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That was transcendental, thank you. I was just thinking to myself a few days ago that the overlap between tech workers and car nuts is quite narrow. Not many p

That was transcendental, thank you. I was just thinking to myself a few days ago that the overlap between tech workers and car nuts is quite narrow. Not many people I know from my professional environment are really into cars. Sure, some can say "this is better than that" or tell a car story or say how some Mini they drove "handled like a go cart" but nearly none of them is a hardcore car nut (e.g. they're more interested in the tech of a Tesla than what a Ferrari V12 feels like). I'm sure there's a good reason somewhere.

macintux 9y ago
Random thought, to which I don't give a lot of credence but can't rule out entirely, is that tech work and car fandom often grow out of childhood/teenage obsessions, and most kids would only have one such obsession. Related, it's also possible that it's a class thing. Many kids who grew up working on computers did so in a white collar household, many who worked on cars did so on a blue collar family. Both mostly off-the-cuff speculation based in no small part on clichés.
- WalterBright 9y ago
  As a teenager I spent much time working on muscle cars. I was very disappointed at Caltech to find nobody interested in cars. None of my engineering coworkers since, either. I've always missed working on cars with my friends.
- cglace 9y ago
  Most of my friends in college worked on their jeeps for rock climbing all the time. It definitely was not a cheap hobby.
- anabis 9y ago
  Somewhat countering your >most kids would only have one such obsession Train nuts and computer nerds seem to have higher overlap. MIT's Tech Model Railroad Club being a prominent example.
  - macintux 9y ago
    Doesn't take many counter-examples to invalidate an idea. Good point.
- lbotos 9y ago
  To throw my anecdote in the mix, growing up in the early 2000s, my blue collar extended family donated to me a bunch of old computers, which were much more accessable to me than a car. I imagine for kids today, the same is possible, old laptops, tablets, etc, hopefully decently hackable. Now that I'm working in tech, my younger brother is interested in cars, so the trend/cycle is resetting itself :)
walshemj 9y ago
I suspect that is they way Unis have been plugging CS ie pure math over EE. I suspect that for those from a "Proper" engineering back ground the over lap is much higher. Certainly working at a world leading RnD place at Cranfield (which had an airfield) in the 80s there was a lot of overlap some engineers had air band radios so they could listen out for anything interesting Bearcats, Spitfire going out for a test (they used to rebuild spitfires on site) run etc and loads would go out and watch
leetcrew 9y ago
although cars and computer systems are both examples of "technology", the way we appreciate them is very different. we consider computers mainly in quantitative terms: cpu speed, memory size and bandwidth, etc. if computer A compiles and runs my project just as fast as computer B, I don't really care what's "under the hood", or whether it was made by an artisan or in a factory. I don't care what it sounds like either, as long as it isn't loud enough to annoy me. while you can certainly compare the stats of different cars, the story on paper doesn't come close to describing what a driving enthusiast really cares about: the qualitative experience of driving the car. when selecting a car I don't just buy the best 0-60 time in my price range; rather, I seek to optimize some holistic measure of drive quality. to grossly generalize, I find that most tech people have a quantitative mindset. they feel most comfortable in decision spaces where things can be compared using objective metrics and an authoritative answer can be reached (at least theoretically). tech people spend a lot of time developing quantitative skills, so it is easy for them to get involved in these types of discussions. I think this explains the bulk of why tech people just aren't that interested in cars; they don't really know how to get involved in the conversation and they don't see why they should.
- harlanlewis 9y ago
  Counterpoint: watches could be described in the same way as cars in your example, and lots of tech folk get into watches.
- lalala1995 9y ago
  I think you have taken the context out of the comparison. In terms of CPU, GPU, thermal systems, PSU... yes computing people do whip out a lot of numbers. But when buying a laptop, assembling a gig, we consider of the overall experience, more abstracts and qualitative measurements: ease of maintenance, aesthetics even. On the other hand, car guys do get nerdy on number crunching when they tune their turbo/ exhaust system, IE: optimizing a very specific component of the system.
  - leetcrew 9y ago
    I'm not trying to say it's black and white; enthusiasts certainly care about the design of a computer and stats for cars. however, I do feel that car enthusiasts have different priorities than computer geeks. I personally am way more interested in computers than cars, but I do feel that cars are more "emotional" possessions than computers. some laptops are ugly and made out of plastic, while others can be quite attractive, but my selection strategy is always to filter out the downright ugly machines and then compare the others component by component. my process for cars is pretty much the reverse; I want one that exceeds some bar for performance and then I will pick the one that feels best to drive around. my car is far from the fastest in its category or price segment, but imo it is definitely the most pleasant to drive. my desktop is a bunch of high end parts inside an ugly leet gamer case that I bought ten years ago.
banach2 9y ago
My experience is that you will find many cs and math people among car enthusiasts (At my university almost everyone involved in motorsport is math/science/eng.) From the other side, you will find a smaller proportion due to the wide variety of people who work in tech nowadays. I don’t think the majority of students who study cs have an obsession any more. It has become such a public and large field that you can hardly expect that to be the case. cs pays more, so it will be more “diluted” (of car enthusiasts) but also an enthusiast of both is more likely to be in cs than eng for the same reason. In my case, I have always been obsessed with cars and then taught myself cs afterwards.
acranox 9y ago
Weird. They are one in the same to me. I started tinkering with cars and computers at a young age. I got a job fixing computers, then I got trained in cars and went to fix cars for a few years. Now I’m back to computers. I take things apart and figure out how they work and put things together. If that’s cars, or software, or computers, toasters, houses, furnaces, it’s all the same process for me. The overlap between these things is 100% in my mind. :)
toyg 9y ago
The cultural gap is real. The car world traditionally appeals to a very different demographic. Remember all those crappy flash intros every geek would hate? Car businesses loved them. Working on cars is a very social experience: you pick up the interest from relatives or friends, and space requirements for the hobby are such that, in urban surroundings, you usually cannot hide it from people, so they will see what you’re doing and stop to have a chat; you will often need help to push this or that relic around; you will have to talk to garage owners for many reasons, etc etc. Whereas IT is traditionally a loner’s world, and more so since the internet became central to it. Then consider that the world of car enthusiasts is shrinking. The big expos have consolidated for lack of visitors, and car evolution itself is shutting out enthusiasts by producing more and more products that cannot be tweaked or even repaired without professional assistance. When I was a teenager my dad was often going on about the fact that me and my friends simply did not do any of the motoring-related activities he did as a kid. I’ve known exactly two geeks in my life who were also car enthusiasts. One was a very atypical programmer, fundamentally a businessman who loved PHP. The other came from a deep UK working-class background, and cars were basically a way to stay in touch with that, a mean to maintain an emotional link with his friends and family. Everyone else only cared about cars enough to use them to from A to B and to hold a non-geek conversation (“did you see Top Gear last night? Ludicrous display! The thing with Jaguar is they always try to walk it in...”).

