AI makes it easier to build almost anything. So why does that make the job harder?

In this episode, Matt sits down with Font Awesome founder Dave Gandy and engineer Travis Chase to get past the hype and into the real day-to-day of building with AI. The conversation covers what's actually changing on the team, where AI falls short, and what human skills matter more now than they did before.

If you're a designer, developer, or anyone trying to figure out where you fit in a world where your output can suddenly go 10x — this one's worth your time. Dave and Travis don't pretend the answers are simple. They also don't pretend the concerns aren't real.

Fair warning: Dave also makes a case for revisiting waterfall development. It's more convincing than it has any right to be.

What We Cover

Why producing more means your quality bar has to get sharper, not looser
The discernment problem — when you can build anything, how do you decide what's worth building?
Why saying no is now a more important skill than ever
The strongest AI concerns Dave and Travis actually take seriously (energy, training data ethics, governance)
Why AI seems to help people become more of who they already are
How to stay curious and useful during a major technology transition without chasing every squirrel

Timestamps

0:00 Cold open — from low-level to strategy
0:38 Intro
1:30 Where AI falls short right now
2:00 Quality control when output explodes
2:30 Taste, responsibility, and Jory's point at the snuggle
3:00 The discernment problem and snacktivities
4:20 Simplicity means saying no more than yes
5:30 Chasing waterfalls — does waterfall development make a comeback?
6:00 The strongest anti-AI arguments worth taking seriously
6:45 Energy, ethics, and training data consent
8:00 Technology's evolution and the genie that's out of the bottle
9:00 The Industrial Revolution farmer analogy
9:45 Superheroes, supervillains, and hiring for character first
10:20 Two ditches: navigating between idealism and cynicism
11:10 Rev share and what the world should look like
11:45 Governance, compromise, and garbage design
13:30 Washing machines and making more clean water
14:00 Guiding principles for using AI internally
15:00 Company behaviors as an AI framework: curious, humble, adventurous
16:00 AI helps people become more of who they are
16:45 AI will ask people to operate at a higher level
18:00 Refusing to engage is the riskiest move of all
19:00 We need critical voices — and we need them in the room
20:00 Echo chambers, bad data, and the water story
21:30 The world is hopeful — spend your life in wonder
22:30 Home prices, colonizing planets, and the leap to the real world
23:00 Outro

Credits

Hosted by Matt Johnson
Featuring Dave Gandy and Travis Chase
Produced and edited by Matt Johnson
Theme song by Ronnie Martin
Music interstitials by Zach Malm
Video editing by Isaac Chase

🔗 Font Awesome: https://fontawesome.com

🔗 Check out episode one of the conversation! https://www.podcastawesome.com/2092855/episodes/19065993-build-week-what-we-made-part-1-with-dave-travis

🔗 Podcast Awesome: https://podcastawesome.com

#PodcastAwesome #FontAwesome #AI #DesignAndDevelopment #TechEthics #SoftwareDevelopment

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Say No More: What AI Actually Changes [Part 2]