Exactly. I can't imagine working in an environment like that.

You don't want to hear me playing Smooth by Neil Cicierega[1], and I don't want to hear you playing rap.

A work environment is not the place to be playing music for everyone around you. Constant generic music is the worst part of retail, and that's saying something.

If your goal is to foster creativity and productivity, but all I hear is thump-thump-thump drilling into my head, I'm not going to be either. Even when it's music I love (or music I love working to) I'll still pause it when I'm trying to really understand what's going on in a complex system.

[1]: https://youtu.be/8D-WVlRohQk

What do you do now, if you don't mind me asking?

He's saying that some people will judge you for working in less prestigious places. He's explicitly condemning that but saying it still happens.

Maybe you can, but I can't. It's so exhausting when it's an everyday thing. Constantly in Slack. Constantly in emails. Constantly expected to believe the exact same thing and if you don't you're a racist bigot that doesn't deserve life itself.

These are two sides of the same problem. I happened to be in both kind of shoes in the past but this is why hiring is fucked up in tech, I believe. This sentence implies someone is expected to work more than they are paid for if they want to be recognized at something. That's ridiculous. The brightest and most talented engineers I ever worked with in the last 20 years had families with kids (I don't, for the record) and were many years in their careers already, who got offline during the weekend enjoying dinners, doing whatever non-tech stuff and posting only personal content online, sharing it with non-work friends.

If you want me to contribute with bug fixes to OSS while I am doing something else of personal value or have neat weekend projects to post on HN then pay me to do so or at least have the decency of not expectating my own life to revolve around what you think it should. These... "projects"... take time and, deities forbid it, I'm doomed in screenings if I don't share the same passion for engineering projects on late weekend nights as you because you are biased?

Hiring folks, through tech managers' perspectives, talk about freedom but they expect others to exercise their own liberty in accordance to what the company think is best, it seems. Bullshit.

What they told me is that it's a good thing that I am familiar with so many technologies, since that probably indicates that I spend a lot of my own time perfecting my skills. Which is actually true. But then they began to rant about how that's a good thing because this is a competitive field and it's really hard to keep up with all the new technologies popping up, so I might have to put up some of my own time to learn the technologies we'll use.

I actually raised an eyebrow and said that no, I'm not willing to do that. This opened up a discussion about dedication and loving one's job beyond the matters of workhours and payment, which are true signs of a professional programmer, at which point I really just told them I'm not interested in their offer anymore and left.

At that point, I'd have left even if they'd have sworn I wouldn't have to do that and that they were just checking. It's really impolite. I don't presumptuously boast about how I know what really makes the difference between a professional medic and one who just has a license to practice. It's also manipulative in a really poor way, implying that if you don't do all that stuff, you're "just" a programmer, rather than a "professional" programmer. Yeah, no shit I'm a "professional programmer" -- I don't have kids, I live close to work, my girlfriend works from home so her schedule is more flexible than mine, everyone in my family is in good health and back in college I fucked up my sleep schedule so hard that the occasional all-nighter doesn't do much damage anymore. But I'm exactly as professional as the dude who comes in at 9 and leaves at 5 because his kids want their father, not his toys.

Absolutely. It's just sheer luck I stumbled into this career because I found like programming and designing systems, and I happen to be pretty good at it, and it just so happens to pay damn well, especially to a guy from a lower middle class background. The unavoidable complexity foisted upon the masses by the techno-aristocracy that they are ill-equipped to navigate is staggering. I don't blame them for hating us.

I'm sorry, but when I go home at night and choose to spend my remaining hours awake on my own project, that's 100% mine. I bought and paid for it. Instead of spending time with friends or loved ones, playing video games, going out and having fun, I labored.

> wandered the hallways recruiting people for it

This makes it sound like you can't have professional relationships or friends at work. Or that you wouldn't want to work with those people after joining another company.

You start with priorities that are fucked up before you even interviewed for the job.

The world of today is not like the world of 10+ years ago. In 2001, if you met a developer, there was an exceptionally high % chance that they were fundamentally into technology in a very deep & personal way. In 2021, you will find that most people in technology see it for the cash cow that it is and utilize it accordingly.

