It seems to me that there’s a class of programmer that will take an overpaid job at a terrible BigCo, spend their evenings writing ranty blog posts about how terrible it all is, culminating in the inevitable “I quit” article, only subsequently to accept a job at a different terrible BigCo.
At no point does this article, or most articles like it, do any effort to realize that things are not always like this. Even if there is some unavoidable law that huge companies inevitably fill their ranks with idiots, like this article suggests, you do not need to work at a huge company.
Most people do not work at huge companies. There’s lots of amazing tech companies with fulfilling jobs and they want you, now. But there’s this super prevalent idea that keeps getting pumped around the blogosphere that it’s absolutely impossible to not work at a terrible huge company and therefore you cannot possibly escape, and I quote, “going home and despairing”.
There’s some weird kind of suffer porn going on here that’s just unnecessary. If you choose to trade your sanity for a high salary then go right ahead but don’t act like you had no choice.