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What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

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Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#11

Post by BrandonM »

The analogy breaks down when the author implies that rock star musicians (or really musicians of any kind) are paid a salary by the record companies. All the record companies pay are advances, and then the rest is just gouging the artist's creative output for every expense they can muster.

At first I thought that's what the article was going to get into: "We want you to produce amazingly high-quality output for an unfairly-low wage and relatively low performance bonuses." Instead it implied that rock star musicians get a significantly better deal than "rock star engineers," and that's pretty bogus. Just ask an aspiring rock star if they'd like to make ~$75K base salary with bonuses (i.e. equity) that reward the quality of their output.

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#12

Post by Xurinos »

Whenever I hear the phrases "rock star developer" or "code ninja", I think, "Oh, they want some young fresh-out-of-college full-of-himself developer who thinks a language named after a rock is the wave of the future."

Jokes aside, those phrases raise red flags in my mind. I think maybe it is that from such an employer, I would expect to see the occasional presentation with swear words ("We're all adults, here" -- "Sure, but you act like you just left your parents' house, and with your first taste of freedom, you express your naughty self."). Ah, that is the word I am looking for: professionalism. I have a hard time taking them seriously.

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#13

Post by joe_the_user »

What I think of when I hear "Rock Star Programmers"?

I think how most musicians, signed to a major label, who perform as "rock stars" still get a net zero payoff after two years.

I think how if programming degenerated to the level of music or motion pictures, the average programmer would labor for nearly nothing in a start-up "hoping to be discovered" while handful got a fake buy-outs with no long term money and a much smaller handful became actual multi-millionaires.

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#14

Post by thenduks »

thirdstation wrote: post #2

Why are software developers segmented between "rock stars" and "not rock stars"? A salary estimate search on Simply Hired for "rockstar accountant" yielded no results :-)

That's exactly the point, they aren't. It's just a buzzword to draw attention to a job posting just like "senior" or "experienced" were before it. No reason to start the hype machine up over this stuff, if you ask me.

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#16

Post by gaius »

thenduks wrote: post #14
thirdstation wrote: post #2

Why are software developers segmented between "rock stars" and "not rock stars"? A salary estimate search on Simply Hired for "rockstar accountant" yielded no results :-)

That's exactly the point, they aren't . It's just a buzzword to draw attention to a job posting just like "senior" or "experienced" were before it. No reason to start the hype machine up over this stuff, if you ask me.

It is the complete opposite of "senior" or "experienced". It's 22-years-old, thinks the web is all of the computing world, and thinks fleshing out a framework is all there is to programming.

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#17

Post by nickdunkman »

It's just semantics. The term rock star was involved in the recruiting process of my current job, and those who used it included a great hands on CTO and a CEO with above average tech knowledge. I had no illusions as to some kind of huge salary or RIAA like treatment.

It's cliche, yea. But sooner or later you'll miss out on a great opportunity if you run away when you see "rock star".

Re: What developers think when you say "Rock Star"

#18

Post by philwelch »

BrandonM wrote: post #11

The analogy breaks down when the author implies that rock star musicians (or really musicians of any kind) are paid a salary by the record companies. All the record companies pay are advances, and then the rest is just gouging the artist's creative output for every expense they can muster. At first I thought that's what the article was going to get into: "We want you to produce amazingly high-quality output for an un…

For real rock stars, records are a loss leader for concert tickets and t-shirts.
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