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> For most of gaming's history it has been a niche product without mainstream appeal Really? So the Atari boom was niche? 500,000 arcade machines sold in 1982

> For most of gaming's history it has been a niche product without mainstream appeal Really? So the Atari boom was niche? 500,000 arcade machines sold in 1982 was niche? 30 million Nintendo Entertainment systems in American homes was niche? It hasn't been a fledgling industry by any reasonable measure for at least 25 years if not much longer. How many artists, testers and game designers do you know that moved into finance, media jobs, or architectural visualization (very much a niche industry). At least 75% of people working in the video game industry doing skilled and professional work can't easily transfer to a different field in the same way as an electrician cant move in to plumbing.

friendlybus 7y ago
I know one in finance and one in arch viz. There are interviews of Bethesda artists looking for work on the side and quoting generous and lazy deadlines for the work. The customer is amazed they can do in two weeks what takes other people a month or more. Games is not in a position of minimizing all risk. What industry is? If you want a safe job get into defense contracting. Go back to university and retrain like everybody else does. It's baffling to see this attitude on Hackernews, famous for tech entrepreneurs who have more pivots in their career than a pirouetting ice skater. Are comic books mainstream? They sold millions of copies, they are still a niche interest. Not until the Wii did games open up to a 'casual' market. With phones it's truly everywhere now.
- Apocryphon 7y ago
  Hacker News is not immune to the vicissitudes of society at large, and there is similar discontent against tech employers in non-game industry as well. There has been both sentiment in support of unionization at large tech megacorps like Google [0], and (non-union-related) sentiment against predatory startups that give misleading promises while forcing employees to assume both greater risk and lesser reward. [1] Not to mention there seems to be less hero worship of founders than there was in the past. [2] There is a generalized dissatisfaction that the wealth generated by tech is not adequately being reached by its workers. Union advocacy is only a component of it. Tech might pay better than other industries, but its workers are just as affected by costs in housing and healthcare, just as everyone else. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21923085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21923085 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21865065 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21865065 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21868022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21868022 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21973333 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21973333

friendlybus 7y ago

I know one in finance and one in arch viz. There are interviews of Bethesda artists looking for work on the side and quoting generous and lazy deadlines for the work. The customer is amazed they can do in two weeks what takes other people a month or more. Games is not in a position of minimizing all risk. What industry is? If you want a safe job get into defense contracting. Go back to university and retrain like everybody else does. It's baffling to see this attitude on Hackernews, famous for tech entrepreneurs who have more pivots in their career than a pirouetting ice skater. Are comic books mainstream? They sold millions of copies, they are still a niche interest. Not until the Wii did games open up to a 'casual' market. With phones it's truly everywhere now.

Apocryphon 7y ago
Hacker News is not immune to the vicissitudes of society at large, and there is similar discontent against tech employers in non-game industry as well. There has been both sentiment in support of unionization at large tech megacorps like Google [0], and (non-union-related) sentiment against predatory startups that give misleading promises while forcing employees to assume both greater risk and lesser reward. [1] Not to mention there seems to be less hero worship of founders than there was in the past. [2] There is a generalized dissatisfaction that the wealth generated by tech is not adequately being reached by its workers. Union advocacy is only a component of it. Tech might pay better than other industries, but its workers are just as affected by costs in housing and healthcare, just as everyone else. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21923085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21923085 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21865065 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21865065 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21868022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21868022 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21973333 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21973333