Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#1

Post by pogotc » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 6:39 PM UTC

In my day job I’m a web developer who has spent the best part of the last 10 years writing software to help sell tickets to arts venues and extract as much money from the customer as possible, it’s not a noble way to earn money but it pays the bills.

I recently started wondering whether I could use my programming knowledge and experience for something better, something other than trying to extract money from rich arts lovers. For the moment I’m stuck at that job but it got me wondering if there are open source projects for things that actually help people. I stumbled on https://hollieguard.com (sadly not open source) recently and it was a reminder that as software developers we have the ability to make real, positive, differences to people’s lives. I’m just not sure where to start.

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#2

Post by mtmail » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 6:44 PM UTC

Have a look at https://www.hotosm.org/

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#3

Post by Jackypot » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 6:57 PM UTC

There's no reason you can't combine the two and create some for-profit service which serves an honourable purpose in the grand scheme of things. The guys who created e.g. JustGiving did exactly that.

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#4

Post by miguelrochefort » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:20 PM UTC

> You have 80000 hours in your career. How can you use them to make a difference?

https://80000hours.org

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#5

Post by sampo » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:26 PM UTC

If you are willing to change jobs, look at AgTech startups in general, and FinTech startups that are targeting the developing countries. All those have needs for front end devs (and mobile devs).

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#6

Post by ceautery » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:30 PM UTC

How are you at teaching? Local elementary and middle schools are starved of good tech help.

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#7

Post by ceautery » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:31 PM UTC

miguelrochefort wrote: post #4

> You have 80000 hours in your career. How can you use them to make a difference? https://80000hours.org

.org

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#8

Post by miguelrochefort » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:35 PM UTC

ceautery wrote: post #7

miguelrochefort wrote: post #4

> You have 80000 hours in your career. How can you use them to make a difference? https://80000hours.org

.org

Done.

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#9

Post by ofosos » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:51 PM UTC

Have a look at https://socialcoder.org/Home/Index

Re: Ask HN: Improving the world as a software developer

#10

Post by danenania » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 8:54 PM UTC

While it's less immediate than starting or working for a non-profit directly, you can have a surprisingly big impact by creating useful devtools and other tech infrastructure (whether OSS or for-profit).

At EnvKey, our configuration and secrets manager has some amazing non-profits like GiveLively and charity:water as customers, as well as some great mission-driven for-profit companies like Lambda School and Seneca Systems. It feels great to know that we're helping them to help others more efficiently and securely. We have other devtool customers too, so we're also helping them to help others to help others... and so on :)

It's the whole "area under the curve" idea--instead of having a very visible, direct impact by, say, working for the Gates Foundation, another option is to play a small but important role as an enabler for many others, and this can still add up to making a big difference overall.