with -integrations, user and customer experience, user acceptance, security, testing, cost controls, change controls.

Not to mention someone accountable, especially when the phone rings at 2 a.m.

And don't get me wrong, AI helps there too. But not equally, and generally not best informed without the knowledge and the judgment from someone who's been on that late night call.

There won't be any shortage of great demos. And they're only going to get more impressive. The harder, and more valuable, work will be making them reliable, safe, economical, and genuinely useful.