macintux 9y ago

Random thought, to which I don't give a lot of credence but can't rule out entirely, is that tech work and car fandom often grow out of childhood/teenage obsessions, and most kids would only have one such obsession. Related, it's also possible that it's a class thing. Many kids who grew up working on computers did so in a white collar household, many who worked on cars did so on a blue collar family. Both mostly off-the-cuff speculation based in no small part on clichés.

WalterBright 9y ago
As a teenager I spent much time working on muscle cars. I was very disappointed at Caltech to find nobody interested in cars. None of my engineering coworkers since, either. I've always missed working on cars with my friends.
cglace 9y ago
Most of my friends in college worked on their jeeps for rock climbing all the time. It definitely was not a cheap hobby.
anabis 9y ago
Somewhat countering your >most kids would only have one such obsession Train nuts and computer nerds seem to have higher overlap. MIT's Tech Model Railroad Club being a prominent example.
- macintux 9y ago
  Doesn't take many counter-examples to invalidate an idea. Good point.
lbotos 9y ago
To throw my anecdote in the mix, growing up in the early 2000s, my blue collar extended family donated to me a bunch of old computers, which were much more accessable to me than a car. I imagine for kids today, the same is possible, old laptops, tablets, etc, hopefully decently hackable. Now that I'm working in tech, my younger brother is interested in cars, so the trend/cycle is resetting itself :)

walshemj 9y ago

I suspect that is they way Unis have been plugging CS ie pure math over EE. I suspect that for those from a "Proper" engineering back ground the over lap is much higher. Certainly working at a world leading RnD place at Cranfield (which had an airfield) in the 80s there was a lot of overlap some engineers had air band radios so they could listen out for anything interesting Bearcats, Spitfire going out for a test (they used to rebuild spitfires on site) run etc and loads would go out and watch

