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The 501 Developer Manifesto

501manifesto.org

61–70 of 120 posts

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#61
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everyone who programs loves programming, but everyone needs to make a living. You are lucky that what you love also makes money.

Make a living doing something you love. If you don't love programming then do something else.

How much does playing video games pay these days?

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#63
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everyone who programs loves programming, but everyone needs to make a living. You are lucky that what you love also makes money.

Make a living doing something you love. If you don't love programming then do something else.

I think this is the nearest real-life equivalent to "let them eat cake" I have ever seen.

Are you going to pay me to play Xbox with my brother or go out to dinner with my wife and talk about interesting books we've read? Neither is anybody else. For most people, the set of "things I love" and "things people will pay me to do" intersect very little if at all.

(I don't actually have this conundrum. There are a few things I enjoy doing that people will pay me for. But I'm lucky that way. If I suddenly became unable to do those two or three things, I'd be in the situation I described.)

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#64

Look, the people you are "pitying" are the people you depend on: we make your operating systems, your languages, your frameworks, your tools; we invent the things you use; we create your social networks; we abstract away the things you find too hard; we built the very internet you're using to mock us. Do not fuck with us, for without us, you would be a clerk in a dusty room writing out invoices with a pen.

This is encouraging developers to leave their jobs at 5 and possibly use their time to build open source, creative projects. I highly doubt people pounding away long hours at their jobs writing commercial software are the ones also contributing to these clerk-to-programmer tools.

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#65
post #45

I don't really want to work with people who are unmotivated and just "Do their time and go". I've done it; I've worked in crappy jobs. Those jobs were, e.g., cashier at fast food joint. Or stocker at department store. Everyone wanted to leave. No one wanted to be there. I am not really up to dealing with the harsh cynicism and assumptions of uselessness of our work with someone who leaves as soon as possible. Doesn't…

I totally agree but to play devil's advocate why does motivation have to correspond with working late into the night? In fact I'd argue that a motivated team should be able to get their 'share' done in less than 8 hours a day.

You're assuming I mean working late into the night. :-)

I would say that a motivated person is okay with staying 5-20 minutes late occasionally when trying to get something done that they care about.

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#66
Personally programming defines me. It is a discipline that can only be mastered through dedication and time. I go through the entire day thinking about programming, I go to sleep thinking about programming. Just because I do it as a job as well does not take away from that. I realize that I am extremely lucky to be so passionate about what I do but it isn't stopping you to do what you want to do...go do it.

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#67
post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make a living doing something you love. If you don't love programming then do something else.

"Make a living doing something you love." That is ideal, but it is not always feasible. There are some things nobody likes doing, but somebody's got to do them. I'm fortunate that I like programming and that people will pay me to do it, but not everyone is so lucky.

If someone loves making lots of money, and those things "nobody" loves pay good money because the supply of people willing to do them is low, then those people who LOVE to make money will do them...

EDIT: It all comes down to balancing and finding what you truly LOVE. If being a janitor paid $300 an hour because supposedly nobody would do it otherwise... I'd do it knowing, thinking, and planning with what I love in mind... saving up money so I could do/have what I love! My time! Sometimes you have to put in short term pain for a long term gain...

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#68

“Playing fußball in the pub with our friends over playing fußball in the office with our team leader” Talk about a false dichotomy. I evade this problem by being friends with the people I work with. Overall, I think there are some good distinctions made here. And there is a good point to the thing: “To us it is just a job, but we still do it well.” I almost feel like the page should lead with that. That this isn't an…

Work: same people every day (nice though they may be).

Everywhere else: everyone else.

Re: The 501 Developer Manifesto

#70
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Make a living doing something you love. If you don't love programming then do something else.

I think this is the nearest real-life equivalent to "let them eat cake" I have ever seen. Are you going to pay me to play Xbox with my brother or go out to dinner with my wife and talk about interesting books we've read? Neither is anybody else. For most people, the set of "things I love" and "things people will pay me to do" intersect very little if at all. (I don't actually have this conundrum. There are a few thin…

The adage should really be "Do what you love AND excel at". If the conversation you had with your wife about books you read was very interesting, you could film it, sell it (or more likely ads around it) and make it your job.

While some passions are easier to monetize then others if you are in the top 100 people that do it, there is a good chance someone will pay you for it.

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