Could/should there be an equivalent of a sports manager and/or sports agent? Like a headhunter, only dedicated to a programmer throughout that programmer's career? Hmmm.
I went to school with one of the people mentioned in the Twitter screenshot “Cassidy Williams”. She behaves like the professional athlete equivalent. She’s a fairly talented engineer, with very very strong soft skills. As such she’s been a developer evangelist since graduation hopping jobs, gaining followers, etc.
Other things that professional athletes have: a player's union, an extremely respectable minimum wage, and a team salary cap.
You ever wonder why athletes (despite being in a fundamentally competitive business) have excellent facilities and training and coaches and sleep schedules, while programmers (in the field of technology which is inherently non-zero-sum) are working long hours on Red Bull in open offices they hate just to try to stay ahead of the other guy? Why aren't we all winning?
I just don't see how our current capitalist environment can ever be beneficial to the average worker in software. We've created a dog-eat-dog world, and wonder why us dogs aren't living the good life. The only answer we're given is to try to become sufficiently senior in rank, or become startup entrepreneurs. If you're only good enough, life is good!