24 ms·

Midwest Developer

208 points by luu 5y ago

binarynate 5y ago
The part about working on side projects in the winter resonates with me. I've lived in Indiana my entire life and am considering moving to Texas to escape the cold, gray winters. Part of me is worried that I'll be less productive in the winter because of that, but I think it will be worth the tradeoff.
eyelidlessness 5y ago
> another half hour in an act known as a Minnesotan Goodbye I’m not a big town city slicker (I am) but my dad (from Iowa) does this and while it was easy to adapt to Minnesota (it wasn’t, but this was) I fucking hate it. Please do not do this, whatever your “I’m done with my time” signal should be reliably done.
jeffreportmill1 5y ago
Thank you for sharing your experience. I recently became a midwest developer myself having moved to Chicago 2 years ago and I've wondered about the lives of colleagues in this part of the country as we've explored a little of Wisconsin and Indiana. They warned me that 6 weeks of the year I would wish to be anywhere else. 2019 was fine - I found the cold invigorating, and with like more than a few inches of accumulated snow, I thought reports had been exaggerated. The winter of 2020-2021, disabused me of that - 3 feet of snow piled outside for 2-3 months has humbled me. I started as a southern developer 30 years ago, but in Texas I was considered a hippie. When I moved to Silicon Valley to fix that, I was considered too much of a Texan. After 10 years in CA we went back to Texas which felt more like home, but paradoxically was more isolating, because I knew very few software developers (working for myself). I must have thought this adventure in Chicago was going to be my happy medium. So I wish you continued good luck in Minnesota. Say hello to Al Franken and Garrison Keillor for me (two Minnesotans I've enjoyed listening to for years).
- blockwriter 5y ago
  The Indiana Sand Dunes are a good day trip into Indiana from Chicago.
- cpher 5y ago
  Welcome to Chicago. I've lived here 15+ years, and Illinois most of my life. And I still hate winter LOL.
- cozzyd 5y ago
  My work takes me to Antarctica and Greenland, so now I don't think Chicago winters are all that bad anymore :).
josefdlange 5y ago
This is so lovely and so remarkably familiar. Thank you so much for sharing. Having recently moved back to the midwest (SE WI) after being in the Seattle area for almost ten years, I feel so much of this. You've put it into words far better than I could dream of doing.
Minor49er 5y ago
This take is pretty spot-on. Many developers also move to Minnesota, so there are some pretty striking personality clashes in odd ways. As long as you like craft beer, though, you're golden
- the_only_law 5y ago
  > As long as you like craft beer, though, you're golden Depends are we talking about “oops all IPA’s” type craft beer or a nice varied selection of styles and flavors.
  - piefayth 5y ago
    You wouldn't believe the extent of the beer scene in the Twin Cities. There's pretty much any beer you could imagine, then probably some ones you can't. I moved here from Chicago ~6 years ago and was disappointed at how much worse the TC food scene was (it still has some gems, and is improving, as another commenter pointed out), but immediately I noticed a stark contrast in my social circles. In Chicago people would invite you to bars and restaurants, but in Minneapolis nearly everyone I met (coworkers, dates, etc) wanted to go to a brewery! And it's clear why - there's genuinely fantastic beers on every corner. You could spend months just trying to sample all the single cans that your local liquor store sells. Even beer haters would be delighted at the nice array of sours and ciders around. My mom, a known beer-despiser, still asks me when we can get more "nice beers from that place you took me."
    - coldpie 5y ago
      There are literally six breweries in walking distance of my office (University & 280).
      - Minor49er 5y ago
        A notable percentage of my friends and coworkers also brew their own beer and have elaborate coolers and dispensers
adamrezich 5y ago
when I was at GDC 2016 I met a couple who are somewhat well-known in those circles and while hanging out one night they started talking about the complex mix of feelings they had about having just moved back to San Francisco after being away for years. they said that because the weather is so mild and largely unvaried there, it's easy for one to lose track of time month after month, and the years sometimes just seem to run together as a result. this was incredibly interesting to me, having grown up in South Dakota (whose status as "midwest" is disputed (if not "midwest," then what?)), which was an experience much like the one in this article. recently worsening cold-season arthritis aside, I very much enjoy the seasonal weather. "The summers are humid, hot, and fleeting, yet caked in an energy that can only be felt when a resource is limited" really resonates with me (except for the humid part).
- dehrmann 5y ago
  > if not "midwest," then what? Great plains.
  - bart_spoon 5y ago
    Great Plains is a subset of the Midwest, not a distinct region. The Midwest is divided into the “Great Plains” and the “Great Lakes” subregions by the Census Bureau.
- justin66 5y ago
  > it's easy for one to lose track of time month after month, and the years sometimes just seem to run together as a result. I grew up with four distinct seasons and found this to be the case living in the Bay Area as well. There are a lot of microclimates on the coast and so experiences can vary, but I moved there on the tail end of an El Nino, which was one sort of season, and then experienced some other season for many years.
vineyardmike 5y ago
As a new englander, living in the PNW, dreaming of returning to california sun, I sure do miss my time in the midwest (although i've never been to Minnesota specifically). Obviously you can't generalize everyone, but the people i met in the MW were way nicer than the people i knew from the east coast or west coast. I've been invited into many strangers homes as if i was a close friend. Very few people seem to be captured by a blind viral drive towards success the way you find in places like NYC or SF, and instead people are just happy and enjoy their position in life. (not to say people don't do good work, or don't succeed at goals). If you dream of a nice middle class life, with a quaint house and a nice family, and all that jazz, it seems like a great place to be, and a culture that wants you to have it... if you're straight and white and "normal". The weather sure does suck though. Hot summers, cold snowy winters. Worse than new england, with less money to keep roads and infra in shape. That said, i find myself every fall on the west coast missing "real fall" where the leaves change and the brisk wind cools you down outside as you can see your breath. Throwing on a soft flannel and grabbing something warm to drink while you stand outside and enjoy nature...
- coldpie 5y ago
  > The weather sure does suck though. Ahhhhh you gotta embrace it and find the good in it or you'll just resent everything :) St Paulite here. This morning it was 9 degrees F on the way to the bus. The snow has a beautiful, sparkling layer of ice from the rainy drizzle we got the other day. Most of the plants were covered in a thin coating of ice, the streetlights reflecting through them looked like inverted icicles. It's snowing now, we'll probably get 2" this afternoon, lovely to crunch through.
  - jcims 5y ago
    I live in Ohio and it's probably my faulty memory at work but it seems that our winters used to be much more like what you describe. I can distinctly recall hunting deer in -20F weather in the 80s and my cheap plastic orange vest just disintegrating as I walk. Lots of weekends and evenings spent sledding or trying to optimize packing vs throwing in a good snowball fight (afterall it's not good until someone bleeds, right?) Aside from a nice blast of snow last year, it seems that our winters are now largely an indiscriminate blah of slush and rain and I'm tired. Need to relocate north or south and i can't figure out which.
mikewarot 5y ago
It should be noted that CBBS, the first Computerized Bulletin Board System, was created because of a snow storm in the Chicago area. Constraints inspire creativity.
mishftw 5y ago
"In Minnesota, the emphasis is on working hard at whatever you do, and living a good life." Having done my undergrad at the University of Michigan and spent a year and half in Detroit afterwards, I relate a lot to this article. People are just nicer and more personable here, there is less arrogance and an attitude of "doing the work".
slowmovintarget 5y ago
I miss the Minneapolis that was. I lived and worked there for a time after getting married. The city is not what it was ten years ago, though. Most of the restaurants I frequented (and they were exceptionally good) are gone. Crime has dramatically increased, including all time highs for murders in St. Paul, and Minneapolis three murders away from its all time high. I lived in an apartment in Minneapolis. I could walk just a block or two into downtown. It was a wonderful, vibrant city. A ten minute walk to Lake Calhoun, groceries down the street, my barber, and the ice cream shop right next to each other. It was my favorite of all the places I've lived. I just wish it was still as I recall it. Perhaps my perspective is too full from consuming news and has too little from current residents.
- DrSteveBrule 5y ago
  > I could walk just a block or two into downtown. It was a wonderful, vibrant city. A ten minute walk to Lake Calhoun Based on these data points, I estimate that you walk at least 15.6 mph.
  - DIVx0 5y ago
    Minneapolis is pretty small compared to "big" cities in other states but I do agree that this is an unlikely walk but a totally achievable bike ride. Also the lake's native Dakota name has been restored and locals call it Bde Maka Ska
  - acqbu 5y ago
    lol!
  - slowmovintarget 5y ago
    That gave me a good laugh. I used to live right near the Walker Art Center. Lake Calhoun was about two miles away, so yes, that was more like thirty minutes. Seemed shorter, though.
- coldpie 5y ago
  > Perhaps my perspective is too full from consuming news and has too little from current residents. Yeah, you're pretty deep into "old man yells at clouds" territory here :) Turn off the news and come visit. The Twin Cities are still great. Maybe you can come discover some new favorite restaurants, we've got loads of great ones.
