3 ms·

I read an assumption there, that if a company hires more tech people, the situation of its systems will improve. This contradicts the tao of programming, from w

I read an assumption there, that if a company hires more tech people, the situation of its systems will improve. This contradicts the tao of programming, from which I quote: The manager asked the Master: "How long will it take to design this system if I assign five programmers to it?" "It will take one year," said the Master promptly. "But we need this system immediately or even sooner! How long will it take if I assign ten programmers to it?" The Master Programmer frowned. "In that case, it will take two years." "And what if I assign a hundred programmers to it?" The Master Programmer shrugged. "Then the design will never be completed," he said.

FrustratedMonky 2y ago
Yes. That does go along with article I just saw on Valve that they operate their systems with 350 admins, versus EA with 10,000 people.
- trallnag 2y ago
  Doesn't Valve only have like 400 employees?
  - FrustratedMonky 2y ago
    Was using this. You're right, total was 350. Compared to EA at 10K. Was remembering the section on Admins, Valve pays a lot for top Admins, and do a lot with little. https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2024/07/valve-runs-its-massive-pc-gaming-ecosystem-with-only-about-350-employees/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2024/07/valve-runs-its-massiv...
    - me_me_me 2y ago
      valve is not publisher. Valve is 95% Steam + 4% side projects + 1% keeping their games barely alive. They have minimal pr. EA manages (with aim to kill) many game dev studios. Schedules and executes release PR campaigns. Its not a fair comparison to be honest
- johnnyanmac 2y ago
  not the best comparison to be fair on EA (thanks, I'm sympathizing with EA). Valve has 1-3 "major projects" outside of games, live updating 2-3 games, maintaining 2 others, and then maybe has some misc. developers here and there for R&D. then you can muliply that by 3 or 4 for art, support, legal, and other stuff. EA works on and releases a dozen games in house a year, if not more. And the studios are scatered all over the world, not all in WA. Then it maintains a few dozen more that still makes big money. Then has publishing wings to publish more 3rd party games. Then has a mediocre store to manage, then has sales and outreach, and probably a few more wings I'm forgetting. They spread out a lot more, so they'll need more staff for that.
gtirloni 2y ago
That's talking about one project, not a company. A company might have repressed demand and more people could allow it to take on more projects and/or take care of tasks that are being left behind.

FrustratedMonky 2y ago

Yes. That does go along with article I just saw on Valve that they operate their systems with 350 admins, versus EA with 10,000 people.

trallnag 2y ago
Doesn't Valve only have like 400 employees?
- FrustratedMonky 2y ago
  Was using this. You're right, total was 350. Compared to EA at 10K. Was remembering the section on Admins, Valve pays a lot for top Admins, and do a lot with little. https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2024/07/valve-runs-its-massive-pc-gaming-ecosystem-with-only-about-350-employees/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2024/07/valve-runs-its-massiv...
  - me_me_me 2y ago
    valve is not publisher. Valve is 95% Steam + 4% side projects + 1% keeping their games barely alive. They have minimal pr. EA manages (with aim to kill) many game dev studios. Schedules and executes release PR campaigns. Its not a fair comparison to be honest
johnnyanmac 2y ago
not the best comparison to be fair on EA (thanks, I'm sympathizing with EA). Valve has 1-3 "major projects" outside of games, live updating 2-3 games, maintaining 2 others, and then maybe has some misc. developers here and there for R&D. then you can muliply that by 3 or 4 for art, support, legal, and other stuff. EA works on and releases a dozen games in house a year, if not more. And the studios are scatered all over the world, not all in WA. Then it maintains a few dozen more that still makes big money. Then has publishing wings to publish more 3rd party games. Then has a mediocre store to manage, then has sales and outreach, and probably a few more wings I'm forgetting. They spread out a lot more, so they'll need more staff for that.

gtirloni 2y ago

That's talking about one project, not a company. A company might have repressed demand and more people could allow it to take on more projects and/or take care of tasks that are being left behind.