When ChatGPT became mainstream, the biggest question was whether AI could build software.
Today, that question feels outdated.
With tools like Claude, Cursor, Lovable, Bolt, and GitHub Copilot, building software has become dramatically faster. A solo developer can ship in days what once took a small team weeks. The barrier to creating products has never been lower, and that's an incredible thing for our industry.
But lowering the barrier has also created a new problem.
As I browse Product Hunt, X, and Indie Hackers, I keep noticing the same pattern. Many new products look surprisingly similar. They have the same layouts, the same feature sections, the same gradients, the same testimonials, and often the same marketing copy with only a few words changed.
This isn't because AI is bad at building websites.
It's because AI is exceptionally good at producing the average first draft.
For a long time, execution was the biggest challenge. If you could build faster than everyone else, you had an advantage. AI has changed that equation. Speed is becoming a commodity. Thousands of developers now have access to the same models and can generate a polished landing page in a matter of hours.
That means the advantage is shifting somewhere else.
I think the next competitive advantage is taste.
Taste is knowing when a headline sounds generic. It's recognizing that a feature section doesn't communicate value. It's removing three sections instead of adding three more. It's making design decisions that aren't the obvious default. It's understanding your users well enough to know when the AI's suggestion is good, and when it completely misses the point.
AI can generate options.
It still can't replace judgment.
That's why I don't think we'll care much about whether a product was built with AI in the next few years. We'll care about whether the final product feels thoughtful, original, and genuinely useful. Users don't reward effort. They reward quality.
As developers, we're entering an interesting phase. AI is no longer the differentiator. It's becoming part of the standard toolkit, just like Git, Docker, or modern frameworks.
The developers who stand out won't necessarily be the ones using the most AI. They'll be the ones with the best judgment about what to keep, what to throw away, and what deserves to be built differently.
I'd love to hear what other developers think. As AI continues to improve, do you think taste and product judgment will become more valuable than raw implementation skills, or do you see the future differently?
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