leetcrew 9y ago

although cars and computer systems are both examples of "technology", the way we appreciate them is very different. we consider computers mainly in quantitative terms: cpu speed, memory size and bandwidth, etc. if computer A compiles and runs my project just as fast as computer B, I don't really care what's "under the hood", or whether it was made by an artisan or in a factory. I don't care what it sounds like either, as long as it isn't loud enough to annoy me. while you can certainly compare the stats of different cars, the story on paper doesn't come close to describing what a driving enthusiast really cares about: the qualitative experience of driving the car. when selecting a car I don't just buy the best 0-60 time in my price range; rather, I seek to optimize some holistic measure of drive quality. to grossly generalize, I find that most tech people have a quantitative mindset. they feel most comfortable in decision spaces where things can be compared using objective metrics and an authoritative answer can be reached (at least theoretically). tech people spend a lot of time developing quantitative skills, so it is easy for them to get involved in these types of discussions. I think this explains the bulk of why tech people just aren't that interested in cars; they don't really know how to get involved in the conversation and they don't see why they should.

harlanlewis 9y ago
Counterpoint: watches could be described in the same way as cars in your example, and lots of tech folk get into watches.
lalala1995 9y ago
I think you have taken the context out of the comparison. In terms of CPU, GPU, thermal systems, PSU... yes computing people do whip out a lot of numbers. But when buying a laptop, assembling a gig, we consider of the overall experience, more abstracts and qualitative measurements: ease of maintenance, aesthetics even. On the other hand, car guys do get nerdy on number crunching when they tune their turbo/ exhaust system, IE: optimizing a very specific component of the system.
- leetcrew 9y ago
  I'm not trying to say it's black and white; enthusiasts certainly care about the design of a computer and stats for cars. however, I do feel that car enthusiasts have different priorities than computer geeks. I personally am way more interested in computers than cars, but I do feel that cars are more "emotional" possessions than computers. some laptops are ugly and made out of plastic, while others can be quite attractive, but my selection strategy is always to filter out the downright ugly machines and then compare the others component by component. my process for cars is pretty much the reverse; I want one that exceeds some bar for performance and then I will pick the one that feels best to drive around. my car is far from the fastest in its category or price segment, but imo it is definitely the most pleasant to drive. my desktop is a bunch of high end parts inside an ugly leet gamer case that I bought ten years ago.

banach2 9y ago

My experience is that you will find many cs and math people among car enthusiasts (At my university almost everyone involved in motorsport is math/science/eng.) From the other side, you will find a smaller proportion due to the wide variety of people who work in tech nowadays. I don’t think the majority of students who study cs have an obsession any more. It has become such a public and large field that you can hardly expect that to be the case. cs pays more, so it will be more “diluted” (of car enthusiasts) but also an enthusiast of both is more likely to be in cs than eng for the same reason. In my case, I have always been obsessed with cars and then taught myself cs afterwards.

acranox 9y ago

Weird. They are one in the same to me. I started tinkering with cars and computers at a young age. I got a job fixing computers, then I got trained in cars and went to fix cars for a few years. Now I’m back to computers. I take things apart and figure out how they work and put things together. If that’s cars, or software, or computers, toasters, houses, furnaces, it’s all the same process for me. The overlap between these things is 100% in my mind. :)

toyg 9y ago

The cultural gap is real. The car world traditionally appeals to a very different demographic. Remember all those crappy flash intros every geek would hate? Car businesses loved them. Working on cars is a very social experience: you pick up the interest from relatives or friends, and space requirements for the hobby are such that, in urban surroundings, you usually cannot hide it from people, so they will see what you’re doing and stop to have a chat; you will often need help to push this or that relic around; you will have to talk to garage owners for many reasons, etc etc. Whereas IT is traditionally a loner’s world, and more so since the internet became central to it. Then consider that the world of car enthusiasts is shrinking. The big expos have consolidated for lack of visitors, and car evolution itself is shutting out enthusiasts by producing more and more products that cannot be tweaked or even repaired without professional assistance. When I was a teenager my dad was often going on about the fact that me and my friends simply did not do any of the motoring-related activities he did as a kid. I’ve known exactly two geeks in my life who were also car enthusiasts. One was a very atypical programmer, fundamentally a businessman who loved PHP. The other came from a deep UK working-class background, and cars were basically a way to stay in touch with that, a mean to maintain an emotional link with his friends and family. Everyone else only cared about cars enough to use them to from A to B and to hold a non-geek conversation (“did you see Top Gear last night? Ludicrous display! The thing with Jaguar is they always try to walk it in...”).