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Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at

Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at least weekly basis now? I love what I do, I really do. But stories like this make me want to get a "boring" tech job that I am just maintaining something. Not innovating anymore and at the mercy of not technical people telling me to make horrible decisions. I just find it disheartening. I am just curious if others ever feel this way?

BeefWellington 4y ago
> Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at least weekly basis now? I personally don't but I think the issue here is that things like ClearView AI and ID.me and the related controversies were inevitable. Just as we're seeing with the development of DeepFakes. An astute observer can probably pretty accurately pick out the differences but will that be true in five to ten years? Audio faking is already fairly good. Once any technology is close, there will be people telling you it's solved. Look at self-driving cars. All these "we've solved it, autopilot is the greatest thing since sliced bread" takes are pushed as marketing, meanwhile the capabilities are substantially lower than human drivers. The bar for these kinds of things should be, at minimum better than a human. The issue isn't with the tech itself but the actors involved. It's a tool, and like any others it can be abused. What makes it dangerous is that the limitations of these tools don't appear to be investigated at all, which is a failure of something or someone, I'm just not sure what or who (probably government). Coupling a "not quite ready" tech with some snazzy marketing and shady practices seems to have been par for the course for a lot of technologies that emerged from the post-industrial revolution era, and in some cases even before then. Just chemical examples: Leaded gasoline, CFCs, DDT, Thalidomide, etc. You could look to something like cryptomining and its environmental and social impact as another more modern tech example.
- nerdjon 4y ago
  I think a lot of what you said emphasizes my view on non technical people making decisions and/or being the public face of a very technical product. I don't mean everyone in this regard. But I imagine many of us have been on the side of being told that marketing/user retention wants a dark pattern introduced. "User Research" wants all kinds of tracking introduced. Finance wants ads. Management wants something quicker so we cut corners (or worse they tell us to release something even though we say its not ready and very buggy but marketing was making a big deal about it... which I have personally been involved in. Will give one guess how that one went and then who was blamed). Or any other decision made by someone non technical that is a bad decision and is another controversy waiting to happen. I still see technology as a great force. I still believe in it. I am lucky that my current job, I don't have to deal with any of these things. But we are not a consumer facing operation. But when I look to the future, I find myself asking myself. Where is the industry going and it feels like it's just constantly getting worse. I worry about being in a position of needing to be involved in that again.
user3939382 4y ago
The way I look at the most general version of the issue I believe you're raising is that technology is morally neutral. It's a tool, in some forms an amazingly powerful tool, and like all tools, that awesome power can be used for good or evil.
- BigBubbleButt 4y ago
  Technology is only neutral in the sense that guns, nuclear weapons, and neurotoxins are neutral. No, not all technology is the same, and much of it is evil. This loosely falls into the same fallacy of "it can either work or fail, so there's a 50% chance" - you are wildly misrepresenting the space in order to project a stance of neutrality. I really think what you're saying is just something engineers tell themselves to feel better about what they do. I hear it more often from people at FAANG, defense contractors, and other morally ambiguous places than anywhere else. Also, if you're the guy building a tool that's oppressing someone, you are the guy building the means to oppress someone. There's nothing neutral about that.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - hiptobecubic 4y ago
    Well a lot of people would argue that guns are neutral, at least. But that aside, I do mostly agree. It's nonsense to help produce something that you know will be misused and then absolve yourself of responsibility. The problem is not that people like this crap, it's that building and selling it is absurdly profitable and people like money. I don't know how you address such a thing other than to have government step in and block it (see GDPR, tracking cookies etc)
  - mellavora 4y ago
    Disclaimer- I enjoy sport shooting. Using a gun on another human to defend my family from immediate threat. Moral. Using a gun on another human to inflict harm on an innocent. Immoral. Thus "tech is neutral, usage determines morality". HOWEVER what if we are in a society where using guns is the normal way to resolve conflict? Where everyone is required to carry a gun at all times and be prepared to use it to defend their family? Is the tech still neutral when it becomes a cornerstone of every interaction? Not a fanciful example. Think: dueling.
_jal 4y ago
I have problems being associated with the rest of humanity, considering all the awful shit they get up to. I don't see a reason to call out tech as being worse than other industries I could name. It is uniquely awful in a number of ways, but so are others.
Melatonic 4y ago
Depends what you work on. If you are working on super privacy invasive projects and have regrets then at minimum that is a problem for you and reducing your quality of life. I generally do not get disheartened by this sort of thing but you also probably will not ever see me working for Facebook for example.....
reaperducer 4y ago
Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at least weekly basis now? Just an hour ago I was thinking to myself, "I wish I was good with my hands. I wish I could do anything but this." Computers are the only talent I have, and changing careers would mean going back to entry-level pay, which I can't do at this point in my life. It used to be that when you got fed up with your profession, you could go teach. But that doesn't pay jack squat anymore.
rurp 4y ago
I totally understand how you feel, and have similar thoughts myself. I love programming and find technology fascinating on a technical level, but either hate or couldn't care less about most of what gets built with it. Most people I talk with in the industry disagree with me on this but I firmly believe that most product/service updates are net negative for the user. They get done for the benefit of a company, with a lot of spin and marketing on top to make it sound like it's actually a good thing.

