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Because nobody is clocking in and willfully contributing to the addiction machine. They're completing an 8-point ticket to integrate a new scroll-tracking libra

by post-it 8mo ago

Because nobody is clocking in and willfully contributing to the addiction machine. They're completing an 8-point ticket to integrate a new scroll-tracking library, or a 5-point ticket to send an extra parameter to the logging system. When there's thousands of people working on a product, nobody feels like they're doing anything impactful.

embedding-shape 8mo ago
> Because nobody is clocking in and willfully contributing to the addiction machine. Are people really not aware of what the company's overall mission, product and impact is? I'm finding that hard to believe. If you accept employment at Facebook, regardless of what department you're in, you know exactly what kind of company you're contributing your time, energy and effort into.
- elevatortrim 8mo ago
  The problem is, between producing cigarettes, weapons, disposable fashion, sugary food and drink, disposable vapes, extremely wasteful cars, addicting game mechanics, many of the financial "product"s, ad optimisation, ..., not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy.
  - blibble 8mo ago
    > not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy let's be honest everyone working as a software engineer at facebook is perfectly capable of finding employment elsewhere working there is a deliberate decision to prioritise comp over the stability of the world
    - elevatortrim 8mo ago
      agreed about this group in particular.
  - embedding-shape 8mo ago
    > not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy We're talking about software engineers here, not "cleaner taking up any job you can". Literally one of the most well paid jobs considering the amount of effort you put into it. People slave away on fields picking berries for less, with more impact on their life expectancy, if there is any career you can almost jump between jobs in just a few weeks, software engineering is one of them.
- StilesCrisis 8mo ago
  I joined Google Analytics in 2018 and had no idea that Analytics really meant "Tracking and Remarketing" until about 3 weeks into the role. At that point, what're you going to do, quit? I knew it wasn't what I wanted to do, but it took two years to get out cleanly.
  - embedding-shape 8mo ago
    > At that point, what're you going to do, quit? Yes? Why not? If I'd join a company and figured out what I did actually harmed more than helped, I'd leave that place, absolutely. I'm a software engineer, even with the lowest possible position in a random company I'd earn better than most people in the country and live a better life, even just the bottom 30% of earners in software in the country (not counting outsourcing obviously). Especially at that time it was very easy to find new jobs.
    - StilesCrisis 8mo ago
      Good for you. I've got a family and no other source of income.
      - embedding-shape 8mo ago
        You think Google is the single company out there who is willing to employ you? How come? Edit: Thinking about it, your comment actually made me more frustrated than I realized. I've been poor enough to having to be homeless at some points in my life, and yes, I've worked for immoral companies too, because I need food and shelter. But once you move up in life to the comfy jobs like software engineering, you don't have any excuse anymore that it's just about "feeding your family" when you literally have a sea of jobs available. It might be an excuse you tell yourself to justify your reasoning for getting paid more, but if you truly did care about it, you'd make a different choice, and still be able to feed your family, and I'm almost confident your family would be OK with you making that choice too, unless they also lack the empathy you seem to be missing.
        8mo ago
- post-it 8mo ago
  Sure, but you could say that about anything. If you're American, then your labour is paying for concentration camps no matter where you work. In a company of 100k+ people, responsibility is diluted.
codyb 8mo ago
I think it's a fair point to say that many people do not feel as if they're the ones responsible even if they're direct contributors.

by post-it 8mo ago

embedding-shape 8mo ago

> Because nobody is clocking in and willfully contributing to the addiction machine. Are people really not aware of what the company's overall mission, product and impact is? I'm finding that hard to believe. If you accept employment at Facebook, regardless of what department you're in, you know exactly what kind of company you're contributing your time, energy and effort into.

elevatortrim 8mo ago
The problem is, between producing cigarettes, weapons, disposable fashion, sugary food and drink, disposable vapes, extremely wasteful cars, addicting game mechanics, many of the financial "product"s, ad optimisation, ..., not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy.
- blibble 8mo ago
  > not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy let's be honest everyone working as a software engineer at facebook is perfectly capable of finding employment elsewhere working there is a deliberate decision to prioritise comp over the stability of the world
  - elevatortrim 8mo ago
    agreed about this group in particular.
- embedding-shape 8mo ago
  > not everyone can avoid immoral but legal work whilst trying to exist in this economy We're talking about software engineers here, not "cleaner taking up any job you can". Literally one of the most well paid jobs considering the amount of effort you put into it. People slave away on fields picking berries for less, with more impact on their life expectancy, if there is any career you can almost jump between jobs in just a few weeks, software engineering is one of them.
StilesCrisis 8mo ago
I joined Google Analytics in 2018 and had no idea that Analytics really meant "Tracking and Remarketing" until about 3 weeks into the role. At that point, what're you going to do, quit? I knew it wasn't what I wanted to do, but it took two years to get out cleanly.
- embedding-shape 8mo ago
  > At that point, what're you going to do, quit? Yes? Why not? If I'd join a company and figured out what I did actually harmed more than helped, I'd leave that place, absolutely. I'm a software engineer, even with the lowest possible position in a random company I'd earn better than most people in the country and live a better life, even just the bottom 30% of earners in software in the country (not counting outsourcing obviously). Especially at that time it was very easy to find new jobs.
  - StilesCrisis 8mo ago
    Good for you. I've got a family and no other source of income.
    - embedding-shape 8mo ago
      You think Google is the single company out there who is willing to employ you? How come? Edit: Thinking about it, your comment actually made me more frustrated than I realized. I've been poor enough to having to be homeless at some points in my life, and yes, I've worked for immoral companies too, because I need food and shelter. But once you move up in life to the comfy jobs like software engineering, you don't have any excuse anymore that it's just about "feeding your family" when you literally have a sea of jobs available. It might be an excuse you tell yourself to justify your reasoning for getting paid more, but if you truly did care about it, you'd make a different choice, and still be able to feed your family, and I'm almost confident your family would be OK with you making that choice too, unless they also lack the empathy you seem to be missing.
      - 8mo ago
post-it 8mo ago
Sure, but you could say that about anything. If you're American, then your labour is paying for concentration camps no matter where you work. In a company of 100k+ people, responsibility is diluted.

codyb 8mo ago

I think it's a fair point to say that many people do not feel as if they're the ones responsible even if they're direct contributors.