But the interpreting process often is a form of compilation - e.g. many interpreters compile source to bytecode and interpret the bytecode - to say nothing of JIT, which after all stands for just-in-time compilation!

Compiler design I think will always be a vital field. The LLVM project I think shows the direction we are headed - with more and more detailed bytecode to allow for better optimization before a 2nd pass compiles down to machine code.