Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026) • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#51

Post by snek_case » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:53 PM UTC

tcp_handshaker wrote: post #38

snek_case wrote: post #10

I was working at an AI startup, and I saw our CTO lie in a demo to potential customers. I know that startups sometimes have a "fake it till you make it" mindset, but the guy straight up used a product from another company, presented it as our company's product, and faked numbers. I saw him completely misrepresent the capabilities of our product several times. Unethical and most likely illegal, I felt super disappoint…

"I quit later, as it became increasingly clear to me that this guy knew nothing about technology, didn't care, but also had a fragile ego where he had to present himself to the company as being in charge, even though he was the worst person for the role. To top it all off, it also dawned on me over time that we basically had an absentee CEO who was working only ~15 hours a week at most. Then when I quit I found out t…

I've come to understand, talking to a friend who is also in the startup world, that there are some CEOs who run a "portfolio" of startups. It's pretty weird. I don't really understand why investors would put money in a company that only has a part-time CEO.

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#52

Post by anonSrEng202309 » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:53 PM UTC

Still can't get work. I've pretty much given up working for anyone else building software. Had an offer on the table for good pay, rescinded after a credit check (gov't subcontractor, "potential insider threat" excuse; fishy happenings with primary contractor lead me to believe they had their own guy they wanted to install...)

I found a little job in education (no tech at all) that pays $22k/yr. That'll float the bills while I use my spare time to build other things. Got a couple dev boards (one SBC, one for that cheap TI component that came across HN a few days ago) to toy around with some little hardware ideas I have that maybe I could productize.

Grabbing a PD analyzer and an older M1 or M2 Mac to explore Asahi Linux and maybe start contributing in a few months.

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#53

Post by Xunjin » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:53 PM UTC

Rnonymous wrote: post #11

Im close to stopping. Founder of a deeptech/hardware startup in a difficult sector and we are struggling to get our tech validated (latest datapoint are no improvement over the current practice). While i believe with sufficient time it can be proven and improved, that crosses into the realm of academia and not entrepeneurship. So yeah motivation is quite low at the moment, and im not sure if to push-on or accept fail…

Now you made me curious, do you mind sharing more?

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#54

Post by temporallobe » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:54 PM UTC

pelagicAustral wrote: post #6

Not long ago I had a dream about becoming a butcher, and so then I bought half a cow with a friend and after a week trying to cut it out in pieces I realised maybe I was too old to make the move... so im still a programmer.

Some years ago, I got so sick of spending endless hours at my desk writing rspec automation tests that I suddenly had a strong urge to become a forest ranger.

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#55

Post by NDizzle » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:55 PM UTC

pelagicAustral wrote: post #6

Not long ago I had a dream about becoming a butcher, and so then I bought half a cow with a friend and after a week trying to cut it out in pieces I realised maybe I was too old to make the move... so im still a programmer.

There are schools. For example, in Bentonville AR I know the head butcher instructor at Brightwater. https://brightwater.nwacc.edu/

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#56

Post by punk_ihaq » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:55 PM UTC

I quit over a year ago after burnout with a little bit of savings working in devrel and technical PM. Since then I went all in on scuba diving - became an instructor, maxed out open-circuit (OC) tec diving with 100m advance trimix dives, technical stage cave diving (OC), and most recently O2ptima CM Air Diluent CCR diving. I also got B2 certified in Indonesian. After burning a hole in my pocket on diving gear and certs, I'm looking for my next fully remote devrel/dev-ed role so I can go CCR cave diving in a few years :D

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#57

Post by poolnoodle » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:55 PM UTC

ryan_n wrote: post #35

huflungdung wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not about money until you have no money At least you now know what privilege feels like

They literally say they ran out of money lol how is that privileged?

They were priviliged before and only now know how that feels because they aren't anymore

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#58

Post by cmrdporcupine » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:56 PM UTC

I quit last September and have been doing sporadic freelancing and intensely working on personal projects.

It was already clear to me last summer that the agentic stuff was kind of the final nail in the coffin of a "normal" software dev shop. All the routine of typical SCRUM-based etc activity was degrading even further from ritual and theater into a pointless charade or comedy, or as you say, absurdity. Dueling LLMs on the code reviews, people sitting around a conference room on laptops counting fantasy story points, getting Claude to write their annual self-assessments.

Unfortunately I still need to make money. I've done a couple freelance gigs. Some is less absurd than others. I'm sporadically interviewing to go full time again but I'm being extremely picky.

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#59

Post by 535188B17C93743 » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:57 PM UTC

I just quit. A comically inept director who screamed at people and promotions given out for obsequiousness over impact. I'm guessing the second one will be more-or-less the same everywhere but I'd rather not deal with people I don't respect in the slightest.

Re: Ask HN: Who is quitting? (July 2026)

#60

Post by skeeter2020 » Thu, Jul 02, 2026, 12:57 PM UTC

louwrentius wrote: post #42

anonymoussuomy wrote: post #20

Not quitting just yet, but the culture is super toxic lately. Managers will promise things that are not feasible, set absurd deadlines, and then let engineers take the fall if they don't meet those deadlines. When engineers come up with good ideas, managers will say it's a bad idea, but then run away with the idea and take the credit. I wake up every day wondering if I should quiet quit or go for a clean exit.

Quiet quit aka : do the actual amount of work you are are paid for and don't let yourself get ripped off due to 'pressures'.

most people are paid as full time salary employees, aka 35-40 hours/week. You may feel that you personally do way more work than everyone else (80%+ plus of people do) but you don't get to define what "the actual amount of work you are paid for" is. There's usually lots of opportunities to find time to learn or go on tangents in non-terrible jobs, but unless your boss is quiet quitting as well, they - and your coworkers - will know, and this will screw you far more in the future than just quiting and getting a new job.