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From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

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Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#291

Post by raverbashing »

avgDev wrote: post #9

"The experience was physically taxing, he was diagnosed with tendonitis after moving hundreds of boxes a day, but it pulled him out of his depression and helped him gain perspective and a deeper sense of meaning"....... I have mixed feelings about this. What this has proven is working at amazon warehouse sucks, and is not sustainable. I've had many physical shitty jobs in my 20's. Then, I had some health issue and co…

Pretty much this. It's like people whose dream is to retire on a farm

You don't know how much work it entails. You have no idea

Actually working at AMZN is easier than a Farm. Hands down.

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#292

Post by varnaud »

_gabe_ wrote: post #246
antiterra wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

> The dude is literally bankrolled by the Koch Industries. This is just a straw man. Who cares who pays him? I could say the same thing for: Typescript. It's literally bankrolled by Microsoft, insert quip that says Typescript devs can't have good intentions here Tensorflow. It's literally bankrolled by Google, insert quip that says tensorflow devs can't have good intentions here React. It's literally bankrolled by Fa…

Maybe you don't care, but I care and so do many people. I'd argue you should also care.

Knowing where the money comes from is fundamental is so many aspect of our society.

Getting a loan from a bank will require you to disclose some information about your money getting activities. Why? First to make sure nothing illegal is going on, and second to make sure you will be able to pay back the loan.

Running your political campaign will require you to disclose how it's financed. Again why? Because people realized long ago that you don't bite the hand that is feeding you or something. Meaning you should expect a strong bias by that politician for their backers.

And so why care about a public figure getting money from the Koch Industries? Because it adds a crucial information on how to process the opinions coming out of that public figure.

Yes it's possible that the source of money doesn't affect anything, but it's also highly possible that it does and many times it does, so why not care about it?

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#293

Post by yourusername »

Temporary_31337 wrote: post #273
enemywalker wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Michael Phelps is probably the only most valid extreme example! https://olympics.com/en/featured-news/michael-phelps-10000-c...

Lots of ultra distance runners and cyclists eat and burn more than that. The point is with sufficient exercise it is almost impossible to stay fat.

Sufficient is a lot. If you eat a fast food meal (burger, fries, soda) above maintenance you're looking at half a marathon to burn that off. And most people aren't pro cyclists that are able to sustain 400 watts+ for a hour.

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#294

Post by ForHackernews »

_gabe_ wrote: post #246
antiterra wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

> The dude is literally bankrolled by the Koch Industries. This is just a straw man. Who cares who pays him? I could say the same thing for: Typescript. It's literally bankrolled by Microsoft, insert quip that says Typescript devs can't have good intentions here Tensorflow. It's literally bankrolled by Google, insert quip that says tensorflow devs can't have good intentions here React. It's literally bankrolled by Fa…

All of those are true! Those projects serve their corporate masters, not you-the-user.

If you get some benefit from using them as a dev, it's either incidental or part of a larger plan to lure you into their corporate "ecosystem" (think: why is React so much more dominant than Vue or Svelte?)

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#295

Post by dvzk »

kamaal wrote: post #234
mancerayder wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps, but the epidemic of sedentary lifestyle has lead to a large suite of problems, ranging from miserable back pain to cardiovascular problems to diabetes. The average office worker can barely run a mile, do a pullup, squat below parallel with their bodyweight, or climb a flight of stairs without panting. Some of us spend hours a week compensating for this. If lifting boxes and carrying them around all day long…

Its one thing to do hard physical exercise, like gym work, cycling, swimming, running etc for like and hour or two everyday, and then get good rest- Work in the time there is in between. This is actually far healthier than a full time job doing hard physical labor. There is certain thing call physical wear-and-tear which is real, together with injuries, and you won't be getting paid nearly as well or with the same be…

Sports are the better answer for improving physical fitness. I do moderate weightlifting and HIIT-style MTB/cycling 5-10 hours per week, and when I took up a short gig to unload shipping containers, I was far more muscular and athletic than the other workers.

The job descriptions for manual labor positions that say “It’s like getting paid for going to the gym!” is deceiving. Yes, you will develop a fortitude and lean strength. It’s very hard work. I was battered after a week. But the physical payoff isn’t worth it and the life-long risks are severe.

It’s super depressing to work alongside a 19-year-old recent high school graduate, who jokes to you about his chronic lower back problem, while he angrily tosses 2,000+ oft-heavy boxes onto the sorting line. It shouldn’t be our children doing the crippling work.

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#296

Post by lukas099 »

ornornor wrote: post #262
bxtt wrote: post #247

My parents post-retirement after not working for 10+ years both found roles at an Amazon Fulfillment Center - one at the ship dock and the other in returns. They are both in their 70s and built a nice nest for themselves, neither need it for the money. In fact, my dad was a machine learning professor, multiple publications, and they ran a small medium sized business for 20+ years (at their peak they were running 80M…

But then why enable such a shitty company actively working at eroding human dignity at work and make a billionaire asshole even richer instead if doing actual good like working at, say, a food bank or ant other charity?

Amazon makes things cheaper and more accessible for regular people.

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#297

Post by ckemere »

For the folks giving hot takes on this transcript of episode 1, I'd definitely recommend the full podcast (http://peaksalvation.com). I think Philip is genuinely motivated by the question of how someone with opportunities in the tech space can make the world better. (Hint - he's not a Mike Rowe alcolyte.)

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#298

Post by ornornor »

lukas099 wrote: post #296
ornornor wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But then why enable such a shitty company actively working at eroding human dignity at work and make a billionaire asshole even richer instead if doing actual good like working at, say, a food bank or ant other charity?

Amazon makes things cheaper and more accessible for regular people.

I'm sure that's a totally valid excuse for exploiting the people working there, union-busting, and generally being a shitty exploitative corporation.

Re: From Burned Out Tech CEO to Amazon Warehouse Associate

#300

Post by ckemere »

eckza wrote: post #192
nathanaldensr wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why deny his experience, though? Not everything needs to be viewed through a lens of privilege. I hope the author gained an appreciation for those less fortunate or less ambitious. At least they have experienced the "other side," so to speak.

> Why deny his experience, though? Because it was an option. He treated it like poverty tourism, like a middle-class youth group "missions trip" to build huts for third-world natives. Good on him for having an epiphany, but I'd wager that he'd have a different perspective if he had to do that job long past his soft-handed tendonitis episode in order to feed his family that he barely mentioned in his interview. Imagin…

To be fair, in the episode where he details the tendonitis, he spends a lot of time describing the ways that the AMZN warehouse bureaucracy is designed to abuse their workers (delay their claims, structure work alternatives to be impossible to accept, etc,) and reflects on how this affects those who rely on their warehouse jobs for, e.g., family health insurance.
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