Other interesting books, in addition to the excellent "Soul", are "Show Stopper!", which covers the development of Windows NT, "Microserfs" (fiction) by Douglas

Other interesting books, in addition to the excellent "Soul", are "Show Stopper!", which covers the development of Windows NT, "Microserfs" (fiction) by Douglas Coupland, and "Proudly Serving My Corporate Masters". These are centered on MS culture, but I think they are representative of the industry at large. NT in particular took a heavy toll, with apparently many divorces and strong burn out in the team. I think it has to do with the culture in many of the firms doing this type of development. Take bright motivated kids out of school, move them close to a corporate campus where they don't know anyone outside of work, work them 70 hours a week, burn out, discard. I'm not saying this is all by an evil design, it might just be the way things work out, but I have seen the bitter results as well. As to the nature of the work itself, I think close-to-the-metal work is a lot of fun. Too bad the work conditions are often rocky. I doubt you'd see the same burn out effect on those in sane work conditions.