boc 5y ago
As someone from the middle of Kansas, it's funny reading someone describe Minneapolis like a sleepy backwater town. If you truly grew up in the heartland, major cities like Minneapolis and Chicago feel incredibly alive and full of energy. Minneapolis is a cosmopolitan city. It has the second most theater seats of any US city (after NYC). It has lots of great food and international diversity, being home to large diasporas from Africa and SE Asia. If you're a Bay Area native, the most shocking thing about Minneapolis will be the weather, not the culture or people. In my opinion, the worst part about the weather in the Midwest is the variability. Good luck trying to plan a few days ahead - fronts whip through and drop or raise the temps dramatically. Rain/sleet/snow can happen almost anytime, and the intraday changes in weather are going to be foreign to anyone accustomed to coastal living. I've personally seen it go from 90F to 28F within 24 hours. If you can handle that, then Minneapolis is a great place to live.
- ericmay 5y ago
  Don’t forget nearby is one of the best hospitals in the world!
- techsin101 5y ago
  just wanted to remind that now even feds accept inflation isn't transitory.
- samschooler 5y ago
  I was interested in the "second most theater seats of any US city (after NYC)" claim. After a little google, it looks like its actually _per capita_. Which is still cool, but not the same. https://thetangential.com/2014/07/29/sorry-twin-cities-that-second-most-theater-seats-per-capita-outside-new-york-stat-is-total-bullshit/ https://thetangential.com/2014/07/29/sorry-twin-cities-that-...
  - hirsin 5y ago
    Ha, thank you, I was about to inject the pro-Cleveland piece mentioned in your link, so that was educational. How bounteous our country is to have so many second place cities!
mNovak 5y ago
I will vouch that the Midwest is highly underrated. People are friendly; there's way more diversity and culture than people seem to think; it's affordable.
- Supermancho 5y ago
  My family (parents and siblings) sold their properties in California and moved to Minnesota, shortly before I moved to Washington with my wife. 2.5 years later we moved to Fargo. It looks like Irvine most of the year and has everything you need in Southern California for a fraction of the price.
  - lotsofpulp 5y ago
    Never thought I would see someone compare Fargo, ND to SoCal. Obviously everyone’s preferences are subjective, but that is quite an outlier opinion.
yesimahuman 5y ago
I live in Madison and believe it or not we have coastal VC-backed startups (including my own and a SoftBank-backed unicorn or two) and lots of professional engineers. A lot of people on the coasts are frankly just not that knowledgeable outside of their bubble and that’s okay, it really doesn’t mean that what the Midwest has isn’t significant. I have actually grown to quite like being an under the radar city for all the benefits that brings and having a different perspective on America
- neartheplain 5y ago
  There's also a full-fledged Google office in Madison, in addition to their offices in Chicago and (soon) Rochester, Minnesota. Working as a developer and living in the Midwest doesn't necessarily mean leaving Big Tech.
  - hellisothers 5y ago
    I love Chicago and Minnesota but the Google offices in the MW tend to be data center jobs which I see complaints aren’t really “tech” jobs so much as supporting be data center. I recall a lot of the jobs were even sourced through temp agencies.
    - BooneJS 5y ago
      I work at Google Madison with many other software and silicon engineers. Come take a look! https://careers.google.com/locations/madison/ https://careers.google.com/locations/madison/ Nearest DC is in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
    - yesimahuman 5y ago
      There are data center jobs, yes, but there are many engineering/research oriented big tech offices, especially in college towns
marktangotango 5y ago
The worst part of being a developer in the midwest is the companies; banks, financial services, insurance, telecoms, insurance, banks. Did I mention insurance and banks? Of course there is more variety, but I think most would agree there's not a lot of cutting edge stuff going on "here" generally. Growing remote oppurtunities do mitigate that, but the number of companies trying to "modernize" their infrastructure is... depressing.
- yesimahuman 5y ago
  There are legacy companies everywhere. There are more than enough interesting startups or remote opportunities in the Midwest (city depending) that this isn’t really true any more
  - PascLeRasc 5y ago
    The interesting companies (Duolingo, Argo, Root, maybe Capital One, etc) in the Midwest won't hire anyone from regular local universities. They get all their people from CMU/Stanford/UCs. If you went to a place like Ohio State the best you can hope for locally is DBA at an insurance company. A lot of the engineers I graduated with have given up on this and are doing real estate or retraining to become a teacher. You can work for SpaceX, Google, Amazon, but you need to move out of the Midwest first. So out of college you need to ask yourself if giving up all your local friends and family is worth having a fulfilling career. It's hard. The workplace culture is different too. If you're in the rust belt, your managers over age 50 came from manufacturing lines and were taught that they need to literally see you looking like you're working all the time and they'll use phrases like "extract value from human capital". They'll want you to beg and plead for permission to use your PTO, but then put in your performance review that you're getting a 1% instead of a 2% raise for excessive time off utilization. My friend's telecom workplace just announced that their holiday bonus is that they may wear jeans on Fridays all 2022.
    - yesimahuman 5y ago
      As a startup employer in the Midwest this doesn’t resonate with me at all. We don’t care what school you went to as long as you’re good. In this hiring climate no one can afford to be weirdly selective about school
HeyLaughingBoy 5y ago
> In Minnesota, the emphasis is on working hard at whatever you do, and living a good life I moved to Minnesota from Connecticut about 20 years ago. When describing the company culture during my interview, my manager said "well, we have a choice of Summer hours to give you more time off during our very short summers, but come Winter, everyone just hunkers down and gets to work." Said with a broad smile and excitement about getting to work! Really nice guy though, and a damn good engineer. I'll just leave this here: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/969324.How_to_Talk_Minnesotan https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/969324.How_to_Talk_Mi...
light_hue_1 5y ago
- kayodelycaon 5y ago
  Having grown up in various places in the Midwest and lived here most of my life, I've never seen this. What campus was this? Cincinnati Pride is a week-long LGBT event that most of the city gets into. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Pride https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Pride
- cozzyd 5y ago
  There are certainly parts of the Midwest like you describe, but not the bigger cosmopolitan cities (Chicago, Minneapolis, Detroit, Columbus, Madison etc.) that people are likely talking about here, but overall you're mostly describing rural small towns all over the country, with a few exceptions (ski towns, vermont).
- bovermyer 5y ago
  First off, stop saying "the Midwest" like it's one unified culture. That's like saying all humans are the same. Secondly, Minneapolis specifically is very cosmopolitan. I live here, and there's a vibrant progressive culture. I've seen far more Trumpling culture recently on a drive through Illinois and Indiana than in my last ten years of living in Minneapolis. I will repeat - do not _ever_ call "the Midwest" one culture again.
  - wobblykiwi 5y ago
    Driving through Illinois during the election last year was interesting. Having grown up and currently living in Chicago, you won't see much "Trumpling" (as you put it) culture in the city proper and much of the surrounding suburbs, but that changes drastically even an hour or 2 drive out from the city. It's like an entirely different world.
    - cozzyd 5y ago
      Yes, probably the best example is driving down Route 66 between Joliet and Wilmington. Wilmington greets you with this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3094815,-88.1413858,3a,47.3y,296.46h,85.95t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sCoTmniLDPPc72SmlyoTN9w!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3094815,-88.1413858,3a,47.3y...
deleted 5y ago
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kayodelycaon 5y ago
I lasted about 2 years in the PNW before I decided to go back to the midwest. It's worked out really well. A side benefit, Cincinnati is within driving distance of a lot of furry conventions. (Before the pandemic...) The midwest is a lot more laid back than other places I've been. People are friendly here. I've had a few nice conversations with random strangers, just because we were standing in the same line. If you don't want to talk to people in line, that's fine too. You're not forced to interact with anyone, but there are a lot of opportunities if you want to.
015a 5y ago
