Posted by nohell 14 hours ago
I strongly identify with all of this. I started programming computers when I was about 7, so now I've been doing it for decades.
I sort of accidentally made it a career for a few years, because I was really good at it, but I didn't like being a professional software developer for a huge tech company.
I still like writing code though, and view it primarily as a means for exploration, figuring out how things work and explaining and systematizing them for myself and for others.
This feeling is probably shared by many lefties people. They love to work, they just don't like to be restricted/manipulated into working under a highly specified and standardized environment, especially when every bit of their performance is measured for competition.
But I have grown to understand the environment of the "big tech" companies. It is hard to manage a project as it expands, and the result of human work is hard to predict, so often there's two ways to choose: 1) only hire people who's "on the same channel", highly talented "rock star" programmer, or 2) regulate everything to the detail, and "filter out" (a.k.a. firing) those who's incapable of fitting. Both are brutal, but effective and cheap to implement at scale.
If you don't like to work for big companies, maybe try start one of your own. But then of course you'll have to find some kind of financial support, maybe it's from "value extracting", but maybe it's something else.
BTW, I don't think "value extracting" == "user hostile". A lot of people go overboard with their religious beliefs, thinking rich is bad. But your time on this Earth is limited, and this is the only adventure you'll ever have. Thus your labor must be fairly compensated, so you can continue your journey a bit more freely. Otherwise it's a zero-sum game, more you "give out", less chance for yourself. How can you be so sure that other people would utilize their time better than you?
Selling your produce for financial isn't "user hostile". It will be if you're predatory, but it won't be if you're being fair.
There's a huge landscape of things in between these two options.
I've been writing software for ~35 years, have taken exactly one course in CS (graduate machine learning while getting my PhD in physics), and did it professionally for about 5 years… that said, "writing software" has been a big part of other jobs I've had, even if not the headline description.
Sure, make money from software. I did. But when you have enough and it's time to give back, open source it.
This is where I'm at. I'm one of the few Gen-Z with enough to live on comfortably + safety net, so I give back.
Edit: took a look, neat stuff you're doing!
Now, instead of worrying about sales, I get to feel good about giving something back to the FOSS community that has given me so much.
I recognize that it is a position of privilege to be able to dedicate so much of my time to a project that gives me nothing financially... and in fact costs me money to produce. No shade at all to people who are not so lucky and need to sell what they make.
Anyway, if you're interested, here's what I'm working on. Feature-wise it's come a long way since the last HN post about it.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46619391
And if you're not interested, that's OK, because I'm not trying to sell you anything!