Hacker News Reader

Comment by dpritchett | Hacker News Reader

You're letting other people determine your worth using their limited domain vocabulary and their suboptimal pattern matching abilities. A .NET programmer is a highly paid commodity, but a commodity all the same.

A high-tech value creator who thinks and talks in terms of profit drivers and cost sinks is not going to ever be a commodity.

Rather than striving to be the top of your class (e.g. Ruby devops guys, which is something HR can use a standardized pay scale for) you can strive to be unique in a one-person class that is more immediately profitable and scalable than a commodity programmer.

View on HN

what?

your last: - 'you can strive to be unique in a one-person class that is more immediately profitable and scalable than a commodity programmer.' seriously?

if this guy wants to become an expert in the technologies he mentioned then why is that so wrong? if he enjoys programming and has the drive to get to the top then he should absolutely go for it. smart employers are going to appreciate and see value in someone that has spent thousands of hours coding.

Think back to the now-wealthy Googler who wrote the code that 97% of $BILLIONS in revenue passes through. Do you think that person introduces him/herself as "C++ programmer with 10+ years of industry experience"?

You'll get better work on better terms if you focus on results rather than tools, even if your technical skillset is fundamentally the same as another dev with a poorer sales pitch. You're finding the best mutually beneficial business arrangements out there rather than just pursuing a predefined career track.

Edit: Mastery is its own reward. If you want to become an expert at a particular corner of technology, go ahead. Just remember to explain your work to others in terms that aren't unnecessarily limiting.

Say that person leaves google and spends all his/her money. What jobs do you think that person will be most qualified to apply to next?

Senior C++ Programmer jobs.

And what do you think they'll have to prove to potential employers? That they are capable of writing lots of C++.

You're overlooking the vast network of powerful Xoogler/VC/founder contacts this guy has surely developed in the past decade. He's also likely picked up world class experience in ecommerce, advertising, billing, and infrastructure scaling at Google.

Commodity programming is an inefficient use of this person's time and luckily he will be known and respected by enough business leaders to be able to carve out a more valuable (and again, mutually beneficial) arrangement somewhere in the Valley.

This job may involve C++ but it won't be as generic as you described. Think Paul and Bret at FriendFeed. "Python Programmers" was not their $50 million value proposition.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com