I would say that maybe 10-20% of the tech employees today actually give a fuck about these sorts of things. The rest just want their paycheck and as many other benefits as they can obtain. Raising a stink over dark patterns is not a good idea if you don't bring a whole lot of other meaningful value to the table.

At the heart of it, this is why I tend to avoid working in particular parts of the software industry. Not every company engages in this sort of thing, and I prefer working for those that don't.

You sound like a typical software engineer, tons of software engineers has such hobbies. Your problem seems to be more that you judge others thinking they will shun you for liking those things instead of opening up to find people like you, trust me there are a ton of software engineers who would love to talk about your hobbies.

If you talked about managers or lawyers then you'd have a point, they are more uptight. But software engineers often live extremely frugally and come with all kinds of hobbies and backgrounds, they usually don't care about social norms that much.

I really wish this was the thing that was most difficult about the jobs I’ve had. I really wish it was.

Instead - I’d say the promise of autonomy, ownership, and craftsmanship but in reality none of that is what bothers me most about the industry. On top of this - extremely bad managers are not just common but the standard. This is talked to death on HN and elsewhere but it’s quite insane that people who make $500k+/yr cannot learn how to be slightly less of an asshole and more empathetic as a human being. It’s weird to me that most managers I’ve had are borderline sociopaths when it comes to the workplace. It’s a weird thing too because if they were just honest about why they did things - people wouldn’t be as upset with them. But most managers I guess think it’s better to lie to reports or maybe they’re too ashamed to say, “well we’re doing this because I might get a good perf review and a promo out of it.” It’s never said but it’s clearly the subtext for anyone noticing.

I just dislike the dishonesty that is so rampant in the industry and the completely insane amount of mixed incentive structure going on that ultimately hinders many companies. I am not surprised that some of the companies I’ve worked at that have over 1000 engineers seem to get even less done than when they had 100. Mixed incentives causing roadblocks everywhere.

I find the technical, the code, and other “programming” like aspects of software dev to be completely boring - and if I’m being honest - a bit below me. They’ve always been… busy work.

And? If you're not proud of the impact your work is having on the world, than you shouldn't be doing it. You only have one life. Why waste it on making the world a worse place?

I had an easy and well paying job working on an IT project at DHS. I left after the child separation thing started, even though I wasn't working on anything related to that. It just disgusted me to go to work every day.

It sounds like you can relate to existing as a person who is different in tech, then.

You're bang on, they sure don't.

Which is why I am extremely selective in who I will work with.

My consulting gigs are generally just favors for friends or friends of friends who are stressed out from having hired shitty programmer after shitty snakeoil salesman for the past few years straight... and are finally ready to bite the bullet and pay a few grand for whatever they need done... once and for all.

I would say that situation describes almost 100% of the consulting gigs that I have ever done.

As a decent software developer, if my less talented co-workers, or, god forbid, some HR-type, started telling me constantly about how I needed to be more "professional", I would hand in my resignation the next day and go somewhere that didn't absolutely suck to work.

This isn't at all the same thing. You were paid to do your job, and at the end of the day you could just joke about those weirdos.

When working on an open-source project, everything becomes much more personal because your motivation is fuelled by your own personal attachement to the project. Imagine you're helping elderly people cross the street every day, and every once in a while they yell at you for not doing it better, whatever that means. At some point is it still worth it?

And of course you can't just put that behind you once you're back home, because this abuse happens at home. I remember this time where someone literally told me to kill myself while I was fixing a bug - at midnight - in a project I handle. Or the time I woke up only to see that during the night someone public had decided to openly send me literal fuck emojis on Twitter to right a perceived wrong. Good times.

So yeah - building a shell is the right solution, but it's hard and we really shouldn't have to deal with that in the first place.

Two things to do, not necessarily in that order: 1. Take a break from work and hobby software projects. Distance yourself a bit from all of it - tech world is not going anywhere. 2. Find another project/company that does what interests you. It will do wonders for your motivation.

I went through it - got stuck in some shitty company on a legacy project, just because of the money. I died inside slowly every day. Took two months off and went on, now I am working with new tech and love it again.

Let me know where you’ve worked so I can avoid these places. I’ve worked for plenty of orgs where tech and those in tech add massive value and impact and therefore are held in high regard.