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Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

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21–30 of 106 posts

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#21

Nature and animal conservation is a political issue. The best use of your skills would be to aid in the lobbying efforts for tighter regulations and more money for developing countries. You might save a tiger, but in the year it took you to save him, Brazil cut down 8 million hectares of the rain forest for palm oil.

Lobbyists require data. Existing wildlife laws require enforcement. Political support requires mobilization. All of the above can be helped by smart, enthusiastic developers. If more people help out, we can save the tiger and the forest.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#22
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services.

In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay.

Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video games much more greatly than museums.

Just because you value certain things more than others doesn't give them any intrinsic value.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#23
There is this development company that’s doing good work (the “improve people’s live in developing country kind of development”):

https://catalpa.io/work-with-us/

They are based in East Timor and were founded by an Aussie and an American (U.S.) and they allow remote work.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#24
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay. Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video…

Tragedy of the commons

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#26
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay. Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video…

well, if museums would drive the same marketing campaigns (read propaganda or simply media based manipulation), this might easily change... Also generally the amount of time you can spend in museums is somehow limited, as most don't allow you to be active (like videogames do in a sort of lobotomied way).

As for your example: if you compare the amount of time people play in bands/sing in choirs (often without any direct money involved, e.g. around church or school) you've got an obvious example that people don't naturally "pay more for the things they value" (or see the need to pay or get payed at all). I value this very much and if someone was coming up and saying: pay up, I'd say - come on guys, let's do this on our own.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#27
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay. Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video…

Everything wrong with HN, in a single comment.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#28
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay. Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video…

a = how much `thing` benefits community

b = how much community values `thing`

a != b

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#29
Yes there are jobs and yes the non-profit industry needs your talents. Software jobs in the industry fall into one of 4 buckets in my experience. Don't expect much career growth or pay. Most of the work is in support of fundraising. Be willing to work at a vendor that serves the non-profit industry.

- Web development. Nonprofits need websites. Sometimes they may have a dev on staff, usually they at least have a digital director that can work with devs at web dev vendors. These vendors are usually solely focused on the non-profit market.

- CRM. Non-profits fundraise and they need people to manage the donor database. Usually this is bought from a vendor that specializes in non-profit CRM and those vendors also have devs/DBAs.

- IT. Non-profits need IT to manage networks, phones and equipment. Often they work with IT vendors.

- Devs for conservation work. This is more rare. Still, some non-profits have staff scientists, GIS people, and devs to build out conservation tools, such as data collecting apps, data visualizations or other things. This is rare because most non-profits are trying to convince the government to do the science because the government has much more money and power to recruit. It's rare and maybe a bit of a vanity project to do any science out of the non-profit, though there are a couple of groups that do that.

Re: Ask HN: Are there any software jobs in nature/animal conservation?

#30
post #17

It's most certainly better for your soul, but get ready to take a pay cut. After a short career in game development and a much longer career in museum/library/archives, my take is that our societies values are out of whack: the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. You'll also take a hit in your reputation among other deve…

> the more your job benefits your community and the planet the less you will get paid, and vice versa. It's even worse for social services. In a free market economy, this is an entirely false statement. People pay for the things they value. They more they value it, the more they pay. Compare the amount of hours spent playing video games to the amount of hours spent touring museums. It's not close. People value video…

In my statement I wasn't trying to center museums particularly. The OP was asking about nature conservation and museums/libraries are the aspect of preservation of the natural world or care of people and communities that I'm most familiar with. Our capitalist society doesn't place much value on these. [Update: wording]
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