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Because being an agent in the movie industry is about finding "talent" and being connected to the right producers. Discovering talent for film, just like in mod

Because being an agent in the movie industry is about finding "talent" and being connected to the right producers. Discovering talent for film, just like in modeling and sports, isn't hard. You go to a few plays and theater productions or hang around enough people and notice which ones seem to have a knack for grabbing attention. This is hard in software because software talent isn't visible. Similarly, being connected in software isn't as relevant as in the movie industry because when software companies hire engineers they want to retain them for as long as possible instead of working on a single project and then putting a whole new team together for another one. In short, the dynamics in software engineering are stacked against this being viable. The incentives that exist in the movie industry don't exist in software so copying the movie business model and expecting it to work the same in the software industry is a non-starter. There are probably a few more concrete reasons but those are the main differences I could think of off the top of my head.

biztos 5y ago
One of my best friends owns a modeling agency specializing in new talent. As far as I can see, it's very hard work to find modeling talent, which I (stupidly?) think is not even "talent" in the same way that actors, writers, squash-players and programmers are. Also, it's a very very feast-or-famine business and the agency is taking most of the financial risk. For the Hollywood case, I agree that my analogy weakens a lot when we consider all the people writing code for 10 years at a crack. However my anecdata (basically, watching what jobs different friends have gotten) suggests that connections in software are at least as important as anywhere else for the top end, it's just that there's a vast middle that pays pretty well and doesn't actually care whom you know. I read somewhere that Netflix says "we're not a family, we're a sports team," which I find quite interesting (and enticing!) but also seems to be an analogy in search of an agent?

biztos 5y ago

One of my best friends owns a modeling agency specializing in new talent. As far as I can see, it's very hard work to find modeling talent, which I (stupidly?) think is not even "talent" in the same way that actors, writers, squash-players and programmers are. Also, it's a very very feast-or-famine business and the agency is taking most of the financial risk. For the Hollywood case, I agree that my analogy weakens a lot when we consider all the people writing code for 10 years at a crack. However my anecdata (basically, watching what jobs different friends have gotten) suggests that connections in software are at least as important as anywhere else for the top end, it's just that there's a vast middle that pays pretty well and doesn't actually care whom you know. I read somewhere that Netflix says "we're not a family, we're a sports team," which I find quite interesting (and enticing!) but also seems to be an analogy in search of an agent?