The first time I saw the title "Architect" used by popular culture in terms of software, was the movie "Matrix". As soon as I saw that, I knew that every "two bit" programmer (pun intended) would try to self annoint themselfs with that title. Eventually, I think it will fall out of favor from the "developer" culture as it generally implies a hands-off approach to Coding. Many places where I have worked as an "Arch", management insisted that I delegated details to underlings (archs suggest - devs implement). Over time, you fail to keep up with the evolution of the frameworks that the gory details are covered with, and your value starts to slide (he always recommends hibernate - why not use JPA or .Net Entities). It will go away (the title) like CTO has disappeared.