The FrontEnd Treadmill

I want to open by stating my biases. I’m a web guy. I’ve been bullish on the web for 20+ years, and I will continue to be. I think it is an extremely capable and unique platform for delivering software. And it has only gotten better over time while retaining an incredible level of backwards compatibility. The underlying tools we have are dope now. But our current framework layer is working against the grain instead of embracing the platform.

But how can we get off the front end treadmill? As developers, as engineering leaders and as organisations?

Companies that want to reduce the cost of their frontend tech becoming obsoleted so often should be looking to get back to fundamentals. Your teams should be working closer to the web platform with a lot less complex abstractions. We need to relearn what the web is capable of and go back to that.

And if you’re an engineer, you will be able to retain much higher market value over time if you dig into and understand core web technologies. I was here before React, and I’ll be here after it dies. You may trade some job marketability today. But it does a lot more for career longevity than trying to learn every new thing that gets popular.

On a more personal note, this is frustrating to me because I think it’s a big part of why we’re seeing the web stagnate so much. I still run into lots of devs who are creative and enthusiastic about building cool things. They just can’t. They are trying and failing because the tools being recommended to them are just not approachable enough. And at the same time, they’re being convinced that learning fundamentals is a waste of time because it’s so different from what everybody is talking about.

Speaking with others in the industry, I know I'm not alone in thinking this. So let’s start a frank conversation about the frontend treadmill, and how we might start getting off it.