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Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

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Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#211

Post by sfifs »

bigtex wrote: post #201
norea-armozel wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I could get a reliable car so I could get to a metro when I needed to see an endocrinologist I would definitely do my work remotely from a rural community. I know that parts of Kansas have FTTH (it's not gigabit but it's reliable and has no datacaps) which are very cheap to live in. Edit: It looks like Nex-Tech now offers gigabit internet. It's around $200 a month with cable and phone but to be fair it's rural Kan…

I have business class internet in a rural community in Tx. Advertised speed in 10/2 but I usually get around 20/2 for $100/month. It is fixed wireless.

Is this high price due to rural or is it normal range for the U.S? In Mumbai India I pay about 30USD a month for 50/5 and there are fibre providers in places like Bangalore that are much cheaper.

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#212

Post by riboflava »

vemv wrote: post #91
ArkyBeagle wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it hurts, you're doing it wrong :) I haven't had a stressful deadline in a very long time. Indeed, I've been weeks or months ahead in almost all cases. I've used that time to get a jump on integration, or help others get a jump on their schedule. By the time I'm ready to ship, the only thing between me and proper operation is disinformation from others. Now, granted, that's annoying to some people. But just consid…

It's an interesting point of view! For me, age 24, I'd see it extremely difficult to keep the same pace when I'm 50. Maybe I can do the same stuff, but slower. So by then I wouldn't feel 'discriminated' if someone hires a more energetic, available candidate.

For me, age 26, I'm already slower than I was when I was 18. I write better code though and can wade through harder abstractions, so on hard, novel material I'd likely win against my old self. Still, I really detest the "work" aspect of work which I don't wake up excited to do, so my plan that I'm on track for is to be "retired" by 32. Why slave until I'm 50? I've even considered depleting my savings earlier on to take a couple years off and then come back, delaying "retirement" by a few years but potentially making the "come back" slog much more pleasant. (I don't think I'll ever master the tricks other, often older, people seem to have about becoming excited to do even the mundane or just being able to plow through it regardless of 'motivation' or 'pleasantness'. My mother basically worked her whole adult life until she died, I don't understand how but sometimes wish such a mindset was more genetic.)

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#213

Post by DominikR »

aantix wrote: post #165
tjic wrote: post #2

I think that the "Bay Area scene" is different from much of the world. I think that part of human nature is that people like people who are like themselves, so you sometimes get these insular / discriminatory sub cultures that judge people on superficial traits instead of the quality of their minds. From both this article and the tales of many friends, San Francisco strikes as one of these low-tolerance / high-discri…

>Personally, I dislike places where people are provincial and close-minded, so I'll stick to the rural countryside and leave SF to the bigots. You hate where people are close-minded so you're _sticking_ with the countryside..? It's possible that NH countryside is different than the other small towns I've visited, but I have zero data points on that. Another discussion, another day. I lived in SF for five years and pe…

> Also, you're a consultant. You obviously have an understanding of client relationships. Understand that your clients in SF are going to skew younger. One of my best friends was the CTO of a startup where the founder was 20. He was 45.

This is only true for startups and other companies that have small budgets or need cheap labor. If you are going after the high paying contracts you'll quickly learn that being 45 or older is often an advantage if you have the necessary experience. (not just technical skill but also social skill)

These corporations aren't going to allow a 25 year old consulter to come in and take lead of a team or a product. (except if the person shows truly remarkable skill)

If they hire young consulters it usually means they want someone that is cheap to hire and easy to fire.

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#214

Post by norea-armozel »

sfifs wrote: post #211
bigtex wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have business class internet in a rural community in Tx. Advertised speed in 10/2 but I usually get around 20/2 for $100/month. It is fixed wireless.

Is this high price due to rural or is it normal range for the U.S? In Mumbai India I pay about 30USD a month for 50/5 and there are fibre providers in places like Bangalore that are much cheaper.

Rural is usually higher in my experience. Especially if you live very far from any small city (25k-100k) like where I lived in western Kansas. It was jarring when it came to prices on everything from groceries to utilities. It's still cheaper on the whole if you have a reasonable salary (50-60k is the minimum IMO). The only big down side I think to rural communities in the US is the extreme isolation due to physical distance between towns and cities which is why so many people avoid them. IMO, if you go rural in the US it's best to pick a smaller town that's no more than 250 miles away from a metro. Getting any further away is just asking for cabin fever (if you grew up in any sizable city).

