I have been on both sides of the coin (i.e. DBA & Developer) and currently do a bit of both in my existing role. I have found that both approaches have merit but this whole discussion is becoming more and more redundant due to the emerging of better ORM (Object relational mapping) systems. You can take a DDD approach as a developer and still interoperate reasonable seamlessly with a relational database with neither parties having to compromise particularly (especially if abstraction is done through stored procedures or the like).

Its worth the time and investment to look into a good ORM (maybe coupled with some form of code templating) for most sized projects bigger than the most basic.

Just my two cents worth