[alaskamiller]

Been at Apple and at Google.

Googlers annoy me endlessly because everyone knows the mission and everyone thinks they're on the same mission. Even if their job is indirectly related or even if what they're doing is potentially evil.

They all believe they are changing the world. It's what they tell their aging hippie parents when they visit, it's what they brainwash the legions of school children that visit, it's what they insist to the political leaders when they visit.

Every Googler thinks they're there to serve humanity and it's pompous.

When I was at Apple the goal was helping the user. You made a better thing so someone can use it better. You made something that your mom could use. You tried harder so that a baby can pick it up and it just works.

Most people didn't care about Steve. Hell, he walked around the cafeteria, grabbed his cookie, but no one really cares. Just yet another eccentric old dude walking around in a place full of eccentric old dudes in skirts and high heels.

What I hated about Apple though was that we loved users so much it became a problem. We suffered from the battered-wives syndrome. Where we tolerated and accepted everything. It became to be a love-hate relationship where on one hand we appreciated users but on the other there was such a disdain for them as well.

Every Apple person thinks they're different because they make things work in a world where things don't work because people are too stupid to make it work. It's equally as pompous as Google.

Hell the whole of Silicon Valley is really pompous, geeks just do a really good job hiding it when the attention wasn't on this place.

[coldtea]

>Most people didn't care about Steve. Hell, he walked around the cafeteria, grabbed his cookie, but no one really cares. Just yet another eccentric old dude

Well, I find this hard to believe, given what I've read about their relationship/feelings towards Jobs from lots of other ex-Apple employees. Makes me hard to believe the claim that you even worked there in the first place.

I mean, "Just yet another eccentric old dude", really?

The difference was that, that PARTICULAR "eccentric old dude" had started the company you worked on in the first place, had ressurected it from bankraptcy just some years ago, has turned it into the most profitable company on earth, had outmost control over it's products and directions, was named "person of the year" several times, had a worldwide cult following, and micromanaged often the software and hardware Apple pushed out -- to the point that people talked about his "Reality Distortion Field".

walking around in a place full of eccentric old dudes in skirts and high heels.

Huh? Was Apple full of transvenstites?

[bruceboughton]

Everyone is pompous about someone.

I'm a Londoner; I'm pompous about out-of-towners. Out-of-towners are pompous about Londoners.

Disdain makes the world go round.

[danishabdullah]

It is to be expected, to some extent, for people in the tech industry to be pompous. After all many of us have been great universities and were taught (or perhaps suggested) that we are the smartest of all.

I see this general pomposity among my fellow techies all the time. Some think that business people are stupid, some think humanities are unnecessary, some argue that users are all noobs etc...

Perhaps it's pride in work/abilities gone too far. Perhaps we overvalue ourselves...

[Amadou]

Perhaps it's pride in work/abilities gone too far. Perhaps we overvalue ourselves...

My experience has been that it is simply a lack of perspective due to ignorance. It is very tempting to be dismissive of what other people do when you only understand what they do at a very simple level.

[Tyrannosaurs]

We probably shouldn't confuse a handful of start ups and successful corporations with "the tech industry" as if it's a single entity.

To me there are at least two bits of the industry - the bit where that either because of the work or because of the culture those working in it might convince themselves that they're changing the world, and the bit where people largely write CRUD database apps that save a few people, usually working for corporations, a bit of time.

Far more people work in the second camp and in my experience most of them really aren't that pompous at all.

[vijayr]

Perhaps we overvalue ourselves

That is one side of the problem. The other side is, many many people (especially engineers) undervalue themselves, think that they aren't worth much etc. It is super hard to precisely know what our value is, and act/live in such a way that it is neither arrogant/proud/pompous nor doormat/depressed.

May be we should stop measuring value/worth through sheer abilities, achievements and things owned?