BeefWellington 4y ago

> Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at least weekly basis now? I personally don't but I think the issue here is that things like ClearView AI and ID.me and the related controversies were inevitable. Just as we're seeing with the development of DeepFakes. An astute observer can probably pretty accurately pick out the differences but will that be true in five to ten years? Audio faking is already fairly good. Once any technology is close, there will be people telling you it's solved. Look at self-driving cars. All these "we've solved it, autopilot is the greatest thing since sliced bread" takes are pushed as marketing, meanwhile the capabilities are substantially lower than human drivers. The bar for these kinds of things should be, at minimum better than a human. The issue isn't with the tech itself but the actors involved. It's a tool, and like any others it can be abused. What makes it dangerous is that the limitations of these tools don't appear to be investigated at all, which is a failure of something or someone, I'm just not sure what or who (probably government). Coupling a "not quite ready" tech with some snazzy marketing and shady practices seems to have been par for the course for a lot of technologies that emerged from the post-industrial revolution era, and in some cases even before then. Just chemical examples: Leaded gasoline, CFCs, DDT, Thalidomide, etc. You could look to something like cryptomining and its environmental and social impact as another more modern tech example.

nerdjon 4y ago
I think a lot of what you said emphasizes my view on non technical people making decisions and/or being the public face of a very technical product. I don't mean everyone in this regard. But I imagine many of us have been on the side of being told that marketing/user retention wants a dark pattern introduced. "User Research" wants all kinds of tracking introduced. Finance wants ads. Management wants something quicker so we cut corners (or worse they tell us to release something even though we say its not ready and very buggy but marketing was making a big deal about it... which I have personally been involved in. Will give one guess how that one went and then who was blamed). Or any other decision made by someone non technical that is a bad decision and is another controversy waiting to happen. I still see technology as a great force. I still believe in it. I am lucky that my current job, I don't have to deal with any of these things. But we are not a consumer facing operation. But when I look to the future, I find myself asking myself. Where is the industry going and it feels like it's just constantly getting worse. I worry about being in a position of needing to be involved in that again.

user3939382 4y ago

The way I look at the most general version of the issue I believe you're raising is that technology is morally neutral. It's a tool, in some forms an amazingly powerful tool, and like all tools, that awesome power can be used for good or evil.

BigBubbleButt 4y ago
Technology is only neutral in the sense that guns, nuclear weapons, and neurotoxins are neutral. No, not all technology is the same, and much of it is evil. This loosely falls into the same fallacy of "it can either work or fail, so there's a 50% chance" - you are wildly misrepresenting the space in order to project a stance of neutrality. I really think what you're saying is just something engineers tell themselves to feel better about what they do. I hear it more often from people at FAANG, defense contractors, and other morally ambiguous places than anywhere else. Also, if you're the guy building a tool that's oppressing someone, you are the guy building the means to oppress someone. There's nothing neutral about that.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- hiptobecubic 4y ago
  Well a lot of people would argue that guns are neutral, at least. But that aside, I do mostly agree. It's nonsense to help produce something that you know will be misused and then absolve yourself of responsibility. The problem is not that people like this crap, it's that building and selling it is absurdly profitable and people like money. I don't know how you address such a thing other than to have government step in and block it (see GDPR, tracking cookies etc)
- mellavora 4y ago
  Disclaimer- I enjoy sport shooting. Using a gun on another human to defend my family from immediate threat. Moral. Using a gun on another human to inflict harm on an innocent. Immoral. Thus "tech is neutral, usage determines morality". HOWEVER what if we are in a society where using guns is the normal way to resolve conflict? Where everyone is required to carry a gun at all times and be prepared to use it to defend their family? Is the tech still neutral when it becomes a cornerstone of every interaction? Not a fanciful example. Think: dueling.

_jal 4y ago

I have problems being associated with the rest of humanity, considering all the awful shit they get up to. I don't see a reason to call out tech as being worse than other industries I could name. It is uniquely awful in a number of ways, but so are others.

Melatonic 4y ago

Depends what you work on. If you are working on super privacy invasive projects and have regrets then at minimum that is a problem for you and reducing your quality of life. I generally do not get disheartened by this sort of thing but you also probably will not ever see me working for Facebook for example.....

reaperducer 4y ago

Does anyone else have regrets about being in the tech industry when things like this, privacy issues, leaks, etc seem to be a big thing on a nearly daily or at least weekly basis now? Just an hour ago I was thinking to myself, "I wish I was good with my hands. I wish I could do anything but this." Computers are the only talent I have, and changing careers would mean going back to entry-level pay, which I can't do at this point in my life. It used to be that when you got fed up with your profession, you could go teach. But that doesn't pay jack squat anymore.

rurp 4y ago

I totally understand how you feel, and have similar thoughts myself. I love programming and find technology fascinating on a technical level, but either hate or couldn't care less about most of what gets built with it. Most people I talk with in the industry disagree with me on this but I firmly believe that most product/service updates are net negative for the user. They get done for the benefit of a company, with a lot of spin and marketing on top to make it sound like it's actually a good thing.