Do you know many plumbers or doctors who are so connected to their work that they do plumbing or doctoring as a hobby?
I personally try to avoid such Programmers when possible, they usually overengineer everything they touch just for the sake of engineering. Without even realizing there is a problem.
Compare to jobs like writers, scientists, carpenters, mechanics, etc that are much closer to programmers in spirit and do have a lot of people doing them in their free time.
Exactly!
> Compare to jobs like writers, scientists, carpenters, mechanics, etc that are much closer to programmers in spirit and do have a lot of people doing them in their free time.
This is your bias of equating programming to an art form. And that's the core of the problem.
In my experience it’s quite opposite. Majority of both hobbyists and professionals have strong tendency to engineer as the main mode and a goal of itself vs shipping the value.
If there is prestige in the profession, it seems to often become an identity.