Carla Rover remembers sobbing for 30 minutes after realizing she had to restart an entire project that relied heavily on vibe coding. Her story highlights a growing trend in tech: vibe coding has turned senior devs into ‘AI babysitters,’ but they say it’s worth it for the speed, experimentation, and creative freedom it offers.
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Rover, a 15-year industry veteran and web developer turned startup founder, described vibe coding as a “beautiful, endless cocktail napkin” for sketching ideas. Yet she also admitted that babysitting AI-generated code can be frustrating, as it often introduces unpredictable errors.
The Promise and Pitfalls of Vibe Coding
Rover turned to AI coding tools to accelerate work on her startup, which builds custom machine learning models. Like many founders, she needed quick results. But skipping careful checks of AI-generated code cost her dearly.
“When I did the manual review, I found so much wrong,” she shared. “When I used a third-party tool, I found even more. I learned my lesson the hard way.”
She and her son ultimately had to restart the project, realizing that AI copilots are not employees, but tools that require constant oversight.
Why Senior Developers Feel Like AI Babysitters
The rise of vibe coding means experienced programmers spend more time reviewing, rewriting, and fact-checking code produced by AI. A recent Fastly report revealed that 95% of nearly 800 surveyed developers said they spend extra hours fixing AI-generated code — with senior developers shouldering most of that burden.
This shift has led to the term “AI babysitters,” capturing both the tedious oversight involved and the responsibility placed on experts to safeguard production-level code.
Is It Worth It?
Despite the extra work, many senior developers insist vibe coding has upsides. The technology enables rapid prototyping, boosts creativity, and lets teams experiment more freely. For startups and fast-moving projects, the trade-off feels acceptable.
Rover described it as frustrating but ultimately rewarding: “AI makes mistakes, but it also pushes me to think differently. I wouldn’t give up the speed it brings.”
The Future of AI in Development
As AI coding tools improve, developers expect the “babysitting” role to shrink. For now, however, the consensus is clear — vibe coding has turned senior devs into AI babysitters, but they say it’s worth it because the innovation benefits outweigh the oversight burden.
For tech teams, the key may lie in balancing automation with human expertise, ensuring AI accelerates progress without compromising quality.
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