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I am life-long 'burger (aside from 4 years away for university), and this doesn't match my experience (I'm 41, so I've been around the proverbial block here--I

by bmj 12y ago

I am life-long 'burger (aside from 4 years away for university), and this doesn't match my experience (I'm 41, so I've been around the proverbial block here--I lived through the first "renaissance" in East Liberty, and am observing the re-growth of that neighborhood now). I jumped about the tech boom bus in the late 90s, and from what I've seen, the tech boom never ended. And, in my experience, that industry is varied--want to build websites? Build medical devices? Work on speech recognition software? There are jobs here for you. not nearly enough new-world accoutrements Can you give examples? As others have pointed out, I think PGH does a great job of bridging the gap between a large, cosmopolitan city and a small town where you don't have to feel lost forever. Of course, as you point out, the flip side to that it is a small town--you have to very careful to avoid burning bridges because it is highly likely you may need to cross that bridge again at some point. (Edit: fixed formatting)

jaaron 12y ago
> the tech boom never ended As a mostly life-long 'burger (up until I was 26), I disagree. In fact, I'll claim that if you're a software engineer in Pittsburgh, then you're in a dead-end job as long as you remain in Pittsburgh. Yes, you'll have a very nice quality of life; however, you have significantly less opportunities as a software engineer there. Aside from a few firms, Pittsburgh doesn't have an industry that provides the environment, training, challenges and opportunities of both large technology firms and a robust startup community that you see in other major tech hubs. This lowers the wages and, to be frank, lowers the quality of engineers available to hire in Pittsburgh. It makes it more difficult to move out for engineers who have spent the formative part of their career in Pittsburgh. And that's fine. Software programming isn't the be-all end-all of human activity. It's awesome to be part of something bigger, delivering real value aside from shipping the next social-photo-sharing-app. But just because you can get software programming jobs in Pittsburgh in no way allows Pittsburgh to compare to San Francisco, Seattle, NYC, LA, Boston, Austin... It's just not the same environment and we shouldn't pretend it is.
- bmj 12y ago
  That's probably true. I'm speaking as a non-CS-educated developer who is content in a "dead-end" job, so you're right, perhaps we are comparing apples to oranges.
- fixermark 12y ago
  It's not the same environment, but I think that you're way off base regarding the quality of engineers. Of course, as a software engineer in Pittsburgh, I may have blinders on. ;) On the other hand, given the rate that Google is growing in Pittsburgh, I suspect they'd disagree with you about available talent quality. (On the third hand, "quality" is a fuzzy metric unless we nail down more concretely how one would evaluate it. Is someone writing thousands of lines of code per day at Facebook higher "quality" than someone writing a hundred lines of code per day on machine-learning cancer detection logic?)
  - bmj 12y ago
    I suspect that Google (and Apple, and Disney) are finding they can keep talented engineers from CMU in the city after graduation. That's not to say there aren't good, indigenous engineers, but, rather, that Google has a nice farm system in the local universities.
autokad 12y ago
I have to agree with jaaron. I graduated with CS and wanted to stay in the city. but tech jobs in Pittsburgh are hard to come by. I had to leave in order to find work. even if there were (and there aren't), its basically an island. a 3.5 hour drive covers jobs from Washington DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City.

by bmj 12y ago

jaaron 12y ago

> the tech boom never ended As a mostly life-long 'burger (up until I was 26), I disagree. In fact, I'll claim that if you're a software engineer in Pittsburgh, then you're in a dead-end job as long as you remain in Pittsburgh. Yes, you'll have a very nice quality of life; however, you have significantly less opportunities as a software engineer there. Aside from a few firms, Pittsburgh doesn't have an industry that provides the environment, training, challenges and opportunities of both large technology firms and a robust startup community that you see in other major tech hubs. This lowers the wages and, to be frank, lowers the quality of engineers available to hire in Pittsburgh. It makes it more difficult to move out for engineers who have spent the formative part of their career in Pittsburgh. And that's fine. Software programming isn't the be-all end-all of human activity. It's awesome to be part of something bigger, delivering real value aside from shipping the next social-photo-sharing-app. But just because you can get software programming jobs in Pittsburgh in no way allows Pittsburgh to compare to San Francisco, Seattle, NYC, LA, Boston, Austin... It's just not the same environment and we shouldn't pretend it is.

bmj 12y ago
That's probably true. I'm speaking as a non-CS-educated developer who is content in a "dead-end" job, so you're right, perhaps we are comparing apples to oranges.
fixermark 12y ago
It's not the same environment, but I think that you're way off base regarding the quality of engineers. Of course, as a software engineer in Pittsburgh, I may have blinders on. ;) On the other hand, given the rate that Google is growing in Pittsburgh, I suspect they'd disagree with you about available talent quality. (On the third hand, "quality" is a fuzzy metric unless we nail down more concretely how one would evaluate it. Is someone writing thousands of lines of code per day at Facebook higher "quality" than someone writing a hundred lines of code per day on machine-learning cancer detection logic?)
- bmj 12y ago
  I suspect that Google (and Apple, and Disney) are finding they can keep talented engineers from CMU in the city after graduation. That's not to say there aren't good, indigenous engineers, but, rather, that Google has a nice farm system in the local universities.

autokad 12y ago

I have to agree with jaaron. I graduated with CS and wanted to stay in the city. but tech jobs in Pittsburgh are hard to come by. I had to leave in order to find work. even if there were (and there aren't), its basically an island. a 3.5 hour drive covers jobs from Washington DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York City.