Being a midwest developer: - Cost of living. Its the cheapest place in the US to live. - Gender ratio. This is something new grads should absolutely consider. The gender ratio even on midwest tech teams feels nation-leading, with many of the companies I've talked to (including my own) near 50-50. But even beyond tech; its far more equitable here. This is a theme I see all the time with west-coast tech; they talk about making change, implement tons of policies to try to it happen, but here, its already happened. We just don't talk about it. This is important for new grads even beyond their job; finding a partner here is so much easier & more fun. - Pay & Job Security. Some companies are "old" and still stuck in their ways and won't match more high-tech salaries. You'll find that anywhere. Other companies have more progressive leadership, despite being a traditionally old business, and pay aggressively well. You'll also find that anywhere. You have to spend some time researching who is who, but: these companies have tons of money, desire to modernize, and the best part: very little sense of what being a "good engineer" means. Read into that what you will, but: you literally won't ever have a problem finding a job. I've gotten offers after literally just casually talking with someone for fifteen minutes in a company's engineering leadership at a tech meetup. - Remote. Many west coast companies are now paying west coast salaries regardless of work location. Local companies are pushing for more work-from-home or hybrid. - Novelty. Tech still feels nascent in many of these cities. Maybe not MSP/Chicago, but more of the second tier midwestern cities. The communities are small, three-person startups are still everywhere, and there's a startling amount of "old money" looking to invest. Most awesomely, there's much less bullshit; in general, you hear what some of these companies are working on and think "shit, that will sell". - Weather. You get used to it. But you know what we don't get? Wildfires, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Tornadoes are common, but they generally don't strike major cities. I'd take the midwest environment over west coast any day; warm weather every day is fine, but imagine buying a house in an area that's years overdue for an earthquake that will level your city.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  > but imagine buying a house in an area that's years overdue for an earthquake that will level your city. Is there credibility to the notion of knowing that a place is going to have an earthquake within the precision of one human’s lifetime, or even a few generations of human’s lifetimes?
hangonhn 5y ago
How could you forget about the humble Gopher protocol: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol) !? :-)
- greenyoda 5y ago
  One of the earliest graphical web browsers, Mosaic, was also a product of the Midwest, having been developed at the University of Illinois: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)
analog31 5y ago
Greetings from Wisconsin. I'd describe the attitude towards work a bit differently: I think we tend to have generally healthy attitudes about work-life balance. I've not seen the 996 culture here except in some rare cases. When we work, we work. Then we go home. There's probably a different age distribution among tech workers, that might be reflected in our attitudes. I have colleagues who are past 65 and still enjoy coming in and doing their thing. Not everybody hates the winter. I love it. Right now I'm looking out at a nice snowstorm, and hoping to take a long walk in it. I believe the trick to dealing with the weather -- hot and cold -- is to get out and embrace it. If you're outside every day, the seasons won't take you by surprise. You'll figure out clothing. You'll find the nice places to take walks or ride your bike. It doesn't have to happen all at once, or even within the space of one year.
- curiousllama 5y ago
  > Not everybody hates the winter. Absolute truth. > I believe the trick to dealing with the weather -- hot and cold -- is to get out and embrace it. I used to routinely need to walk >2 miles over the course of a day in Chicago winters. I assure you, I still hated it! 100 degrees and humid? No problem. Sub-zero? I'm leaving!
jplhomer 5y ago
Des Moines, IA software engineer checking in! It’s great. Not terribly exciting, but the hours/culture/WL balance others have described holds up.
mgkimsal 5y ago
I grew up in Detroit, but moved south about 15 years ago. I've got a couple friends from MN, and visited there for a conference ... maybe 8-9 years ago. I loved the downtown - big enough to feel like a 'real city', but not overwhelmingly so. That was my impression, anyway. I was only there for a few days, but really liked the short vibe I got. I was visiting in July, however, and kept imagining how brutal the winters would be. I have to imaging 'as bad as Detroit' or perhaps worse. It was amazing to me how quickly I don't miss winter/snow at all. I never cared for it, even when living there, but when you're born in to an area, you 'live with it'. After a while, much of your life is there, and leaving can be hard (friends/family/work/etc). My family is in 34(f)-degrees-Detroit area right now, while I had a 72(f)-degrees afternoon. Just could not think of moving back permanently, but I do like to visit.
neartheplain 5y ago
I'm a Midwest native and huge fan of the region. It's been great to see more big tech firms open offices here, in addition to a rising number of startups and software consulting firms. Was happily surprised to see that Tundra Labs, who recently launched a well-reviewed VR full-body tracking product, is based out of Green Bay, Wisconsin (I am not affiliated, just a Midwest VR enthusiast): https://twitter.com/Tundra_Labs https://twitter.com/Tundra_Labs
rmason 5y ago
You think it's bad being from Minneapolis-St. Paul, try telling them you're originally from Detroit! It's getting better but the amount of ignorance about Detroit is amazing! I tried once talking an evangelist into adding Detroit to the road show around twenty years ago. There had just been an article in Time magazine and it said something like the city had the lowest number of college graduates per capita of any major city and there were less than 670,000 people. The guy immediately hit me with that fact. He said we couldn't possibly go to a place that small and if we did there wouldn't be that many developers. I said that may be true for the city of Detroit but the Detroit metro has over four million people and I assure you there are a lot of developers. So they decided to add Detroit as a tour stop and he later told me that it was one of the largest and most enthusiastic audiences on the entire tour. Even today Detroit gets left off most tech tours and when one does add them they're pleasantly surprised by the turn out. That's despite the fact that Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Twitter have offices there.
- michigama 5y ago
  There's something particularly exciting about Detroit that's hard to put my finger on, especially the last few years of development in the Midtown area. Something about all of the lovely art deco architecture slowly being re-occupied and revitalized by tech/retail/restaurants makes it an incredibly interesting time and place to be around.
  - psbp 5y ago
    I don't have the gumption to move there, but I completely agree. There's a lot of desire to move to the "next big" city (recent example being Austin), but I think there's a lot more pride in revitalizing a city with an existing identity. I think there's also a future where we're just creating more pockets of urban (and suburban) decay by hopping to whichever trendy city. American population isn't expanding like it was decades ago. imo, some metros (recent growing ones like Austin, Dallas, Phoenix, Atlanta) are expanding at a rate that will not be sustainable in 30-40 years. Parts of those areas will be in an even worse situation than places like Detroit.
  - rmason 5y ago
transienthrow 5y ago
Oh boy. Thoughts from someone who's worked extensively east coast, west coast, and now midwest: Insanely cargo-culty with regard to technology and development practices, but 5 years behind. Tall nail gets hammered down. On the west coast, if you're really good, you're a god. On the east coast, people will try to level up to you. In the midwest, you'll get bullied/ostracized. Seriously. With limited decent opportunities, you're seen as an existential threat. Most opportunities pay poorly, and most of the ones that pay decently are awful. Layoffs and corporate instability rampant. Many places think offshoring is a silver bullet (!)
- DarylZero 5y ago
  What state in the Midwest?
  - transienthrow 5y ago
allturtles 5y ago
No matter how dismissive one is of the midwest, how could you be ignorant of the existence of a major metro area like Minneapolis-St. Paul? Per [0], it's the 16th largest in the U.S. Its teams participate in every major televised sports league (NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB). I dunno, I almost just don't believe the OP's anecdotes, unless they are talking to recent arrivals to the U.S. from other countries. I'm from a significantly smaller Midwestern city than Minneapolis, and I don't recall anyone ever saying "where's that" or "are there buildings there" when I say where I'm from. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area Edit: Based on comments it seems many do agree with OPs view. Maybe it's a California/SV thing, I've never lived there. But I've been in the south/east/mountain regions and never encountered this level of ignorance that civilization exists in the Midwest (whether real or feigned.)
- aspaceman 5y ago
  I grew up pretty close to Chicago and folks in California still call me "corn boy".
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - almost_usual 5y ago
    Really? I grew up in literal cornfields and no one I know who grew up in California says stuff like this.
  - stjohnswarts 5y ago
    I bet you don't live in a large city though? This sounds like small town nickname games. Source: I grew up in a small town where everyone had to have a nickname.
- pech0rin 5y ago
  I am from Indianapolis and regularly have people not know anything about it so I dont find this to be an exaggeration. The anecdotes really ring true for me so sounds like you arent from the midwest.
kerneloftruth 5y ago
This is very good, and applies to so many people from the Midwest. This describes, pleasantly and without vitriol, the attitudes (shaped by perspective) that many coastal folks with little exposure to the rest of the US have. These are the same folks who call the Midwest states "flyover states", implying "nobody who's anybody stops or lives there". I've been asked by someone from Boston if we celebrated Independence Day in Texas, and have seen a UC Berkeley graduate become genuinely frightened by the sight of a Southern Living cookbook. Being ignorant of places you haven't been to is understandable, but it seems a common pattern for those in the Midwest to see the coastal places as "special" and desirable to at least visit; whereas geographically ignorant Californians (the ones I'm most familiar with) generally view all the interior states as "lesser". Granted, this is a bit of a generalized judgement on my own part.
