[rrvsh]

It resonates with me. I grew up coding with basically zero network - software engineering basically only became viewed as a viable career in my country when it became lucrative, right as I was beginning my schooling i.e. I walked into a snakepit of people who were only in it for the money. I thought going into the industry would help this and let me finally meet a community of other passionate devs, but then LLMs got good right as I started work. It does really suck - I feel you on it feeling solitary as a baseline, and now ever more so. I wish I could somehow experience the early SV era hacker culture first hand, but alas