4 ms·

> which proves the thesis that it’s possible to be a professional maintainer earning rates competitive with the adjacent market for senior software engineers Y

> which proves the thesis that it’s possible to be a professional maintainer earning rates competitive with the adjacent market for senior software engineers Yeah, if you're Filippo Valsorda. Not sure that "proves the thesis" broadly whatsoever, though.

gerdesj 4y ago
The bloke has found some measure of success that HN readers might generally applaud. To be fair: he has only generated a single data point and not enough for a "thesis".
vxNsr 4y ago
I think the main caveat is “Senior” and he means fairly senior at that anyone less will definitely have trouble, but if you’ve been in the industry 10-15 years and are looking to be your own boss and are very competent, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to do this and make comparable compensation.
- lhorie 4y ago
  As someone with more than 15 years of experience and who has leveraged my open source work to improve my own career, my two cents is that GP has a fairly sober view on OSS as a job: Filippo is an outlier among outliers. Most people simply don't have the opportunity to build a reputation from multi-year, full time, corporate sponsored open source work on a high visibility project to leverage when leaving a cushy job to pursue higher rungs in Maslow's pyramid. "Possible" is very different than "likely".
  - lmeyerov 4y ago
    Yes. This is a variant of building an OSS project using company funds then leaving the company to commercialize it. It's a real path, but requires taking advantage of years of corporate largess. Not impossible, but some big "if"s involved.
- withinboredom 4y ago
  Hahaha. Not every engineer is a salesman who can close a deal. Contracting is a cutthroat business as well where the competition is fierce. It’s global competition too! I wouldn’t recommend this route to any random senior engineer.

4 ms·

> which proves the thesis that it’s possible to be a professional maintainer earning rates competitive with the adjacent market for senior software engineers Y

by edfletcher_t137 4y ago

gerdesj 4y ago
The bloke has found some measure of success that HN readers might generally applaud. To be fair: he has only generated a single data point and not enough for a "thesis".
vxNsr 4y ago
I think the main caveat is “Senior” and he means fairly senior at that anyone less will definitely have trouble, but if you’ve been in the industry 10-15 years and are looking to be your own boss and are very competent, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to do this and make comparable compensation.
- lhorie 4y ago
  As someone with more than 15 years of experience and who has leveraged my open source work to improve my own career, my two cents is that GP has a fairly sober view on OSS as a job: Filippo is an outlier among outliers. Most people simply don't have the opportunity to build a reputation from multi-year, full time, corporate sponsored open source work on a high visibility project to leverage when leaving a cushy job to pursue higher rungs in Maslow's pyramid. "Possible" is very different than "likely".
  - lmeyerov 4y ago
    Yes. This is a variant of building an OSS project using company funds then leaving the company to commercialize it. It's a real path, but requires taking advantage of years of corporate largess. Not impossible, but some big "if"s involved.
- withinboredom 4y ago
  Hahaha. Not every engineer is a salesman who can close a deal. Contracting is a cutthroat business as well where the competition is fierce. It’s global competition too! I wouldn’t recommend this route to any random senior engineer.