I worked at Google for a year, and am currently at a much smaller company in San Francisco. There's plenty of alcohol consumption at semi-official work social events, and I've seen some recreational marijuana use as well and nobody bats an eye. But I've never heard of developers using drugs for performance enhancement. It may happen, but it's certainly not part of the general culture, and I've never felt any pressure to use stimulants to keep up. I consider myself to be a high performer.
Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
281–290 of 642 posts
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#282Drop me an email, you can find it in my profile.
I will do that. Forgive me, I'm new to HN. When I click on your handle, I don't see an email. Do I find it somewhere else?
Didn't know it wasn't shown, I've added to the about section of my profile. Long history with dope, happy to share if it'll help you.
edit: I'm a senior software engineer
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#283I'll add a data point, though it's almost entirely negative. I've been at Google over 10 years and have yet to come across a person using illegal hard drugs. I can think of three people with serious drinking problems. There's been a drinking culture (many offices have beer on tap), but I see that changing, as people are more conscious of the negative effects. A bunch of people use marijuana, but off-hours. I haven't…
Simply said, you are biased as people don't talk openly about it. I know a lot of googlers that have a completely different experience than yours
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#284Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think a human being is really only capable of like 6 hours of solid mental work throughout the day. And even that is tough, with all the distractions of modern life. When you take something like Adderall, that doubles to, say 12 hours and enables you to get hyper-focused on the task at hand. Sure, you can still get hyper-focused on the wrong thing , but if you can reign that in you're golden. Not only that, the amo…
Out of curiosity, did the stuff you learned during that time also increase 10x? Did it all stick with you, or did it just temporarily increase your ability to hold it all in your head?
It's great for long-term memory, but short-term memory loss is a side effect of amphetamines. You can read a textbook and retain all of it, but you may not remember where you put it when you finished.
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#285There is a population of media developers that are fairly heavy marijuana users. By 'media developer' I mean animation, VFX, games, and other graphics & entertainment related type of software. We tend to be older, having been in graphics and media for 20 to 30 years for most of us pothead graphics junkies. We have bongs and all the typical pot smoking accessories out in the open at our offices, and they are in active…
Do you think that the pot is countering any depression or down feelings that may come from being isolated for so long each day? That sounds really hard, even if you really like the work.
A somewhat odd reoccurring conversation we all have is discussing our dislike of long periods of not being stoned. I personally feel I get naively optimistic, and being stoned make me more critical. I am more easy going (too easy going?) when completely sober, and tend towards obsessive creative introspection when high. It is not a rare topic, the discussion of our long term heavy use, for those of us that are more health minded. In addition to my heavy smoking, I ironically am a marathon runner too.
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#286I started a large latte habit (which sounds silly) a couple months ago at my new startup job, but I've been working in tech for 3.5 years now. My tolerance is low so thats all I need to get kickstarted... but now I'm pretty dependent on it and can't get nearly as much done without it. At my last job, some SEs would have 5+ cans of coke a day. I think it was an overdose of caffeine/sugar.... which actually might be more unhealthy than Adderall. I'd be curious to see what people think of that.
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#287Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even though the entire ethos of my comment suggests that you wanna stay away from this stuff ... occasional/recreational use is not a big deal. He never pushed it on me, it was just something that I could take advantage of on occasion. I don't look back on it and think it was predatory or a big deal or a malicious thing. I definitely don't think he deserves to be in jail or punished.
The guy is in a power relationship with his subordinates, he is definitely not the one to go and prescribe medication. The best thing he could have done is to send you to a doctor. If a CEO here in NL suggested I take some pills in order to improve my productivity and offered to supply them my first step would be to inform the board in writing and my second would be to resign my position. This is simply not ok, and n…
>If a CEO here in NL suggested I take some pills in order to improve my productivity
I'd agree that it's not professional/ethical, but the OP didn't say the CEO suggested it.
For all we know, poster might have initially asked (Of course, agreeing to hand out arbitrary medication is of course not the right answer).
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#288From the Midwest originally. I moved to the Bay Area in the mid-2000s for work right out of college. As a young teen, I had gotten most drug use and experimentation out of my system. Marijuana and LSD were my mainstays then. In my later teens called it quits when I realized grades matter. Fast-forward to moving to Bay Area, I was astounded by the level of cavalier toking up, dosing, or snorting that folks my age and…
Trust me there is much more drug use in Berlin than you saw. The dance music underground there is just as drug-addled as the burner scene here, maybe just not as inundated with tech workers
Yeah, I saw all of that. Oakland’s drug use makes Berlin looks quaint.
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#289I remember your article. I hope it helps to have the ability to so beautifully render the tragedy that befell you in words. I'm in tech. My first experience with drugs other than weed, which I just don't enjoy, happened relatively late. I was around 30 at the time when I joined friends of a friend taking MDMA at a club. I have experienced chronic depression for as long as I can remember. I was rarely actually "sad",…
it was enormously freeing to finally be able to write about what happened to my family, yes, thank you. I felt like I was living in a John Grisham created hell, afraid of telling anyone what really happened and instead acting like Peter was the victim of his own stringent work ethic (which is true and not true). May I ask you what you do for a living? Are you a developer?
Re: Ask HN: I'm writing a book about white-collar drug use, including tech sector
#290I've made a throwaway account to comment on this, and I've not scanned down through all the comments so you may already have similar stories. I am a software developer based in London, UK who uses several stimulants / drugs in my day-to-day work, I also understand that I am the exception to the rule and whilst I do use a number of substances for many reasons, there are very few of my colleagues that do the same - in…
Interesting stuff. Around how old are you and around how much do you make? (get as general as you want)