semireg 5y ago
I grew up in Minneapolis and then the suburbs and left as soon as I could... but returned to a small town about 2 hours drive southeast in a small town called Winona. It's the home of Fastenal, Peerless Chain, and a ton of other "startups" from the last 50 years. I work "remote" for my own consultancy turned Electron-based software company making apps for label printers. The cost of a home here in Winona, circa 10 years ago was about $100k and even though prices have nearly doubled the houses are still affordable. You don't need to make much to live here, and we love the beauty of Minnesota... especially southeastern Minnesota. It's MN "NICE!"
- voidlogic 5y ago
  Hey, I live near you. Agree on multiple points. I doubt most people from the coasts would believe how good the food and drink scene in Winona and La Crosse is.
TameAntelope 5y ago
As I work more with someone from the midwest, and being from the mid-atlantic region myself, I'm growing more and more suspicious of the "hard worker" mindset. What I'm seeing, over and over, is that this drive to "work hard" ends up creating all kinds of "bad" work; difficult/tedious labor intensive decisions rather than efficient and innovative ways that are objectively better. He gets stuck on a problem, and won't put it down and go pick up the other problems that are easier to complete and provide similar (if slightly reduced) value to the customer. That's his "hard work" ethic at play, and I've found it pretty difficult to break him of that habit. And this isn't some idle efficiency meddling on my behalf; instead of providing some incremental value on a daily or near-daily basis, he goes completely dark for days or even weeks at a time before surfacing with a "glorious solution" to the problem he's ratholed on. If he had dropped the work at the first sign of trouble (seemingly anathema to a "hard worker"), he would have found other ways to have an impact on our customers. He's substantially less effective because he wants to "work hard". I do believe that people who value "hard work" generally don't understand this downside, and it's kind of fascinating to me, because of how ingrained this flawed trait is into an entire subset of American culture (being an American myself).
- projectazorian 5y ago
  This is an issue with hustle culture and not Midwesterners, IMO. I see just as much of this sort of thing, if not more, at my current West Coast employer that mainly hires out of top-20 CS programs
  - TameAntelope 5y ago
    My experience with "hustle" culture is entirely the opposite. "hustle culture" folks are loathe to do any work at all until you can tie to directly back to value, usually for them.
    - projectazorian 5y ago
      Maybe on the business side, but I've seen lots of undesirable grinding from engineers from all sorts of places, and wanting to prove they have hustle (ie. they are hard workers) is often at the root of it.
cmrdporcupine 5y ago
As a Canadian, I dig the midwest. It feels eminently familiar. Maybe more Canadian than much of Canada. Or large parts of Canada are a vaguely Britishy extension of the midwest. Or something. I find it interesting, the geographical division in the US, too. Here, we are roughly "west coast -> rockies -> prairies -> central (great lakes st lawrence) -> maritime". Down there it's like "west coast -> rockies -> west -> new england / mid-atnlantic / east coast" and so our central and prairies overlap with what's "midwest." Ontario is sorta both midwest (a lot like Ohio) and also New England? Anyways, praise to the midwest :-) I'd like to visit someday when things at the border aren't so insane.
cushychicken 5y ago
Atmosphere, Minneapolis's hometown rap group, summarized the vibe there very well in their song "Say Shh": So if the people laugh and giggle when you tell 'em where you live Say shhh, say shhh And if you know this is where you wanna raise your kids Say shhh, say shhh If you're from the Midwest, and it doesn't matter where Say shhh, say shhh If you can drink tap water and breathe the air Say shhh, say shhh
- reducesuffering 5y ago
  > If you can drink tap water and breathe the air Flint would like a word…
geerlingguy 5y ago
I think one of the biggest differences for midwest towns (I'm a native of St. Louis) is that when we meet someone else in our city who has similar interests / passion for tech, we're surprised, and automatically form some sort of bond, mostly because there are comparatively few. The OP hits the nail on the head with the introverted part, too—there are many hardware and software devs in flyover country, but it seems like most are the heads-down, family-over-work types, and don't tend to be as public and/or extroverted (thus leading back to my mention of surprise when one of us finds another local). I think I've met a grand total of two other people in my city who have ever commented on HN.
- atomicnumber3 5y ago
  I'm also from STL! I usually identify fellow tech folks by their Rolla shirts. Even if they're not tech, they still know matlab!
  - geerlingguy 5y ago
    Haha so true.
nateabele 5y ago
I grew up 15 minutes from Minneapolis, and have lived & worked in the Southern California area as well as up and down the Northeast (from Boston to DC). It's not that people are specifically ignorant of the Midwest, it's that they're insular and myopic, and generally ignorant of anything outside of their regions and vacation spots (Hawaii and Florida respectively, sometimes Western Europe).
yosito 5y ago
I live in Budapest. My sister lives in Minneapolis. I wouldn't compare the two in any way, except that both have lots of great coffee shops.
abdel_nasser 5y ago
i moved to the midwest from the san fran bay area. i could not have imagined it. people from the coast think they know but they dont know. coastal people have absolutely no idea about the midwest. like this guy says, if you tell a coastie some midwestern city or state they just stare blankly. two minutes later they will refer to your city/state again but mix it up with some other cliche midwestern city/state. the experience of living in this place and sharing a house with natives has been mind bending. i have been to a dozen countries and these people are less like me than any other people i have met. it really makes you see how there are so many things that we take for granted that are really totally invaluable triumphs of cultural curation and accumulation. there are sensibilities that simply dont exist here and you didnt even realize that these things were sensibilities at all or that a person could not have them. there are so many gears and cogs that are essential to a good quality of life and a civilized standard of living that are invisible and whos names arent in the lexicon. to see a place like this is to see those pieces finally, through their absence. i really believe that raising a child in the midwest is form of child abuse. many of these places are in need of nothing besides more intelligent people. they just suffer from poor planning, a lack of intellectual rigor within public institutions... if a bunch of coastal people would just come back then these midwestern cities would be the best cities in the country without a doubt. but its still a great choice if you just want an affordable place to escape to that has a functional economy/society.
- bart_spoon 5y ago
  Child abuse? Really? I think that outlook says more about you than the Midwest.
  - abdel_nasser 5y ago
    yeah, exposing a child to nothing more than a corn field is abusive because when they become adults they have no tools to succeed or any context with which to understand and navigate the world. and also it creates a cultural barrier that really makes it hard for them to get along on the coast. you create this stunted human, yeah i think it meets the criteria for abuse if only just and if only in the most modern interpretation of the word abuse. i certainly would never do it to any kid that i had to raise. maybe youre from the midwest and if i have offended you then i apologize but no problem has ever gone away because people ignored it. it must be confronted like all the other societal problems that hurt people needlessly.
bsenftner 5y ago
I was originally a developer from Des Moines, IA. Moving to Boston, and Los Angeles after that I was surprised to learn one of the early real time operating systems, called os9, came from a company from Des Moines in the 80's. That OS was used on the original generations of ATM machines deployed world wide. I worked on early real time streaming during the early 90's in Los Angeles, and Des Moines was one of the better places for locating experienced real time developers. A while ago I heard Iowa in general and Omaha, NE have growing tech hubs.
maxmalkav 5y ago
The first thing that comes to my mind about Minneapolis is 80s punk and alt. rock (Hüsker Dü and The Replacements to be more specific, I am European and probably a bit of an outlier)
jedberg 5y ago
About 10 years ago, the recruiters at Netflix focused on Midwestern/Southern devs. It seemed like there were a lot of good people working for Target/Walmart/Dominoes/Playboy, etc. who were mostly getting overlooked. Netflix paid enough money to convince most of them to move to California, and some of our best people came from there.
irateswami 5y ago
Greetings from Minneapolis, I work and live as a Dev here and it fucking sucks.
meddlin 5y ago
I like this one. Reminds me of how I felt moving into software engineering growing up in south Louisiana. I only moved to ATX, and yet others' bewilderment is my amusement.
- selimthegrim 5y ago
  Some of us are still here.
jmce 5y ago
If anybody is looking for a vc-backed startup with deep MN roots, connect with me about Civic Eagle. Email is jesse@ Definitely have had some similar experiences though overall I have to say it hasn’t been a barrier to hiring and interfacing with tech folks from the coasts. Our MN team members are extra loyal, though ;) Honestly it’s a bigger barrier on the finance side.
jmnicolas 5y ago
I'm not American. According to Google Earth's ruler, Minneapolis Minnesota is 1500 miles from the west coast and 1000 miles from the east coast. How can it be called Midwest? It feels more Mideast to me.
MrDresden 5y ago
As someone who is from Iceland this actually sounds like the perfect place for me to move to if I ever were to relocate to the US.
grouphugs 5y ago

