Funnily enough, my cofounder is an architect. And from the tales he (and his architect friends) tell me, yes, architecture clients are just as fickle. They hav

Funnily enough, my cofounder is an architect. And from the tales he (and his architect friends) tell me, yes, architecture clients are just as fickle. They have loads of self-contradicting stakeholders too (particularly for larger buildings). And they change their mind about the costs. And they get architects to design something to get bids in and then change their mind about half the building. And they want everything, done quickly, cheap, and the highest quality. And they change their requirements. And they expect the architect to adapt to this. And if the architect makes a mis-step in this complex client management process, they will typically get sued and lose money. I think one way in which architecture is actually much more difficult than software development is that architects often have to pour their heart and soul into a project to design the most amazing building, only to have it cancelled at the last minute. It's a common practice for developers to get architects to design a cool building and get planning permission for it, only to raise the value of the land (by showing that cool stuff can be built on it) so that they can sell it on to someone else (who will of course want something completely different). To me, that would be very disheartening, because those buildings are often quasi-artistic creations that take a lot of creative energy, and giving it my all time and time again only to have my projects regularly canned and forgotten would just depress me.