tl;dr - Quite a PR piece for http://www.tenxer.com/. Impressive that they could get the Economist to do this, even in a blog property.
Super-star programmers
31–40 of 124 posts
Re: Super-star programmers
#32Forgive potential ignorance here, but people often quote Joel Spolsky as saying things like: "...the trouble with using a lot of mediocre programmers instead of a couple of good ones is that no matter how long they strive, they will still produce something mediocre." What really genius-level things has Fog Creek done? I remember demoing FogBugz, and it was marginally better than its competitors, but it was far from a…
> What really genius-level things has Fog Creek done? Made himself independently wealthy. Repeatedly (IE: Not luck). Not that I disagree with you. But that is worthy of respect in itself. Also, there is an art to the very difficult task of making the difficult look simple and easy.
I'd argue that occurred through his writing talent more then his recruiting.
Re: Super-star programmers
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're missing the point that the term rock-star programmer doesn't mean they will produce world changing programs. It means they'll do an order of magnitude better/faster than their non-rockstar peers. That might be a bit contradicting to what Joel is explaining. From what I've experienced first hand, there's programmers that can produce similar code/software in a week that takes 5 mediocre programmers to produce in…
Well, in the linked article he used a Mozart/Salieri analogy, implying that rock star programmers write masterpieces, not simple bug trackers. If all Fog Creek programmers were truly rock stars, wouldn't they be beating Google instead of writing menial money-farm stuff? In my experience, those of us who move at a faster pace than our peers tend to get the most interesting projects. There's a reason that ERP software…
The point is that if John Lennon was borne today he (or if Jean, she..) would make great music. You might never hear it because of "the industry" but John, or Jean, would be out there somewhere doing ingenious things with melodies that no one else would have.
You can't stop people like that, the same is true for programming, if it's your thing you'll do it. If not.. you won't, you'll be a session musician, and every tune you hear (or function you see) you will be able to say "I could of written that" but you didn't.
Re: Super-star programmers
#34Forgive potential ignorance here, but people often quote Joel Spolsky as saying things like: "...the trouble with using a lot of mediocre programmers instead of a couple of good ones is that no matter how long they strive, they will still produce something mediocre." What really genius-level things has Fog Creek done? I remember demoing FogBugz, and it was marginally better than its competitors, but it was far from a…
"Forgive potential ignorance here"
"Don't get me wrong; I think Joel has a lot of good ideas in general"
The saying that comes to mind is perhaps the following. "Those who can, do, those who can't teach." I'm guessing that Joel, by his writings, is a combination of the two and as a result his output is not "rockstar" quality.
Another example might be Steve Blank. Who no doubt achieved more fame as a teacher then he ever did creating anything.
There is obviously quite a value in people who can do both in varying degrees.
Re: Super-star programmers
#35As I reached about half way through the article I got bored and my mind starting having stray thoughts - god this is long. Isn't it ironic that a superstar programmer would have been bored by now and stopped reading. - momentarily after that, I guess I just admitted that I'm not s superstar programmer. - momentarily after that, I wonder if there are writers who can transmit ten times as much information using one ten…
You can achieve faster reading rates with this sort of stuff by only reading one sentence from the middle of each paragraph, or reading the second and last sentence in the rare case that the middle sentence wasn't enough. The content is of such low density that it takes little more than that to decode the meaning and intent of the article.
Re: Super-star programmers
#36Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm constantly fighting that same urge. The problem is one of domain. UI coding for straightforward data models (which is 90% of all "web" development) just ... isn't very hard or impressive. Great programmers in that regime produce software that is smaller, cleaner, tighter and higher quality. But it's still just a bug database or social thing or web store, etc... Anyone (even mediocre programmers) can look at it an…
Although the article never used the word "super star", it's something I see around HN and the startup world quite a bit.... I sort of snicker when I see startups post jobs looking for "rock star" coders [1]. What self respecting person would call him or herself a "rock star", let alone apply for such a position? Maybe it's just a gimmick to get mediocre developers to get to work on boilerplate web work.. [1] I also s…
The term "rock star programmer" is by now a symbol that people intuitively understand the meaning of. Essentially equivalent to the "creme de la creme" of programmers, but if we switched to using that term few would balk at the comparison to dairy production. I've described support staff coworkers as "total rock stars" before. Everybody gets what I mean when I say that.
Re: Super-star programmers
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm constantly fighting that same urge. The problem is one of domain. UI coding for straightforward data models (which is 90% of all "web" development) just ... isn't very hard or impressive. Great programmers in that regime produce software that is smaller, cleaner, tighter and higher quality. But it's still just a bug database or social thing or web store, etc... Anyone (even mediocre programmers) can look at it an…
Although the article never used the word "super star", it's something I see around HN and the startup world quite a bit.... I sort of snicker when I see startups post jobs looking for "rock star" coders [1]. What self respecting person would call him or herself a "rock star", let alone apply for such a position? Maybe it's just a gimmick to get mediocre developers to get to work on boilerplate web work.. [1] I also s…
Next time you see someone ask for it - simply reply with your request for a $M salary.
After all what does a rockstar get ?
Re: Super-star programmers
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What really genius-level things has Fog Creek done? Made himself independently wealthy. Repeatedly (IE: Not luck). Not that I disagree with you. But that is worthy of respect in itself. Also, there is an art to the very difficult task of making the difficult look simple and easy.
I'd argue that occurred through his writing talent more then his recruiting.
Perhaps you didn't catch the fact that everything he wrote was a recruitment pitch?
Re: Super-star programmers
#39I see no comments yet on one of the biggest factors underlying highly productive programming: choosing the part of a development at which you can most easily excel. Sometimes there are legitimate areas where you have expertise, but mostly it's the well-defined areas that have no external roadblocks. And the rough parts get left for everyone else!
Re: Super-star programmers
#40Forgive potential ignorance here, but people often quote Joel Spolsky as saying things like: "...the trouble with using a lot of mediocre programmers instead of a couple of good ones is that no matter how long they strive, they will still produce something mediocre." What really genius-level things has Fog Creek done? I remember demoing FogBugz, and it was marginally better than its competitors, but it was far from a…
"Forgive potential ignorance here" "Don't get me wrong; I think Joel has a lot of good ideas in general" The saying that comes to mind is perhaps the following. "Those who can, do, those who can't teach." I'm guessing that Joel, by his writings, is a combination of the two and as a result his output is not "rockstar" quality. Another example might be Steve Blank. Who no doubt achieved more fame as a teacher then he e…
Indeed; and my post was never intended to belittle Joel himself. He has provided great value to the industry in both capacities. I'm mainly challenging the notion that if he truly hires only developers he considers to be rockstars, then why doesn't the company have a more compelling domain than bug tracking and PM?