[ChuckMcM]

Its an interesting bit of nostalgia which I can find much to relate too. But I take a more practical view of the future. The author makes this statement:

"In contrast to those golden days, the tech industry today seems to lie at this horrible intersection of the mysteriously entitled generation Y, the millenials, and the extremely cheap and available resources for getting a product to market that the cloud and inexpensive overseas outsourcing shops have created."

When I think about these things and the dot com explosion, I realize that these markets are best created by the people living in them. Specifically, if you're primary labor supply consists of "mysteriously entitled generation Y and millenials" then if you are building tools for these people you need to understand what they like and what they don't like. As engineers we tend to create things that "we" would like, and if "we" are no longer a close match for what the overall market is looking like, then our instincts will lead us astray.

So the challenge is to extract the useful things from your experience and apply the core truths, rather than lament that you cannot reproduce that experience in others. Passing on the truths is important, how you get to, or teach, those truths depends on the current fashion.

[saschajustin]

It's insane to think that the least powerful members of a field are the ones controlling it.

Is the medical field controlled by medical students, or by 60 year old medical authorities?

Is chemical engineering controlled by new graduates, or by 60 year old engineering authorities?

It's completely ludicrous to imply that programming is somehow being led astray by young people. Young people have no power. They do what they are told.

The "black box" programming philosophy was not invented by Gen Y. It was invented in the 80s at least and taught by greybeard professors.

The hip new language trend was not invented by Gen Y but was pushed by VCs and other string pulling money-masters. Paul Graham pushed LISP and Python and generally advocated for the creation of new, hipper languages.

The ageism in the field is not something that is coming from young people either. It is coming from employers with the purse strings who recognize that young people are MORE EXPLOITABLE than old people and so they can get more work for their dollars.

The reason for ageism in tech is to keep industry veterans away from impressionable young workers--what if the veterans and the youngins form some kind of union or association that drives up costs?

Old people lead every field. Young people do what they're told. Old people lead programming too--this guy just isn't one of the influencers. He isn't a 50 year old VC, a 50 year old Comp Sci prof, a 50 year old CEO, a 50 year old BDFL.

[wpietri]

This is probably a good rant for some other topic. But Zuckerberg is only 30, even now. The people I see turning up at entrepreneurship events and in the fundraising news aren't 60. They're ~25.

[saschajustin]

Zuckerberg dances to the tune of the greybeards just as I do. Did Zuckerberg code the backend of facebook? Hell no. He hired people to do it. What programming technologies did those people use? Styles and methods passed down by greybeards. Techniques learned at Stanford University. Techniques learned from Hacker News.

Zuckerberg himself played the tech tune sung by greybeards before him--LAMP was not invented by millenials. LAMP was not popularized by millenials. Zuckerberg's Facebook was a LAMP project.

Of course people showing up at newbie events are newbies!

The people pulling the strings sit in boardrooms, academic boards, they have office hours, people come to them!

[wpietri]

If you're saying that no generation invents culture completely anew, sure, that's undeniable. And uninteresting.

But there's a big difference between somebody choosing to do what's known to work and that person being forced to do something that doesn't work because other people have the power. Zuckerberg started in the LAMP stack because that's what he liked for his pet projects, not because some mean old Stanford greybeard forced it upon him.

[saschajustin]

You're reading way too far into it...

I never said greybeards are "mean", I said they are influential. Greybeards are more influential on Zuck than vice versa when it comes to technology choice. That's why Zuck chose greybeard certified tech to erect facebook on.

[Blackthorn]

The people getting the funding aren't the ones with the power. It's the people giving it.

[typicalrunt]

Your writing reads like you have a chip on your shoulder. It beats around the bush, but you should just come out an say that you don't like people over a certain age. But be careful, because there's a good chance you will soon be that age (or older) and start griping at younger people who don't seem to hold your viewpoint. Your account is 20 minutes old with only 2 comments, both of which are inflammatory. Please take a breath before clicking Submit.

It's completely ludicrous to imply that programming is somehow being led astray by young people. Young people have no power. They do what they are told.

Young people don't have to do what their told. We are raised to listen to our parents so, yes, we do what we're told for fear of being punished (grounded, yelled at, etc.). Though that doesn't mean you can't break out of that mold.

The "black box" programming philosophy was not invented by Gen Y. It was invented in the 80s at least and taught by greybeard professors.

This doesn't even make sense. You are being insensitive towards people. The entire point of learning how to program and understanding computer science is to open the black box and peer inside.

