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Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
161–170 of 288 posts
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#162It's your problem with not finding out the problem you want to solve.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#163I'm not sure how this will resonate here, but this past year my interests in side projects sharply declined. For reference I am early 30s, married no kids. Up until now I used to work on 2-3 large side projects a year, diving deep into them obsessed with sleepless nights working. Now with LLMs it just feels kind of like whats the point? Either my work will be consumed by an LLM to train and get tossed aside or i shou…
> Even the highest level artists are not satisfied with their work. Is this true, sad if true > Its hard to work hundreds of hours on something knowing the end monetary value is going to be $0. What else are you gonna do with your life, this is it. Fire up VSCode.
Why is it sad to pursue something that will never reach perfection? Why is it sad to go on a path literally thousands of people have gone on and have done better than you? Release yourself from these things and you will be much happier.
Music taught me you don't need to be perfect or the best. Music is about connecting with other people. Its much better than computers for that. Its a very "meatspace" realm and while the virtual space has made music more accessible, it will always be firmly fully experienced in the in-person physical world that requires another human being.
> What else are you gonna do with your life, this is it
Well i mean there are tons of things out in life that you can do besides sit in front of the computer producing code that very few people will see.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#164Wow, I just wanted to say thanks a lot for posting this. I'm in a very similar boat. I was always very focused and goal-oriented in my younger days - a bit of a workaholic but generally enjoyed working hard. A number of changes since the pandemic have left me feeling very similar to you: 1. Like tons of other people, I re-evaluated my relationship with work during the pandemic. To be honest, it wasn't easy. I think a…
One question I’ve set out to answer is: what would I do if I were fired tomorrow? Understood that not everyone is in the position to switch to lower paying careers, start over, etc - but if you have some leash, what WOULD you do if you were fired tomorrow? (And I don’t mean short term like take a vacation then find another tech job - mean longer term like what kind of job will you be looking for next, or business to…
I’ve been thinking about this too. And it’s also usually used as a counter-argument to people wanting to get out of their jobs.
However, here’s what I realized: most people work in “regular” 9-5 jobs. That includes “tech people”, who like to think of themselves as artists, but are not. And it takes like 2 decades to get trained to do a regular job if you take into account k-12 (which trains you to be a 9-5 worker and discourages anything else), uni, and the first few years of professional experience.
So is it that surprising that once you get disillusioned with being a 9-5 worker it would take you at the very least few years to figure out how to not be one?
What I’m trying to say is it should be expected to not know what you want to do. Because even getting to the point where you could do what 90% of the population does take a tremendous amount of effort. So once you want to do something else, it will take a while to figure out too. And you can totally fail along the way as well.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#165I'm doing boring stuff. Forms with 5 to 20 fields that people put data into. Nothing AI, not a startup, regulated industry, kind of slow, low stress. I can focus on delivering on quality, I close laptop at 5pm and do other stuff. I feel that it's valuable to society to have this basic stuff not in a half-broken state, I enjoy the people around -- no tech bros with inflated egos or anything.
#bogatyrlife
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#166There's a lot of negative vibes in programming these days. When I think of a programming community I think of fun, learning, engagement, projects, /programming/. These days it feels like it's just for money or power. These negative feelings make it all less fun. So I've been doing music instead. I'm not good at it at all, but learning it ticks pretty much all the boxes that programming does. It's scientific in some w…
TBH modern music also bears a lot of negative vibes.
The industry is not the music.
Musical improvisation is one of the few forms of art a creator can enjoy as much as an audience.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#167Sometime in my late 40s I got really tired of learning the "next great thing" only to realize that some young developers had reinvented the wheel. Again. Since then, I have learned new things, but not because they were "relevant" or "important", bit just because they were fun. Python is a crappy language, and always has been. It's just a happy accident that the ML folks glommed in to it. Most frameworks suck, serious…
> Since then, I have learned new things, but not because they were "relevant" or "important", bit just because they were fun. How do you maintain a career? I stopped caring about relevant and important and my career suffered for it. I stopped caring about fun because it was either a waste of time or inaccessible.
find balance, it's not all or nothing.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#168Earlier quoted context omitted.
> when you pass Nihilism is not the belief that there is no God and life is ultimately meaningless. Nihilism is recognizing that there is no God and life is ultimately meaningless, while continuing to sacrifice at a grinding job you hate, continuing to submit to the phony morality of those higher than you in the social hierarchy, conforming to social rituals and customs you privately think are bullshit, continuing to…
I found this video to be quite significant to me on the "nihilism" front : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jv79l1b-eoI
Thanks for the video. This is so encouraging.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#169These things come in seasons. Definitely good to take a beat and focus on yourself. You phrase it like it's permanent though.
I've certainly had times where I don't work on anything outside of work. Other times I have multiple side projects. I'm always doing it out of self love though whether its self care or projects! That's what's key.
Re: Ask HN: Who else is working on nothing?
#170Here. I'm just lazy. An excuse I tell myself is ehh that probably has no monetary future so I just don't do it, but its probably just laziness.
The worst thing about laziness is how everyone is against the idea. Hey, you have 1 guy in me who sees that as justifiable and valid expression.