I guess the OP referred to ageism as loss of job security.
What’s been your experience? Not everyone is a Spiekermann, Esslinger or Rams. Have you lost out to the newer crowd… more and more folks finish these 3-6 month UX boot camps and not all companies value experience or understand it’s not just about pixel pushing.
Or does OSS design help pay the bills? I’m guessing getting involved in OSS is more about maintaining the design muscle and helping folks out.
At the moment it does not look like there is a really an issue with job security. Due to the high rate at which boomers are retiring the next generation which always was under the shadow of the boomers has become critical to keep the shops running.
Meditation, regular hours of sleep in true darkness, lots of soluble fiber, not much passive transportation. (But I'm just 65 and inventing not designing or coding now.)
"Nobody knows you are a dog on the internet" Ditto being aged ~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Internet,_nobody_knows_...
Most of the technologies I play with - HTML5, webGL, Three.js etc - did not exist ten years ago. So it's a level playing field.
There's more open source stuff on GitHub that needs help and mentoring than you can shake a keyboard, er, stick at.
My digital afterlife is destined to be a thought-leader for generations to come. Fingers crossed.
As I started to understand that I am a designer, I came to realize that my own life is open to being designed. Day in and day out.
It turns out that that my design of my own life is one of my better efforts. ;-)