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Comment by kevinconroy | Hacker News Reader

Try the nonprofit world: http://idealist.org/

I used to say "Nonprofits? They aren't doing anything interesting with tech!!"

One day, my wife convinced me to try searching on Idealist just to see if there were any nonprofits doing anything interested with tech. I feel in love with the very first result, got the job, worked my way up the ranks, and am now Chief Product Officer at GlobalGiving.org and I couldn't be happier.

Looking for a shortlist of orgs that I'd recommend? Try any one of the orgs at https://www.ctosforgood.org

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This! But you know, starting your own non-profit is a great idea too. I started one this year, and now I get to invent my very own job every day: fighting and sometimes suing the government under state and federal Freedom of Information laws, and rescuing millions of records that I return to the public domain! It's meaningful work that I can do on my own schedule, and it fills a void that no one else was doing. And no dumb-ass recruiter is ever going to beat that.

I read through to see if anyone had mentioned this.

When I retired I was rather bored and felt as if life was not really giving me any challenges. So, I found it in volunteering, including a small non-profit startup.

I'd also add that there may not need for it to be your work, as in gainful employment, that is meaningful. You may be able to fill that outside of work - assuming you have time. Dunno if it will work for you, but I'll add it.

It's nice to be able to give something back. It's uplifting to fill a void for someone else. I suppose, in a way, it may even be a little selfish. I do, after all, sometimes do it because it makes me feel better.

Ah well... Just some potential food for thought.

+1 for non-profits with a mission. There are many good projects out there, and they are often can't afford a full-time and experienced devs, so the addition of one competent person could make a significant impact.

You'll definitely experience more higher-level-Maslow-pyramid buzz when working for a big mission than for big dollar.

This. Without stating my employer I rub elbows with people from all the household name cloud vendors and an knee deep in their stuff plus we invent new things where they can't cut the mustard.

It's hard to find but it is possible

Really? You don't think that any for-profit companies are doing anything meaningful? That's quite a leap. Surely there are physical products in your life that provide a tangible benefit, thereby making the labor behind them "meaningful." I mean things like your car, your house, your clothes. All of which involve tech these days.

Not the OP, but I have had the experience of working on worthwhile products, but in the context of a preponderately meaningless job. Even if a product has some value, you can find your role demeaned by terrible ethical practices, psychopathic bosses, sales-dominated practises insisting on low quality work, institutional insistence on lying to clients, etc etc. The word 'meaningless' may be a bit over-categorical, but I'd consider it defensible to refer to situations where the meaningless/negative aspects overwhelm the positive.

My experience was that this was the case with all commercial jobs I did. Bearing in mind that only the top 10% or so (which by definition we can't all be included in) have a very wide choice of work.

I think you're the one making a leap here...

Suggesting that non-profits are a good place to look for meaningful work is nowhere close to claiming that for-profits can never do anything meaningful.

Yep. I'm sure there are plenty of for-profits doing meaningful stuff too. Given OP's original question, seemed like he was missing non-profit from his search.

I'd suggest searching (non-profit + meaningful for-profit).

hey wow, i use gg a lot :)

Thanks! Always open if you have any suggestions or bug reports :)

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