As an aspiring songwriter with a 9-5 the main benefit is simply providing a time constraint that forces you to work.
Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
11–20 of 31 posts
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#12work, eat, sleep, repeat—an uninspiring 9to6 job does not help getting art done
unless your job IS making art, then you're golden
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#13Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#14Paywall. Can someone provide a summary?
Many artists had day jobs. For example, the composer Philip Glass was a plumber, the poet William Carlos Williams was a doctor. The article explores whether a day job gets in the way of your art or feeds it in some way.
And a very silly article it is too, because the confirmation bias is absolute.
We never hear of talented artists whose careers were sunk by job slavery, because their stories will never get media attention.
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#15I think The Onion already said it better:
["Find The Thing You're Most Passionate About, Then Do It On Nights And Weekends For The Rest Of Your Life"](https://www.theonion.com/find-the-thing-youre-most-passionat...)
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#16Unfortunately intellectual property (IP) contracts make the lifestyle described in the article difficult for engineers and programmers. Work on something in your spare time that is plausibly related to work your company does? Too bad, your company owns it, usually. (I plan to negotiate on this point when getting a job offer in the future.)
I wouldn't be surprised if such policies were shown to be negatively correlated with innovation (however defined), because they remove much incentive to generate good ideas.
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#17NYT is always pro-working for people with money. Art freed from working works against the system as a whole because it shows other ways of being and thinking are possible. I'm sure there's something to artists living and working among the rest of us to make the art relevant, but it doesn't need to be on an employer's schedule or in the quantity they demand. EDIT: For instance, having a job allows an artist to be a mi…
Please help me understand. You're saying the NYT has some agenda to keep artists from quiting their day jobs? If so that seems implausible.
For many artists there is no other choice. Art won't pay the bills but for a small few. I for one enjoy the freedom that comes with having a day job. I don't have to worry if people will like my art (because it doesn't need to make money) And I often get good ideas for writing and music when completing some monotonous task in the office.
About your first edit... I think it's absurd to think you need to be jobless in order to question society. In fact, having a job gives you a front row seat to everything wrong with us.
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#18Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many artists had day jobs. For example, the composer Philip Glass was a plumber, the poet William Carlos Williams was a doctor. The article explores whether a day job gets in the way of your art or feeds it in some way.
And a very silly article it is too, because the confirmation bias is absolute. We never hear of talented artists whose careers were sunk by job slavery, because their stories will never get media attention.
But the article spotlightd successful artists who say dayjobs fueled their work. I don't think the point is to answer the question statistically. For some talented people, a dayjob is preferred. And that's all the article is about
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#19As an aspiring songwriter with a 9-5 the main benefit is simply providing a time constraint that forces you to work.
I can totally understand this. This would be the main problem for me about freelancing. Too much freedom turns me into a hobo hermit.
Re: Does Having a Day Job Mean Making Better Art?
#20I made the best "art" of my life when I was unemployed living at home taking care of my elderly father.
However, I also believe that software engineering is an art, not just the programming part, but the communicating/organizing/planning part as well. It's hard to compare the two