The ageism in the field is not something that is coming from young people either. It is coming from employers with the purse strings who recognize that young people are MORE EXPLOITABLE than old people and so they can get more work for their dollars.

Ageism exists in every field, but let's just focus on tech. Do you see many 50+ year old programmers? Ever wonder why? There is a bias for younger people because, yes, they can be molded (or exploited, as you put it), but it is up to that young person to identify any exploitation and resolve it. That's the only way it can change.

Old people lead every field. Young people do what they're told. Old people lead programming too--this guy just isn't one of the influencers. He isn't a 50 year old VC, a 50 year old Comp Sci prof, a 50 year old CEO, a 50 year old BDFL.

If you don't like the way you perceive the game being played, then you are completely free to change the rules of the game. It will mean you need to break out on your own, and take your lumps, but just throwing your hands up and complaining that the "old people" own everything isn't going to change anything. You are simply allowing the problem to persist and then complaining that it exists.

[saschajustin]

Good lord!

Don't confuse envy with hatred. I don't hate old people, I envy them! I envy Wedge Martin who got into tech in a time when it was professionally acceptable and viable to drill down into details. I envy a time when you could have a career based on fundamentals rather than buzzwords and rapidly learning frameworks.

I have tremendous respect for greybeard, which is precisely why I recognize that greybears are NOT all the same.

There are different kinds of greybeards. There is especially a wide gulf between the greybeards that have POWER and INFLUENCE and the ones that have been SIDELINED by other greybeards.

The field is not run by the young. The young dance to the tune of money and expertise. But not all greybeards are allowed into the club of influence.

The ageism is not something that is pushed by 20-somethings. it is pushed by employers and those holding the purse-strings. The employers also pull the strings of the teachers, like my computer science professors (greybeards) who taught us that we should not worry about peeking into the black box. Who taught me the waterfall method. Who taught me the agile method too. Who taught me everything I know.

Powerful and influential greybeards (money & position) taught me everything I know. Other greybeards then get mad at me when they don't like what I was taught.

>If you don't like the way you perceive the game being played, then you are completely free to change the rules of the game.

This is just absurd. No one is free to change the rules of the game, or those rules wouldn't be rules.

The rules of this game are set down by those with the most power. A small handful of elite tech winners at the top of industry, academia, and finance.

C'est la vie

[typicalrunt]

There's a fable, "The Scorpion and the Frog" [1] wherein the moral is (copied from Wikipedia):

The fable is used to illustrate the position that no change can be made in the behavior of the fundamentally vicious.

My point about changing the rules of the game is that if the oppressors are not changing because they have all the power, then don't try to change the oppressors. Instead, find a way to remove yourself from the rules that they created. After all, rules are just constructs and can be changed by anyone.

If enough people stopped allowing employers to push 60-hour work weeks on programmers [2], then we might start to see some change. The way that I stopped employers from abusing my time was to first admit that it was myself that was allowing it to be abused, and then to say no and instead show them what I could accomplish in 8 hours (or 40 hours per week). If an employer violated my rules, I left. That's my rule. It may mean that I miss out on some opportunities, but there are so many more opportunities for people out there that stick to their principles (within reason) and work with other decent people.

Lastly, I'll be more clear. The overall point I'm making to you in this comment and others is that you need to stop thinking in absolutes. There is too much pent up stress that doesn't need to be there, and your life will be a lot better if you stop feeling like things are things are set in stone (because they're not). This is very cliché to write but this is one of the few things that only age can teach you.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scorpion_and_the_Frog

[2] by quitting, talking to labour relations boards or the government, etc. Or, just saying no. It's a very very powerful word.

[saschajustin]

As a millenial who is very familiar with capitalist exploitation of myself and my peers, I am 100% in favor of unionization, regulation, and association.

It's the boomer and Gen X tech people that I talk to who are the most opposed to unionization, talking about labour relations, etc.

Gen X techies in particular have this strange and incomprehensible hatred for unions.

Anyway I absolutely would like to change the rules of the game through collective action. Doesn't seem like it's in the cards though--the tech industry is under the thumb of a much bigger neoliberal agenda--and the string pullers in tech are either:

1. Billionaires who oppose collective action for obvious selfish reasons

2. Strange Gen X anarchist cyberpunks (or something?) who oppose unionization because they think it's somehow associated with communism and goes against the hacker ethos.

