::scr programming/$job burnout

[Chris Ball]

On Mon, Dec 03, 2001 at 04:18:12PM +0000, simon wistow wrote:
> Something interesting came up on this walk - how many of you (I'm thinking
> especially of the programmers but it's a valid question for all) would be
> doing their job if it wasn't for the Net 'revolution' - and I don't just mean
> working for their current employer - I mean how many of you would be working
> as, say, a programmer if they hadn't started off doing web stuff?

I've thought about this a lot.

I'm not particularly sure I'm qualified to talk, though.  I'm (just) 20,
and though I have a job (working with perl/oracle for a search engine
company, fast.no) in the industry that wouldn't have been there without
The Big Internet Thing, along with Uni studies, I think I'm talking about
a different feeling to the one that you're all likely to be experiencing.

Two-odd years ago, I wasn't going to be a programmer.  At least, not
professionally.  I'd decided that I was going to go and get a degree in
Neuroscience and be a psychologist person, and help people, and make my
time on the Earth vaguely meaningful to people, rather than vaguely
meaningful to the bank balance of whichever company I was coding for at
the time.  I applied for more Psych/Cog. Sci/Neurosci courses than CS
ones.

And, around that time, I also ran into some RMS transcripts, and Linux,
and started playing, and thought how wonderful it was that I'd be able to
balance not feeling absurdly useless and selfish with coding.  I don't
think that anymore - the whole RMS manifesto was what 17-year old Chris
wanted to hear, but it's not making nearly as much sense these days.

So, yeah.  I've wandered off entirely, so I'll stop.  I don't know if
anyone else feels fairly insignificant as a programmer these days, or
that they're involved in a fad that's not as meaningful as it should be.
But I've been thinking lately about how that Psych degree wouldn't have
been so horrible after all.

- ~C, feeling a little silly.
-- 
$a="printf.net"; Chris Ball | chris@void.$a | www.$a | finger: chris@$a
As to luck, there's the old miners' proverb: Gold is where you find it.