Ask HN: Why did you leave the tech industry?

Post by hnick » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 10:40 PM UTC

str34ml1n3 wrote: post #242

chewz wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I haven't been working in the last ten years. For seven years I have been mostly traveling and drifting, mostly in SE Asia. Long story. You need way, way less money then you think you do but the expectations adjustment process on the mental level is very slow. But of course it is good to have some savings.

I have lived in SE Asia for about seven years. In case anyone is curious, I've been able to live well on about $6000-8000 a year. I certainly eat like a king, since fruits and vegetables are amazingly cheap here. Otherwise my hobbies are inexpensive, e.g. exercise and sports, writing software for personal projects, making digital art, etc. It's not for everyone, but I would have really struggled on a more conventiona…

Post by AnimalMuppet » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 10:51 PM UTC

jl2718 wrote: post #250

peckrob wrote: post #108

I stated my career early - while I was still in high school. I went from bagging groceries and doing checkouts at a grocery store to programming for a local company my senior year of high school. I continued doing this for my first couple years of college. But then dot-bomb happened and it looked like the party was over. I looked down at the job opportunities after graduation. I didn't really want to spend the rest o…

Like most people here, I developed myopia fairly soon after starting a cubicle job, and I can’t even see the stars anymore. It’s just a memory now. Even with glasses it’s not the same. Whether staring at a acreen was the cause, or just the thing I wasted it on, it’s gone.

Post by bg4 » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 10:59 PM UTC

volkk wrote: post #226

chuck3201 wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I honestly believe that if the nerds told them to fuck off and started spending their time working on things they think are relevant, the world would become much better quickly. This won't happen, I know. Most of the "creative nerds" I have encountered in this industry are arrogant, have grandiose beliefs about their own intelligence and have zero empathy for anybody who is not exactly like them. I don't think thin…

+1 for this. The "business" folk might be filling your day to day with features that only improve conversion rates which is soul draining, of course, but nothing feels worse than working on something interesting surrounded by these wannabe wozniak "nerds" that instill this unspoken aura of "youre too dumb to be in the room with me." THOSE are the people that i hate the most in this industry.

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

Post by agumonkey » Wed, Apr 15, 2020, 11:50 PM UTC

hnick wrote: post #398

karatestomp wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was spending more time wrestling with package managers, version conflicts, obtuse configuration files, pointless deadlines, egotistical colleagues, and almost zero time solving interesting problems on products that I care about. That squares with my experience of software development. It's like being a furniture maker but spending 80% of your time fixing your goddamn hammer because it keeps breaking and no better…

My attraction to tech is the certainty of digital. In a messy analogue world, it provides a semblance of predictability. But my PC has recently started crashing for no obvious reason. The analogue has crept into the digital. Every error message is different. Parts work when tested in isolation. The whole is less than the sum of the parts. It's really quite annoying, and I'm enjoying walks in the park more these days…