HTMX Founder Launches ‘No AI Fridays’ to Preserve Coding Skills

Large language models have become embedded in software development, helping engineers generate, review and debug code. HTMX founder Carson Gross argues that relying on them too heavily can create “cognitive debt,” leaving developers less practiced at independent reasoning and weakening the foundational skills needed to assess whether machine-generated output is sound. The concern has grown as AI coding tools assume a larger share of routine engineering work.

Gross has launched “No AI Fridays,” an initiative calling on teams to switch off AI tools every Friday and write code themselves. The proposal would reserve one full day each week for unaided programming, with the aim of reinforcing critical thinking and hands-on technical judgment. The report did not specify a formal launch date, the number of participating teams or detailed enforcement rules, indicating the campaign remains primarily a call for broader industry discussion.