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The inflated sense of ego associated with “saving the world” and “solving tough problems” has almost completely turned me off from tech, in the Bay Area in part

The inflated sense of ego associated with “saving the world” and “solving tough problems” has almost completely turned me off from tech, in the Bay Area in particular. My problem isn’t with the sentiment—it’s that 99 out of 100 times it’s pure bullshit. There are a few people out their doing really amazing things, but the vast majority of people who have big egos aren’t the people working on that stuff. Tech is the new Wall Street in a lot of ways. But instead of being honest about where the paycheck comes from we gloss it up so it’s less morally reprehensible. I actually have more respect for people on Wall Street these days. At least they are honest with themselves about the game. I think I have more respect for Jordan Belfort and Lou Pai then the exec teams af Facebook and Uber.

prolikewh0a 8y ago
>The inflated sense of ego associated with “saving the world” and “solving tough problems” has almost completely turned me off from tech, in the Bay Area in particular. My problem isn’t with the sentiment—it’s that 99 out of 100 times it’s pure bullshit. There are a few people out their doing really amazing things, but the vast majority of people who have big egos aren’t the people working on that stuff. I see this mindset in Seattle very often. A lot of my friends have recently been quitting their jobs to do something other than tech because of the overly inflated egos and the need for software engineers to constantly "do something new" instead of just maintaining & fix what they already have.
- zBard 8y ago
  Or they get tired/can't keep up with having to continuously learn and adapt, which cognitive dissonance defensively turns into disdain for 'something new'.
bokonon12 8y ago
As a web developer I've even come across other web devs who are chasing "hard problems" and claim CRUD apps are easy and boring. Yet many of them still manage to write nearly-unmaintainable and rigid APIs etc. They haven't even figured out the "basics" but want to go straight for the "hard problems".
blub 8y ago
One doesn't need to save the world. But not making it worse through ads and ubiquitous tracking would be nice. So is not pushing negative externalities inherent to web apps to customers just because it makes web devs more productive. Today's web is a monster.
- jxub 8y ago
  > So is not pushing negative externalities [...] to customers Same could be said of bailouts, recycling, MLM, and other sucker games...

prolikewh0a 8y ago

>The inflated sense of ego associated with “saving the world” and “solving tough problems” has almost completely turned me off from tech, in the Bay Area in particular. My problem isn’t with the sentiment—it’s that 99 out of 100 times it’s pure bullshit. There are a few people out their doing really amazing things, but the vast majority of people who have big egos aren’t the people working on that stuff. I see this mindset in Seattle very often. A lot of my friends have recently been quitting their jobs to do something other than tech because of the overly inflated egos and the need for software engineers to constantly "do something new" instead of just maintaining & fix what they already have.

zBard 8y ago
Or they get tired/can't keep up with having to continuously learn and adapt, which cognitive dissonance defensively turns into disdain for 'something new'.

bokonon12 8y ago

As a web developer I've even come across other web devs who are chasing "hard problems" and claim CRUD apps are easy and boring. Yet many of them still manage to write nearly-unmaintainable and rigid APIs etc. They haven't even figured out the "basics" but want to go straight for the "hard problems".

blub 8y ago

One doesn't need to save the world. But not making it worse through ads and ubiquitous tracking would be nice. So is not pushing negative externalities inherent to web apps to customers just because it makes web devs more productive. Today's web is a monster.

jxub 8y ago
> So is not pushing negative externalities [...] to customers Same could be said of bailouts, recycling, MLM, and other sucker games...