208 points by luu 5y ago

The part about working on side projects in the winter resonates with me. I've lived in Indiana my entire life and am considering moving to Texas to escape the cold, gray winters. Part of me is worried that I'll be less productive in the winter because of that, but I think it will be worth the tradeoff.

eyelidlessness 5y ago

> another half hour in an act known as a Minnesotan Goodbye I’m not a big town city slicker (I am) but my dad (from Iowa) does this and while it was easy to adapt to Minnesota (it wasn’t, but this was) I fucking hate it. Please do not do this, whatever your “I’m done with my time” signal should be reliably done.

jeffreportmill1 5y ago

Thank you for sharing your experience. I recently became a midwest developer myself having moved to Chicago 2 years ago and I've wondered about the lives of colleagues in this part of the country as we've explored a little of Wisconsin and Indiana. They warned me that 6 weeks of the year I would wish to be anywhere else. 2019 was fine - I found the cold invigorating, and with like more than a few inches of accumulated snow, I thought reports had been exaggerated. The winter of 2020-2021, disabused me of that - 3 feet of snow piled outside for 2-3 months has humbled me. I started as a southern developer 30 years ago, but in Texas I was considered a hippie. When I moved to Silicon Valley to fix that, I was considered too much of a Texan. After 10 years in CA we went back to Texas which felt more like home, but paradoxically was more isolating, because I knew very few software developers (working for myself). I must have thought this adventure in Chicago was going to be my happy medium. So I wish you continued good luck in Minnesota. Say hello to Al Franken and Garrison Keillor for me (two Minnesotans I've enjoyed listening to for years).

blockwriter 5y ago
The Indiana Sand Dunes are a good day trip into Indiana from Chicago.
cpher 5y ago
Welcome to Chicago. I've lived here 15+ years, and Illinois most of my life. And I still hate winter LOL.
cozzyd 5y ago
My work takes me to Antarctica and Greenland, so now I don't think Chicago winters are all that bad anymore :).

josefdlange 5y ago

This is so lovely and so remarkably familiar. Thank you so much for sharing. Having recently moved back to the midwest (SE WI) after being in the Seattle area for almost ten years, I feel so much of this. You've put it into words far better than I could dream of doing.

Minor49er 5y ago

This take is pretty spot-on. Many developers also move to Minnesota, so there are some pretty striking personality clashes in odd ways. As long as you like craft beer, though, you're golden

the_only_law 5y ago
> As long as you like craft beer, though, you're golden Depends are we talking about “oops all IPA’s” type craft beer or a nice varied selection of styles and flavors.
- piefayth 5y ago
  You wouldn't believe the extent of the beer scene in the Twin Cities. There's pretty much any beer you could imagine, then probably some ones you can't. I moved here from Chicago ~6 years ago and was disappointed at how much worse the TC food scene was (it still has some gems, and is improving, as another commenter pointed out), but immediately I noticed a stark contrast in my social circles. In Chicago people would invite you to bars and restaurants, but in Minneapolis nearly everyone I met (coworkers, dates, etc) wanted to go to a brewery! And it's clear why - there's genuinely fantastic beers on every corner. You could spend months just trying to sample all the single cans that your local liquor store sells. Even beer haters would be delighted at the nice array of sours and ciders around. My mom, a known beer-despiser, still asks me when we can get more "nice beers from that place you took me."
  - coldpie 5y ago
    There are literally six breweries in walking distance of my office (University & 280).
    - Minor49er 5y ago
      A notable percentage of my friends and coworkers also brew their own beer and have elaborate coolers and dispensers

adamrezich 5y ago

when I was at GDC 2016 I met a couple who are somewhat well-known in those circles and while hanging out one night they started talking about the complex mix of feelings they had about having just moved back to San Francisco after being away for years. they said that because the weather is so mild and largely unvaried there, it's easy for one to lose track of time month after month, and the years sometimes just seem to run together as a result. this was incredibly interesting to me, having grown up in South Dakota (whose status as "midwest" is disputed (if not "midwest," then what?)), which was an experience much like the one in this article. recently worsening cold-season arthritis aside, I very much enjoy the seasonal weather. "The summers are humid, hot, and fleeting, yet caked in an energy that can only be felt when a resource is limited" really resonates with me (except for the humid part).

dehrmann 5y ago
> if not "midwest," then what? Great plains.
- bart_spoon 5y ago
  Great Plains is a subset of the Midwest, not a distinct region. The Midwest is divided into the “Great Plains” and the “Great Lakes” subregions by the Census Bureau.
justin66 5y ago
> it's easy for one to lose track of time month after month, and the years sometimes just seem to run together as a result. I grew up with four distinct seasons and found this to be the case living in the Bay Area as well. There are a lot of microclimates on the coast and so experiences can vary, but I moved there on the tail end of an El Nino, which was one sort of season, and then experienced some other season for many years.

vineyardmike 5y ago

As a new englander, living in the PNW, dreaming of returning to california sun, I sure do miss my time in the midwest (although i've never been to Minnesota specifically). Obviously you can't generalize everyone, but the people i met in the MW were way nicer than the people i knew from the east coast or west coast. I've been invited into many strangers homes as if i was a close friend. Very few people seem to be captured by a blind viral drive towards success the way you find in places like NYC or SF, and instead people are just happy and enjoy their position in life. (not to say people don't do good work, or don't succeed at goals). If you dream of a nice middle class life, with a quaint house and a nice family, and all that jazz, it seems like a great place to be, and a culture that wants you to have it... if you're straight and white and "normal". The weather sure does suck though. Hot summers, cold snowy winters. Worse than new england, with less money to keep roads and infra in shape. That said, i find myself every fall on the west coast missing "real fall" where the leaves change and the brisk wind cools you down outside as you can see your breath. Throwing on a soft flannel and grabbing something warm to drink while you stand outside and enjoy nature...

coldpie 5y ago
> The weather sure does suck though. Ahhhhh you gotta embrace it and find the good in it or you'll just resent everything :) St Paulite here. This morning it was 9 degrees F on the way to the bus. The snow has a beautiful, sparkling layer of ice from the rainy drizzle we got the other day. Most of the plants were covered in a thin coating of ice, the streetlights reflecting through them looked like inverted icicles. It's snowing now, we'll probably get 2" this afternoon, lovely to crunch through.
- jcims 5y ago
  I live in Ohio and it's probably my faulty memory at work but it seems that our winters used to be much more like what you describe. I can distinctly recall hunting deer in -20F weather in the 80s and my cheap plastic orange vest just disintegrating as I walk. Lots of weekends and evenings spent sledding or trying to optimize packing vs throwing in a good snowball fight (afterall it's not good until someone bleeds, right?) Aside from a nice blast of snow last year, it seems that our winters are now largely an indiscriminate blah of slush and rain and I'm tired. Need to relocate north or south and i can't figure out which.

mikewarot 5y ago

It should be noted that CBBS, the first Computerized Bulletin Board System, was created because of a snow storm in the Chicago area. Constraints inspire creativity.

mishftw 5y ago

"In Minnesota, the emphasis is on working hard at whatever you do, and living a good life." Having done my undergrad at the University of Michigan and spent a year and half in Detroit afterwards, I relate a lot to this article. People are just nicer and more personable here, there is less arrogance and an attitude of "doing the work".

slowmovintarget 5y ago

I miss the Minneapolis that was. I lived and worked there for a time after getting married. The city is not what it was ten years ago, though. Most of the restaurants I frequented (and they were exceptionally good) are gone. Crime has dramatically increased, including all time highs for murders in St. Paul, and Minneapolis three murders away from its all time high. I lived in an apartment in Minneapolis. I could walk just a block or two into downtown. It was a wonderful, vibrant city. A ten minute walk to Lake Calhoun, groceries down the street, my barber, and the ice cream shop right next to each other. It was my favorite of all the places I've lived. I just wish it was still as I recall it. Perhaps my perspective is too full from consuming news and has too little from current residents.

