3 ms·

I’ve thought that a lot recently too. I often look into SWE jobs, companies that announce funding, or I notice a “somebody got a new job” alert on LinkedIn. It

by jc_811 5y ago

I’ve thought that a lot recently too. I often look into SWE jobs, companies that announce funding, or I notice a “somebody got a new job” alert on LinkedIn. It seems 90% of the time the company involved in the above scenarios is some sort of “marketing analytics platform to grab more insight from your customers allowing you to make actionable decisions!” Again. And again, and again. Why does it seem like there are 2 billion companies doing the exact same thing (ie tracking users, probably in the grey-ish ethical zone, and throwing a bunch of garbage buzzwords around like “synergy”)? I suppose that’s where the money is flowing but it just seems so soul sucking to me.

wpietri 5y ago
I think there are a lot of answers to your "why" question. But one important answer is that when product quality plateaus at a level good enough for most users, then marketing becomes the main differentiator and the main way to increase revenues and profits. As an example, think about Coke vs Pepsi vs everybody else who makes a cola. The products are very stable and basically equivalent. So billions get spent on manipulating customers. That means plenty of opportunity to create tools that aid in that manipulation. (Which is already an ethical grey zone, so it's no shock that people will go further.) To me, and I'd imagine to you, this is absurdly pointless and wasteful. I'd be perfectly happy to ban most advertising, freeing up hundreds of billions per year, plus untold amounts of human time and attention. But for people who just want to make money, they seem willing to look past the vast waste. I think the solution is to find work in areas beyond the markets where a few dominant companies are engaged in trench warfare over customers for stagnant, good-enough products.

3 ms·

I’ve thought that a lot recently too. I often look into SWE jobs, companies that announce funding, or I notice a “somebody got a new job” alert on LinkedIn. It

by jc_811 5y ago

wpietri 5y ago
I think there are a lot of answers to your "why" question. But one important answer is that when product quality plateaus at a level good enough for most users, then marketing becomes the main differentiator and the main way to increase revenues and profits. As an example, think about Coke vs Pepsi vs everybody else who makes a cola. The products are very stable and basically equivalent. So billions get spent on manipulating customers. That means plenty of opportunity to create tools that aid in that manipulation. (Which is already an ethical grey zone, so it's no shock that people will go further.) To me, and I'd imagine to you, this is absurdly pointless and wasteful. I'd be perfectly happy to ban most advertising, freeing up hundreds of billions per year, plus untold amounts of human time and attention. But for people who just want to make money, they seem willing to look past the vast waste. I think the solution is to find work in areas beyond the markets where a few dominant companies are engaged in trench warfare over customers for stagnant, good-enough products.