Comment by ijustdontgetit | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ijustdontgetit | Hacker News Reader

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So I have an off topic question?

I originally got into tech because I hate my life and thought that tech was this outlet that could actually make some change. I come from a world of violence and abuse and never really cared for the powers that be. Tech seemed like the answer.

So my question to the people who don't feel this way: why are you in tech? Serious question. Tech only seems interesting because you can move fast. What value do you find from working in this field if you don't feel this way? If you have to work inside some system?

This comes from a person who lived in an abusive household most of my life and still struggling to find something outside of QA while I work on my own projects, but I don't really get the appeal of this field if all you want is a house with kids and work within the system. It comes off as mediocre to me. So as a person reaching almost 30 who hates life the way it is and wants to see a change, please explain to me what you get out of this.

Thanks for those who answer this seriously.

I switched from Marketing to Computer Science because I got tired of writing multiple page essays based on a few sentences out of a textbook and I wanted to be in a field of study where I was judged by what I could or couldn't do rather than by how many buzzwords I could fit in an essay.

But there's plenty of other reasons to be in tech: The promise of money is almost as good as the finance industry; The ability to touch a lot of lives and improve people's quality of life is another possibility; The desire to understand technology as it exponentially permeates our lives was another aspect of my decision.

I enjoy working as a software engineer because I have fun building new things, because I find the science behind it intellectually stimulating, and because I feel the work our industry is doing is building the foundations for the future.

Speed is important, but isn't the biggest priority to me. It's best when things move quickly, of course... but my first priority as a professional engineer is to do things correctly, ethically, and safely. It's a point of personal pride.

I don't think there's any part of that that's in conflict with changing the world for the better. Move fast and break things; just don't break other people in the process.

Of course, there's a big difference in what's at stake when building a website, versus someone building a rocket / self-driving car / nuclear reactor / life-critical system. The engineering practices need to be adjusted accordingly in each case.

I'm in tech because I'm an idealist and believe very seriously that, done right, technology can change people's lives for the better. For the record, I don't think I could be convinced work at Uber.

Sorry about your experiences.

Purely anecdotal but I enjoy tech because I enjoy building things and the rabbit hole that is technology is near unendingly deep.

The salaries are great, benefits are great, paid time off is great. It's hard to complain.

I'm not a fan of the "system". But I also quite firmly don't believe that change in any direction, just for the sake of change, is good. There are a ton of things the system does wrong. There are also many things the system does right.

There's a lot of interesting tech where you don't run afoul of regulation but you still massively change lives for the better. Take cell phones - that's been a huge change in the world, and at no point did anyone need to break laws or skirt regulations to make it happen. (I'm not even sure how they could; the only thing that comes to mind is using disallowed frequencies, and even that would have been so much more harmless than anything involving cars.) But they've made an immeasurably huge change in the world, for the better.

Or take the Internet. Or take Wikipedia. Or Twitter. Or mobile camera technology. Or e-commerce. Or the technologies required to run large research clusters to develop new medications. None of these things are things where the system is fundamentally opposed to what you're doing. There may be regulatory fights, sure; someone will be worried about e-commerce and taxes, or encryption and law enforcement, or whatever. You're moving fast, and the system is confused; yes, fight the system.

But you're not calling the very concept of the rule of law into question. That's where I disagree with the libertarian/anarchist technocratic movement: the fact that someones you disagree with the law doesn't mean you have to consider it illegitimate.

Terry Pratchett wrote in the forward to his books that he became an author because it was indoor work with no heavy lifting.

Similarly, I got into tech because I was a smart kid who was good with computers and so it's a well paying field that I find easy and enjoyable. I'm also someone who's always been very much "within the system" and therefore try to be aware of my privileges. Don't underestimate the value of "house with kids and work within the system". Plenty of refugees dying on beaches for the possibility of a chance of maybe having that. Even within the comfortable West, it looks a lot more attractive when you're closer to 40 than 30.

Mind you, the reason I didn't go into CS research when I might have had the opportunity was because it was very obviously so much of a dead end; at least with startups there's a chance of people using your product.

I've thought a lot about this and can only conclude that the only reason that drives me (when I could be in other socially and financially better jobs) is the promise of striking gold with some successful B2C or B2B product, be it VR or CRUD apps. Actual CS engineering is interesting but not worth making as many sacrifices for.

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