DrSteveBrule 5y ago
> I could walk just a block or two into downtown. It was a wonderful, vibrant city. A ten minute walk to Lake Calhoun Based on these data points, I estimate that you walk at least 15.6 mph.
- DIVx0 5y ago
  Minneapolis is pretty small compared to "big" cities in other states but I do agree that this is an unlikely walk but a totally achievable bike ride. Also the lake's native Dakota name has been restored and locals call it Bde Maka Ska
- acqbu 5y ago
  lol!
- slowmovintarget 5y ago
  That gave me a good laugh. I used to live right near the Walker Art Center. Lake Calhoun was about two miles away, so yes, that was more like thirty minutes. Seemed shorter, though.
coldpie 5y ago
> Perhaps my perspective is too full from consuming news and has too little from current residents. Yeah, you're pretty deep into "old man yells at clouds" territory here :) Turn off the news and come visit. The Twin Cities are still great. Maybe you can come discover some new favorite restaurants, we've got loads of great ones.

boc 5y ago

As someone from the middle of Kansas, it's funny reading someone describe Minneapolis like a sleepy backwater town. If you truly grew up in the heartland, major cities like Minneapolis and Chicago feel incredibly alive and full of energy. Minneapolis is a cosmopolitan city. It has the second most theater seats of any US city (after NYC). It has lots of great food and international diversity, being home to large diasporas from Africa and SE Asia. If you're a Bay Area native, the most shocking thing about Minneapolis will be the weather, not the culture or people. In my opinion, the worst part about the weather in the Midwest is the variability. Good luck trying to plan a few days ahead - fronts whip through and drop or raise the temps dramatically. Rain/sleet/snow can happen almost anytime, and the intraday changes in weather are going to be foreign to anyone accustomed to coastal living. I've personally seen it go from 90F to 28F within 24 hours. If you can handle that, then Minneapolis is a great place to live.

ericmay 5y ago
Don’t forget nearby is one of the best hospitals in the world!
techsin101 5y ago
just wanted to remind that now even feds accept inflation isn't transitory.
samschooler 5y ago
I was interested in the "second most theater seats of any US city (after NYC)" claim. After a little google, it looks like its actually _per capita_. Which is still cool, but not the same. https://thetangential.com/2014/07/29/sorry-twin-cities-that-second-most-theater-seats-per-capita-outside-new-york-stat-is-total-bullshit/ https://thetangential.com/2014/07/29/sorry-twin-cities-that-...
- hirsin 5y ago
  Ha, thank you, I was about to inject the pro-Cleveland piece mentioned in your link, so that was educational. How bounteous our country is to have so many second place cities!

mNovak 5y ago

I will vouch that the Midwest is highly underrated. People are friendly; there's way more diversity and culture than people seem to think; it's affordable.

Supermancho 5y ago
My family (parents and siblings) sold their properties in California and moved to Minnesota, shortly before I moved to Washington with my wife. 2.5 years later we moved to Fargo. It looks like Irvine most of the year and has everything you need in Southern California for a fraction of the price.
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Never thought I would see someone compare Fargo, ND to SoCal. Obviously everyone’s preferences are subjective, but that is quite an outlier opinion.

yesimahuman 5y ago

I live in Madison and believe it or not we have coastal VC-backed startups (including my own and a SoftBank-backed unicorn or two) and lots of professional engineers. A lot of people on the coasts are frankly just not that knowledgeable outside of their bubble and that’s okay, it really doesn’t mean that what the Midwest has isn’t significant. I have actually grown to quite like being an under the radar city for all the benefits that brings and having a different perspective on America

neartheplain 5y ago
There's also a full-fledged Google office in Madison, in addition to their offices in Chicago and (soon) Rochester, Minnesota. Working as a developer and living in the Midwest doesn't necessarily mean leaving Big Tech.
- hellisothers 5y ago
  I love Chicago and Minnesota but the Google offices in the MW tend to be data center jobs which I see complaints aren’t really “tech” jobs so much as supporting be data center. I recall a lot of the jobs were even sourced through temp agencies.
  - BooneJS 5y ago
    I work at Google Madison with many other software and silicon engineers. Come take a look! https://careers.google.com/locations/madison/ https://careers.google.com/locations/madison/ Nearest DC is in Council Bluffs, Iowa.
  - yesimahuman 5y ago
    There are data center jobs, yes, but there are many engineering/research oriented big tech offices, especially in college towns

marktangotango 5y ago

The worst part of being a developer in the midwest is the companies; banks, financial services, insurance, telecoms, insurance, banks. Did I mention insurance and banks? Of course there is more variety, but I think most would agree there's not a lot of cutting edge stuff going on "here" generally. Growing remote oppurtunities do mitigate that, but the number of companies trying to "modernize" their infrastructure is... depressing.

yesimahuman 5y ago
There are legacy companies everywhere. There are more than enough interesting startups or remote opportunities in the Midwest (city depending) that this isn’t really true any more
- PascLeRasc 5y ago
  The interesting companies (Duolingo, Argo, Root, maybe Capital One, etc) in the Midwest won't hire anyone from regular local universities. They get all their people from CMU/Stanford/UCs. If you went to a place like Ohio State the best you can hope for locally is DBA at an insurance company. A lot of the engineers I graduated with have given up on this and are doing real estate or retraining to become a teacher. You can work for SpaceX, Google, Amazon, but you need to move out of the Midwest first. So out of college you need to ask yourself if giving up all your local friends and family is worth having a fulfilling career. It's hard. The workplace culture is different too. If you're in the rust belt, your managers over age 50 came from manufacturing lines and were taught that they need to literally see you looking like you're working all the time and they'll use phrases like "extract value from human capital". They'll want you to beg and plead for permission to use your PTO, but then put in your performance review that you're getting a 1% instead of a 2% raise for excessive time off utilization. My friend's telecom workplace just announced that their holiday bonus is that they may wear jeans on Fridays all 2022.
  - yesimahuman 5y ago
    As a startup employer in the Midwest this doesn’t resonate with me at all. We don’t care what school you went to as long as you’re good. In this hiring climate no one can afford to be weirdly selective about school

HeyLaughingBoy 5y ago

> In Minnesota, the emphasis is on working hard at whatever you do, and living a good life I moved to Minnesota from Connecticut about 20 years ago. When describing the company culture during my interview, my manager said "well, we have a choice of Summer hours to give you more time off during our very short summers, but come Winter, everyone just hunkers down and gets to work." Said with a broad smile and excitement about getting to work! Really nice guy though, and a damn good engineer. I'll just leave this here: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/969324.How_to_Talk_Minnesotan https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/969324.How_to_Talk_Mi...

light_hue_1 5y ago

kayodelycaon 5y ago
Having grown up in various places in the Midwest and lived here most of my life, I've never seen this. What campus was this? Cincinnati Pride is a week-long LGBT event that most of the city gets into. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Pride https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Pride
cozzyd 5y ago
There are certainly parts of the Midwest like you describe, but not the bigger cosmopolitan cities (Chicago, Minneapolis, Detroit, Columbus, Madison etc.) that people are likely talking about here, but overall you're mostly describing rural small towns all over the country, with a few exceptions (ski towns, vermont).
bovermyer 5y ago
First off, stop saying "the Midwest" like it's one unified culture. That's like saying all humans are the same. Secondly, Minneapolis specifically is very cosmopolitan. I live here, and there's a vibrant progressive culture. I've seen far more Trumpling culture recently on a drive through Illinois and Indiana than in my last ten years of living in Minneapolis. I will repeat - do not _ever_ call "the Midwest" one culture again.
- wobblykiwi 5y ago
  Driving through Illinois during the election last year was interesting. Having grown up and currently living in Chicago, you won't see much "Trumpling" (as you put it) culture in the city proper and much of the surrounding suburbs, but that changes drastically even an hour or 2 drive out from the city. It's like an entirely different world.
  - cozzyd 5y ago
    Yes, probably the best example is driving down Route 66 between Joliet and Wilmington. Wilmington greets you with this: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3094815,-88.1413858,3a,47.3y,296.46h,85.95t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sCoTmniLDPPc72SmlyoTN9w!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 https://www.google.com/maps/@41.3094815,-88.1413858,3a,47.3y...

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kayodelycaon 5y ago

I lasted about 2 years in the PNW before I decided to go back to the midwest. It's worked out really well. A side benefit, Cincinnati is within driving distance of a lot of furry conventions. (Before the pandemic...) The midwest is a lot more laid back than other places I've been. People are friendly here. I've had a few nice conversations with random strangers, just because we were standing in the same line. If you don't want to talk to people in line, that's fine too. You're not forced to interact with anyone, but there are a lot of opportunities if you want to.

