Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#81

Post by ehnto » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:06 PM UTC

Nextgrid wrote: post #64

I wish I could leave. The tech industry nowadays is no longer about solving real-world problems and making the world a better place, instead it's all about screwing the end user in every single way possible, whether it's ads, stalking and privacy violations, spam ("marketing" as they call it) or just plain fraud where the company is happy to take the money but can't make it right if things don't go to plan and the cu…

> Instead, engineering became its own thing and most companies encourage and reward those who opt for over-engineered solutions, which means you spend more time fighting with dozens of layers of abstractions and chasing the latest JS framework instead of actually delivering functionality.

I've been thinking about this in relation to the concept of incidental complexity lately. Every year there is more and more tooling and configuration to do before actually coding anything.

I have always considered myself a full stack developer, but each field gets more specialized, and when issues arise I'm just not on top of the suddenly very complex nature of the surrounding ecosystem, even though the goal is to eventually write the same code in the same language I normally use.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#82

Post by yahyaheee » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:07 PM UTC

hackyhacky wrote: post #78

As a kid, I aspired to be a programmer. As an adult, I succeeded, and I stuck around for a good long while. There are a lot of reasons to like working tech, obviously: the salary, the flexible working environment, the prestige, the opportunity to build products that real people use, the chance to play with new technology, and of course working with occasionally brilliant colleagues. I tried to convince myself that th…

This sounds a lot like toxic work culture, but unfortunately there’s a lot of that in tech

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#83

Post by cryptica » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:07 PM UTC

Engineers who work for companies like Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft... They aren't getting paid for engineering. They're getting paid to increase employee head count which gives corporations political leverage. Also, they don't want smart people to be thinking about the economic system in an objective way - Hiring smart people and giving them massive salaries and bonuses is a good way to keep those people focused on ideas which are aligned with the existing corporation-friendly political order.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#84

Post by mmargerum » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:08 PM UTC

me_me_me wrote: post #69

mmargerum wrote: post #48

Making 6 figures to play and create all day if just awful. Boo hoo. I feel like the luckiest guy alive to get paid handsomely to do what I love.

I would love to be so closed-minded as you, not realizing that other people are different than you. Ignorance is a bliss. Some people are in tech because its a job, not because they love it. Some people got burned out. Some people discover other things that they love more then what they doing currently.

Programming would be the worst job in the world if you didn't love it and weren't naturally good at it. I don't know why people would get involved in it otherwise. You either have an aptitude for it or you don't. It's completely obvious within days of trying it out. If you don't you honestly shouldn't pursue it.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#85

Post by deedubaya » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:09 PM UTC

Nextgrid wrote: post #64

I wish I could leave. The tech industry nowadays is no longer about solving real-world problems and making the world a better place, instead it's all about screwing the end user in every single way possible, whether it's ads, stalking and privacy violations, spam ("marketing" as they call it) or just plain fraud where the company is happy to take the money but can't make it right if things don't go to plan and the cu…

And here we have the product of today's VC backed tech.

There is a whole other world of bootstrapped/profitable businesses out there where these things aren't a focus or problem. You might not even have to take much of a pay cut.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#86

Post by mandelbrotwurst » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:10 PM UTC

michaelt wrote: post #67

gman83 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is a full time parent? I remember as a kid that I was always encouraging my mom to take up hobbies so that she's leave me alone so I could get on with my own stuff. I can't imagine putting all your identity into being a parent. Kids grow up extremely fast.

It's the gender-neutral, unpaid-work-respecting equivalent of a "stay-at-home mom" or "housewife" If a couple decides they want four kids, the numbers can work out, for 10 years or so - especially if childcare is expensive.

Yup - the "numbers" can work out with even one kid, particularly if your equations value time spent with the child.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#87

Post by kyuudou » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:11 PM UTC

lidHanteyk wrote: post #30

I keep getting laid off after criticizing upper management. I don't see any reason to regret my choices; they made their choices, too. I'm only here to share links, to show people how they are wrong, and to follow the Prime Directive.

>I keep getting laid off after criticizing upper management.

OK nice it's not just me!

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#88

Post by Kye » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

I got a 2 year network admin degree and realized the kind of people I had in class were the kind of people I would have to work with. At least the skills didn't go to waste. Knowing how to operate Linux over SSH comes in handy running a blog for the things I do now.

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#89

Post by non-entity » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

TheCapn wrote: post #75

encom wrote: post #23

I left it before I really got started, and looking back at it now, I don't regret it. In my mid-twenties I decided I'd rather be an electrician. I don't sit on my ass all day. I get to meet new people, and see new places all the time. Some places that few ever get to see. Power plants, clock towers, police stations, homeless shelters, church attics. All sorts of stuff. Not all of it equally exciting, but a lot of it…

Find your way into Industrial Electrical work if you can. You get a strong mix of tech and electrical, moreso than Residential, can't really say the comparison to Commercial work though... My company (Automation & controls) is partnered with electricians for all the jobs we bid on. Having electricians that know wiring for specialized bus networks, how to do basic troubleshooting on control circuits and all that is am…

I recently became kinda intrigued by PLCs and even consider buying one just to play with it (idk maybe it's the novelty of it) and the various programming languages for them and how they can be so different. What kind of education do you need to work on this kind of stuff?

Re: Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

#90

Post by jerf » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

encom wrote: post #23

I left it before I really got started, and looking back at it now, I don't regret it. In my mid-twenties I decided I'd rather be an electrician. I don't sit on my ass all day. I get to meet new people, and see new places all the time. Some places that few ever get to see. Power plants, clock towers, police stations, homeless shelters, church attics. All sorts of stuff. Not all of it equally exciting, but a lot of it…

"because software issues can piss me off like no other thing is capable of."

This in reverse is part of why I am a programmer; it can take two or three days before I'm really pissed at a software problem, but physical stuff really annoys me in mere minutes.

Why? Don't really know. I know a bit of it is that I know how to get myself into trouble in software and then usually get back out much better than I do in the real world, but even so, I had the patience in software to develop that and I really don't for real things.