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#215

Post by 20yrs_no_equity »

groby_b wrote: post #141
20yrs_no_equity wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best team composition is an age of ranges, spanning 20 years- eg: early twenties to late 40s. (I wouldn't turn down an engineer older than that though, of course). And ranges of experiences. You need diversity to refine the ideas before committing them to code. Often the younger guys are faster at producing features, but produce lower quality code while the older guys understand architecture but aren't as fast at…

> while the older guys understand architecture but aren't as fast at executing it It's the older women who rock both architecture and quick execution. :) ("I'm sorry, but you opened the door, counselor") Age does not immediately confer advantages or disadvantages - we just often use it as a proxy for "experienced", "more methodical", "slower", "inflexible", "good mentor". (Your pick here) All of those are independent…

You can't have 30 years of experience when you're 20 years old. You're unlikely to have 15 years experience when you're 20 years old, and you're certainly going to have a different perspective when you're more years into programming, which has good and bad aspects.

Like I said, you want diversity of ages. I'm in my late 40s, I work with 20 year olds and 30 year olds and a guy whose even a fair bit older than me.

Hire the best people first, then make your team diverse, both across thinking and across ages and across everything else.

But there's a synergy I've noticed more than once when pairing a 40ish with a 20ish. OR even a 20ish, 30ish and 40ish three person team.

I'm obviously not (and it should be clear in the above message) calling for quotas, but it's a good goal.

Homogenity reduces ingenuity.

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#217

Post by sfrailsdev »

johnwheeler wrote: post #3

Hi Everybody, I'm the creator of the site the down blog in the OP links to https://oldgeekjobs.com . I developed it as an MVP last night in one hour. The blog looks like it's getting crushed under load, so here's the content of the post: Check out https://oldgeekjobs.com/ if you’re over 30. In the software development industry it’s hard to get hired when you get past 35 and are still “just a developer”. Employers loo…

Of course I'd point out that not every older developer has been a developer all along. A number of people move to software development as a second career, (or as a first career after a series of less career oriented jobs).

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#218

Post by dragonwriter »

loeg wrote: post #118
kelukelugames wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it weird we consider over 30 old when legal protection doesn't kick in until we are over 40.

I find it odd that 18-40 year olds are not legally protected from age discrimination in the US.

Its largely an example of a solution very narrowly crafted to the way a problem seemed to be manifesting at the time it was created, rather than generalizing to the ways it could manifest in the future.

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#219

Post by derekp7 »

JPKab wrote: post #98
rdtsc wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Personally, I dislike places where people are provincial and close-minded, so I'll stick to the rural countryside and leave SF to the bigots. I like that quote. Copied it to my notes for future reference. To expand more on the topic, I wonder if remote workers are a good way to bring some revival for smaller rural communities. I visit some of those places and many have a beautiful setting, everyone knows each other…

It's a weird situation, because I was working remotely for a tech company and was required to move to the Boulder, CO area recently. It's an awesome company and I was stoked about the area, so I went ahead and did it, but the requirement for collocation that has been driven by certain management ethos' is odd in such a technology driven world. The advantages I've had by moving from Arkansas to here have been numerous…

And yet there are companies that think nothing of hiring offshore workers to replace local jobs. Sometimes within the same organization. Why is it that a company will require you to either be on-site, or in India, but nowhere else?

Re: Old Geek Jobs: fighting against ageism in the industry

#220

Post by dragonwriter »

initram wrote: post #123
robohamburger wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even without the legality, it is super weird. If someone told me I was old at 30 I would laugh :)

My spouse is a dancer. They generally retire at around 30 yrs. old. (And by retire, I mean find a different job because you aren't going to retire on a dancer's salary.)

> My spouse is a dancer. They generally retire at around 30 yrs. old.

The varies a bit depending on the kind of dance, but, yeah, people who can stay in dance much longer than that (and, really, people who can make a decent living in it at all, even below that age), mostly do so as dance instructors, choreographers, etc., with their own dancing (if its even something they directly get paid for at all) sort of an adjunct and means of advertising the other parts of what they do.

There's something much weaker in technology (not just in computing) in the worker -> manager push, where people who don't jump that divide by a particular time start being seen as less desirable as workers. But its brutal in dance (and only partly due to the actual physical requirements of performing the movements.)

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