015a 5y ago

Being a midwest developer: - Cost of living. Its the cheapest place in the US to live. - Gender ratio. This is something new grads should absolutely consider. The gender ratio even on midwest tech teams feels nation-leading, with many of the companies I've talked to (including my own) near 50-50. But even beyond tech; its far more equitable here. This is a theme I see all the time with west-coast tech; they talk about making change, implement tons of policies to try to it happen, but here, its already happened. We just don't talk about it. This is important for new grads even beyond their job; finding a partner here is so much easier & more fun. - Pay & Job Security. Some companies are "old" and still stuck in their ways and won't match more high-tech salaries. You'll find that anywhere. Other companies have more progressive leadership, despite being a traditionally old business, and pay aggressively well. You'll also find that anywhere. You have to spend some time researching who is who, but: these companies have tons of money, desire to modernize, and the best part: very little sense of what being a "good engineer" means. Read into that what you will, but: you literally won't ever have a problem finding a job. I've gotten offers after literally just casually talking with someone for fifteen minutes in a company's engineering leadership at a tech meetup. - Remote. Many west coast companies are now paying west coast salaries regardless of work location. Local companies are pushing for more work-from-home or hybrid. - Novelty. Tech still feels nascent in many of these cities. Maybe not MSP/Chicago, but more of the second tier midwestern cities. The communities are small, three-person startups are still everywhere, and there's a startling amount of "old money" looking to invest. Most awesomely, there's much less bullshit; in general, you hear what some of these companies are working on and think "shit, that will sell". - Weather. You get used to it. But you know what we don't get? Wildfires, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Tornadoes are common, but they generally don't strike major cities. I'd take the midwest environment over west coast any day; warm weather every day is fine, but imagine buying a house in an area that's years overdue for an earthquake that will level your city.

lotsofpulp 5y ago
> but imagine buying a house in an area that's years overdue for an earthquake that will level your city. Is there credibility to the notion of knowing that a place is going to have an earthquake within the precision of one human’s lifetime, or even a few generations of human’s lifetimes?

hangonhn 5y ago

How could you forget about the humble Gopher protocol: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_(protocol) !? :-)

greenyoda 5y ago
One of the earliest graphical web browsers, Mosaic, was also a product of the Midwest, having been developed at the University of Illinois: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mosaic_(web_browser)

analog31 5y ago

Greetings from Wisconsin. I'd describe the attitude towards work a bit differently: I think we tend to have generally healthy attitudes about work-life balance. I've not seen the 996 culture here except in some rare cases. When we work, we work. Then we go home. There's probably a different age distribution among tech workers, that might be reflected in our attitudes. I have colleagues who are past 65 and still enjoy coming in and doing their thing. Not everybody hates the winter. I love it. Right now I'm looking out at a nice snowstorm, and hoping to take a long walk in it. I believe the trick to dealing with the weather -- hot and cold -- is to get out and embrace it. If you're outside every day, the seasons won't take you by surprise. You'll figure out clothing. You'll find the nice places to take walks or ride your bike. It doesn't have to happen all at once, or even within the space of one year.

curiousllama 5y ago
> Not everybody hates the winter. Absolute truth. > I believe the trick to dealing with the weather -- hot and cold -- is to get out and embrace it. I used to routinely need to walk >2 miles over the course of a day in Chicago winters. I assure you, I still hated it! 100 degrees and humid? No problem. Sub-zero? I'm leaving!

jplhomer 5y ago

Des Moines, IA software engineer checking in! It’s great. Not terribly exciting, but the hours/culture/WL balance others have described holds up.

mgkimsal 5y ago

I grew up in Detroit, but moved south about 15 years ago. I've got a couple friends from MN, and visited there for a conference ... maybe 8-9 years ago. I loved the downtown - big enough to feel like a 'real city', but not overwhelmingly so. That was my impression, anyway. I was only there for a few days, but really liked the short vibe I got. I was visiting in July, however, and kept imagining how brutal the winters would be. I have to imaging 'as bad as Detroit' or perhaps worse. It was amazing to me how quickly I don't miss winter/snow at all. I never cared for it, even when living there, but when you're born in to an area, you 'live with it'. After a while, much of your life is there, and leaving can be hard (friends/family/work/etc). My family is in 34(f)-degrees-Detroit area right now, while I had a 72(f)-degrees afternoon. Just could not think of moving back permanently, but I do like to visit.

neartheplain 5y ago

I'm a Midwest native and huge fan of the region. It's been great to see more big tech firms open offices here, in addition to a rising number of startups and software consulting firms. Was happily surprised to see that Tundra Labs, who recently launched a well-reviewed VR full-body tracking product, is based out of Green Bay, Wisconsin (I am not affiliated, just a Midwest VR enthusiast): https://twitter.com/Tundra_Labs https://twitter.com/Tundra_Labs

rmason 5y ago

You think it's bad being from Minneapolis-St. Paul, try telling them you're originally from Detroit! It's getting better but the amount of ignorance about Detroit is amazing! I tried once talking an evangelist into adding Detroit to the road show around twenty years ago. There had just been an article in Time magazine and it said something like the city had the lowest number of college graduates per capita of any major city and there were less than 670,000 people. The guy immediately hit me with that fact. He said we couldn't possibly go to a place that small and if we did there wouldn't be that many developers. I said that may be true for the city of Detroit but the Detroit metro has over four million people and I assure you there are a lot of developers. So they decided to add Detroit as a tour stop and he later told me that it was one of the largest and most enthusiastic audiences on the entire tour. Even today Detroit gets left off most tech tours and when one does add them they're pleasantly surprised by the turn out. That's despite the fact that Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Twitter have offices there.

michigama 5y ago
There's something particularly exciting about Detroit that's hard to put my finger on, especially the last few years of development in the Midtown area. Something about all of the lovely art deco architecture slowly being re-occupied and revitalized by tech/retail/restaurants makes it an incredibly interesting time and place to be around.
- psbp 5y ago
  I don't have the gumption to move there, but I completely agree. There's a lot of desire to move to the "next big" city (recent example being Austin), but I think there's a lot more pride in revitalizing a city with an existing identity. I think there's also a future where we're just creating more pockets of urban (and suburban) decay by hopping to whichever trendy city. American population isn't expanding like it was decades ago. imo, some metros (recent growing ones like Austin, Dallas, Phoenix, Atlanta) are expanding at a rate that will not be sustainable in 30-40 years. Parts of those areas will be in an even worse situation than places like Detroit.
- rmason 5y ago

transienthrow 5y ago

Oh boy. Thoughts from someone who's worked extensively east coast, west coast, and now midwest: Insanely cargo-culty with regard to technology and development practices, but 5 years behind. Tall nail gets hammered down. On the west coast, if you're really good, you're a god. On the east coast, people will try to level up to you. In the midwest, you'll get bullied/ostracized. Seriously. With limited decent opportunities, you're seen as an existential threat. Most opportunities pay poorly, and most of the ones that pay decently are awful. Layoffs and corporate instability rampant. Many places think offshoring is a silver bullet (!)

DarylZero 5y ago
What state in the Midwest?
- transienthrow 5y ago

allturtles 5y ago

No matter how dismissive one is of the midwest, how could you be ignorant of the existence of a major metro area like Minneapolis-St. Paul? Per [0], it's the 16th largest in the U.S. Its teams participate in every major televised sports league (NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB). I dunno, I almost just don't believe the OP's anecdotes, unless they are talking to recent arrivals to the U.S. from other countries. I'm from a significantly smaller Midwestern city than Minneapolis, and I don't recall anyone ever saying "where's that" or "are there buildings there" when I say where I'm from. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolitan_statistical_area Edit: Based on comments it seems many do agree with OPs view. Maybe it's a California/SV thing, I've never lived there. But I've been in the south/east/mountain regions and never encountered this level of ignorance that civilization exists in the Midwest (whether real or feigned.)

aspaceman 5y ago
I grew up pretty close to Chicago and folks in California still call me "corn boy".
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- almost_usual 5y ago
  Really? I grew up in literal cornfields and no one I know who grew up in California says stuff like this.
- stjohnswarts 5y ago
  I bet you don't live in a large city though? This sounds like small town nickname games. Source: I grew up in a small town where everyone had to have a nickname.
pech0rin 5y ago
I am from Indianapolis and regularly have people not know anything about it so I dont find this to be an exaggeration. The anecdotes really ring true for me so sounds like you arent from the midwest.

kerneloftruth 5y ago

This is very good, and applies to so many people from the Midwest. This describes, pleasantly and without vitriol, the attitudes (shaped by perspective) that many coastal folks with little exposure to the rest of the US have. These are the same folks who call the Midwest states "flyover states", implying "nobody who's anybody stops or lives there". I've been asked by someone from Boston if we celebrated Independence Day in Texas, and have seen a UC Berkeley graduate become genuinely frightened by the sight of a Southern Living cookbook. Being ignorant of places you haven't been to is understandable, but it seems a common pattern for those in the Midwest to see the coastal places as "special" and desirable to at least visit; whereas geographically ignorant Californians (the ones I'm most familiar with) generally view all the interior states as "lesser". Granted, this is a bit of a generalized judgement on my own part.

semireg 5y ago

I grew up in Minneapolis and then the suburbs and left as soon as I could... but returned to a small town about 2 hours drive southeast in a small town called Winona. It's the home of Fastenal, Peerless Chain, and a ton of other "startups" from the last 50 years. I work "remote" for my own consultancy turned Electron-based software company making apps for label printers. The cost of a home here in Winona, circa 10 years ago was about $100k and even though prices have nearly doubled the houses are still affordable. You don't need to make much to live here, and we love the beauty of Minnesota... especially southeastern Minnesota. It's MN "NICE!"

voidlogic 5y ago
Hey, I live near you. Agree on multiple points. I doubt most people from the coasts would believe how good the food and drink scene in Winona and La Crosse is.

