I have been a working writer as well as a software engineer. I have been a broke poet and fiction writer (for years) and a senior level engineer (for years). I

I have been a working writer as well as a software engineer. I have been a broke poet and fiction writer (for years) and a senior level engineer (for years). I get to be a homeowner because of the software skills and I sent my kid to a good college. Overall I have moved back and forth. I've had 4 books published and I've had some really exciting tech jobs. So I have a 'both sides' perspective. I have a computer science degree, not a writing degree. If I had gotten an MFA, I might have been able to get a teaching job in creative writing, but the the lit world is more status conscious so I would have had to go to a great school, say Brown, or the like. My CSC degree is from a state university and it has gotten me into top companies and start ups. I did not have to go into debt for my incredibly useful degree. I think the tech world is actually more decent, fair, and respectful than the creative arts world. The rank exploitation of low paid writers (including the adjunct jobs most get) is truly awful. The level of personal sabotage and jealousy in the creative arts world, where there is not enough to go around, is disheartening to experience. My artsy friends are high horse about the tech bros but they need to be more mindful of the practices in their own back yard - which are worse, in my informed opinion. If you want an art career you have to plan strategically. You have to go to a great school for an MFA, one that has buzz (e.g. Yale), and you have to network like crazy (there are ways of describing that that will get my post blocked), and you have to be a bit cunning, and you have to have family resources. Oh, you also have to get that MFA right away out of college, because the art world grooves on youth. Possibly for years and years you'll have to work hard without any idea if it will get you anywhere, although the more years go by, the more your chances dwindle. You also need to always be doing self-promotion. It's endless and I can't stand it. I am in that respect a typical engineer and thinking in these ways is unpleasant. One of the weird things about the art world is that it requires so much money to get a career that rich kids are very over-represented. Young people from all over the world make it - there's lots of cultural diversity, but the other kind, the economic kind, not so much. It's creepy. I think of that every time I see another movie star kid who is making a movie. It's not cool people. It's disgusting. But my overall message for all you tech geeks is that if you want to be an artist too, you can be. Go for it, be the best you can be, take it seriously, etc. Just realize it is not only hard but somewhat horrible. I have actually had some success and truly it made me love computer science even more.