[JoeAltmaier]

How about I speak for my demographic of tech people vs unions? Its not some blind hatred of communism, or an independent ethos. Its a professional being reduced to a dues-paying blue-collar guy. Dues that I don't get to say how they're being spent. Its workplaces where I cant start a build because that's another guy's job. Its payroll padding for guys that don't even work there but used to. Its somebody else negotiating my pay at a startup instead of me.

[logfromblammo]

Try playing a game called "Nomic".

The initial rules of Nomic are such that any game of Nomic can be subsequently remodeled into any other rules-based game. It can also simulate the functioning of real-world political structures.

The one unwritten rule of Nomic that cannot be repealed--the one that makes the game fun to play--is that you can stop playing Nomic.

Real life is not so forgiving. You start playing on the day you are born, and you can't stop until the day you die. The people who make the rules have already changed the rules such that you are not allowed to change or ignore the rules. If you try, other people who still follow those rules can receive bonus points for impeding you for as long as you are in violation of the rules.

That's not strictly true. The public set of rules are set up so that you cannot change or ignore them, but there are also multiple secret sets of rules that can be used to change both the public set of rules and the secret sets of rules. But most of those secret sets of rules have rules that prevent people who know about them from revealing anything about them to those who don't.

You couldn't design a game that sadistic. No one would ever start playing it. But here we are, still taking our turns, trying to figure out how to win.

[logfromblammo]

Try playing a game called "Nomic".

The initial rules of Nomic are such that any game of Nomic can be subsequently remodeled into any other rules-based game. It can also simulate the functioning of real-world political structures.

The one unwritten rule of Nomic that cannot be repealed--the one that makes the game fun to play--is that you can stop playing Nomic.

Real life is not so forgiving. You start playing on the day you are born, and you can't stop until the day you die. The people who make the rules have already changed the rules such that you are not allowed to change or ignore the rules. If you try, other people who still follow those rules can receive bonus points for impeding you for as long as you are in violation of the rules.

That's not strictly true. The public set of rules are set up so that you cannot change or ignore them, but there are also multiple secret sets of rules that can be used to change both the public set of rules and the secret sets of rules. But most of those secret sets of rules have rules that prevent people who know about them from revealing anything about them to those who don't.

You couldn't design a game that sadistic. No one would ever start playing it. But here we are, still taking our turns, trying to figure out how to win.

[logfromblammo]

Try playing a game called "Nomic".

The initial rules of Nomic are such that any game of Nomic can be subsequently remodeled into any other rules-based game. It can also simulate the functioning of real-world political structures.

The one unwritten rule of Nomic that cannot be repealed--the one that makes the game fun to play--is that you can stop playing Nomic.

Real life is not so forgiving. You start playing on the day you are born, and you can't stop until the day you die. The people who make the rules have already changed the rules such that you are not allowed to change or ignore the rules. If you try, other people who still follow those rules can receive bonus points for impeding you for as long as you are in violation of the rules.

That's not strictly true. The public set of rules are set up so that you cannot change or ignore them, but there are also multiple secret sets of rules that can be used to change both the public set of rules and the secret sets of rules. But most of those secret sets of rules have rules that prevent people who know about them from revealing anything about them to those who don't.

You couldn't design a game that sadistic. No one would ever start playing it. But here we are, still taking our turns, trying to figure out how to win.

[logfromblammo]

Try playing a game called "Nomic".

The initial rules of Nomic are such that any game of Nomic can be subsequently remodeled into any other rules-based game. It can also simulate the functioning of real-world political structures.

The one unwritten rule of Nomic that cannot be repealed--the one that makes the game fun to play--is that you can stop playing Nomic.

Real life is not so forgiving. You start playing on the day you are born, and you can't stop until the day you die. The people who make the rules have already changed the rules such that you are not allowed to change or ignore the rules. If you try, other people who still follow those rules can receive bonus points for impeding you for as long as you are in violation of the rules.

That's not strictly true. The public set of rules are set up so that you cannot change or ignore them, but there are also multiple secret sets of rules that can be used to change both the public set of rules and the secret sets of rules. But most of those secret sets of rules have rules that prevent people who know about them from revealing anything about them to those who don't.

You couldn't design a game that sadistic. No one would ever start playing it. But here we are, still taking our turns, trying to figure out how to win.

[barce]

Ya, I agree with extracting useful things from your experience. It seems the OP fails to do so by realizing that having extremely cheap and available resources for getting a product to market is historically rare and also constitutes a golden age.