TameAntelope 5y ago

As I work more with someone from the midwest, and being from the mid-atlantic region myself, I'm growing more and more suspicious of the "hard worker" mindset. What I'm seeing, over and over, is that this drive to "work hard" ends up creating all kinds of "bad" work; difficult/tedious labor intensive decisions rather than efficient and innovative ways that are objectively better. He gets stuck on a problem, and won't put it down and go pick up the other problems that are easier to complete and provide similar (if slightly reduced) value to the customer. That's his "hard work" ethic at play, and I've found it pretty difficult to break him of that habit. And this isn't some idle efficiency meddling on my behalf; instead of providing some incremental value on a daily or near-daily basis, he goes completely dark for days or even weeks at a time before surfacing with a "glorious solution" to the problem he's ratholed on. If he had dropped the work at the first sign of trouble (seemingly anathema to a "hard worker"), he would have found other ways to have an impact on our customers. He's substantially less effective because he wants to "work hard". I do believe that people who value "hard work" generally don't understand this downside, and it's kind of fascinating to me, because of how ingrained this flawed trait is into an entire subset of American culture (being an American myself).

projectazorian 5y ago
This is an issue with hustle culture and not Midwesterners, IMO. I see just as much of this sort of thing, if not more, at my current West Coast employer that mainly hires out of top-20 CS programs
- TameAntelope 5y ago
  My experience with "hustle" culture is entirely the opposite. "hustle culture" folks are loathe to do any work at all until you can tie to directly back to value, usually for them.
  - projectazorian 5y ago
    Maybe on the business side, but I've seen lots of undesirable grinding from engineers from all sorts of places, and wanting to prove they have hustle (ie. they are hard workers) is often at the root of it.

cmrdporcupine 5y ago

As a Canadian, I dig the midwest. It feels eminently familiar. Maybe more Canadian than much of Canada. Or large parts of Canada are a vaguely Britishy extension of the midwest. Or something. I find it interesting, the geographical division in the US, too. Here, we are roughly "west coast -> rockies -> prairies -> central (great lakes st lawrence) -> maritime". Down there it's like "west coast -> rockies -> west -> new england / mid-atnlantic / east coast" and so our central and prairies overlap with what's "midwest." Ontario is sorta both midwest (a lot like Ohio) and also New England? Anyways, praise to the midwest :-) I'd like to visit someday when things at the border aren't so insane.

cushychicken 5y ago

Atmosphere, Minneapolis's hometown rap group, summarized the vibe there very well in their song "Say Shh": So if the people laugh and giggle when you tell 'em where you live Say shhh, say shhh And if you know this is where you wanna raise your kids Say shhh, say shhh If you're from the Midwest, and it doesn't matter where Say shhh, say shhh If you can drink tap water and breathe the air Say shhh, say shhh

reducesuffering 5y ago
> If you can drink tap water and breathe the air Flint would like a word…

geerlingguy 5y ago

I think one of the biggest differences for midwest towns (I'm a native of St. Louis) is that when we meet someone else in our city who has similar interests / passion for tech, we're surprised, and automatically form some sort of bond, mostly because there are comparatively few. The OP hits the nail on the head with the introverted part, too—there are many hardware and software devs in flyover country, but it seems like most are the heads-down, family-over-work types, and don't tend to be as public and/or extroverted (thus leading back to my mention of surprise when one of us finds another local). I think I've met a grand total of two other people in my city who have ever commented on HN.

atomicnumber3 5y ago
I'm also from STL! I usually identify fellow tech folks by their Rolla shirts. Even if they're not tech, they still know matlab!
- geerlingguy 5y ago
  Haha so true.

nateabele 5y ago

I grew up 15 minutes from Minneapolis, and have lived & worked in the Southern California area as well as up and down the Northeast (from Boston to DC). It's not that people are specifically ignorant of the Midwest, it's that they're insular and myopic, and generally ignorant of anything outside of their regions and vacation spots (Hawaii and Florida respectively, sometimes Western Europe).

yosito 5y ago

I live in Budapest. My sister lives in Minneapolis. I wouldn't compare the two in any way, except that both have lots of great coffee shops.

abdel_nasser 5y ago

i moved to the midwest from the san fran bay area. i could not have imagined it. people from the coast think they know but they dont know. coastal people have absolutely no idea about the midwest. like this guy says, if you tell a coastie some midwestern city or state they just stare blankly. two minutes later they will refer to your city/state again but mix it up with some other cliche midwestern city/state. the experience of living in this place and sharing a house with natives has been mind bending. i have been to a dozen countries and these people are less like me than any other people i have met. it really makes you see how there are so many things that we take for granted that are really totally invaluable triumphs of cultural curation and accumulation. there are sensibilities that simply dont exist here and you didnt even realize that these things were sensibilities at all or that a person could not have them. there are so many gears and cogs that are essential to a good quality of life and a civilized standard of living that are invisible and whos names arent in the lexicon. to see a place like this is to see those pieces finally, through their absence. i really believe that raising a child in the midwest is form of child abuse. many of these places are in need of nothing besides more intelligent people. they just suffer from poor planning, a lack of intellectual rigor within public institutions... if a bunch of coastal people would just come back then these midwestern cities would be the best cities in the country without a doubt. but its still a great choice if you just want an affordable place to escape to that has a functional economy/society.

bart_spoon 5y ago
Child abuse? Really? I think that outlook says more about you than the Midwest.
- abdel_nasser 5y ago
  yeah, exposing a child to nothing more than a corn field is abusive because when they become adults they have no tools to succeed or any context with which to understand and navigate the world. and also it creates a cultural barrier that really makes it hard for them to get along on the coast. you create this stunted human, yeah i think it meets the criteria for abuse if only just and if only in the most modern interpretation of the word abuse. i certainly would never do it to any kid that i had to raise. maybe youre from the midwest and if i have offended you then i apologize but no problem has ever gone away because people ignored it. it must be confronted like all the other societal problems that hurt people needlessly.

bsenftner 5y ago

I was originally a developer from Des Moines, IA. Moving to Boston, and Los Angeles after that I was surprised to learn one of the early real time operating systems, called os9, came from a company from Des Moines in the 80's. That OS was used on the original generations of ATM machines deployed world wide. I worked on early real time streaming during the early 90's in Los Angeles, and Des Moines was one of the better places for locating experienced real time developers. A while ago I heard Iowa in general and Omaha, NE have growing tech hubs.

maxmalkav 5y ago

The first thing that comes to my mind about Minneapolis is 80s punk and alt. rock (Hüsker Dü and The Replacements to be more specific, I am European and probably a bit of an outlier)

jedberg 5y ago

About 10 years ago, the recruiters at Netflix focused on Midwestern/Southern devs. It seemed like there were a lot of good people working for Target/Walmart/Dominoes/Playboy, etc. who were mostly getting overlooked. Netflix paid enough money to convince most of them to move to California, and some of our best people came from there.

irateswami 5y ago

Greetings from Minneapolis, I work and live as a Dev here and it fucking sucks.

meddlin 5y ago

I like this one. Reminds me of how I felt moving into software engineering growing up in south Louisiana. I only moved to ATX, and yet others' bewilderment is my amusement.

selimthegrim 5y ago
Some of us are still here.

jmce 5y ago

If anybody is looking for a vc-backed startup with deep MN roots, connect with me about Civic Eagle. Email is jesse@ Definitely have had some similar experiences though overall I have to say it hasn’t been a barrier to hiring and interfacing with tech folks from the coasts. Our MN team members are extra loyal, though ;) Honestly it’s a bigger barrier on the finance side.

jmnicolas 5y ago

I'm not American. According to Google Earth's ruler, Minneapolis Minnesota is 1500 miles from the west coast and 1000 miles from the east coast. How can it be called Midwest? It feels more Mideast to me.

MrDresden 5y ago

As someone who is from Iceland this actually sounds like the perfect place for me to move to if I ever were to relocate to the US.

grouphugs 5y ago