I don't think the author's troubles have anything to do with AI, other than making it harder to get an interview. He seems to get a few of those. I think the real problem he has is... well, the meaning of life, i.e. 42.
He's a 42 year old dude. Looking for a job in software? You gotta be joking. He says he can't clear the 25-year old Steve-Jobs complex SV bro mini-boss. Well, duh.
That's the industry. It sucks you up and it spits you out. It vampires the best years of your life and then you're on your own.
Sorry that the author had to find out, but I think I've seen that coming from the day I was first employed as a junior engineer. I just averaged up the ages of my colleagues and it was blindingly obvious how things turn out in the long run.
Nor "AI" as in "Artificial Intelligence", but "AI" as in "Ageist Industry".
P.S. Look on the bright side: at least you're not a 42 year old woman looking for software jobs. Hah.
uberman · 5h ago
I feel terrible for this guy, but he really has stacked the deck against himself by moving to a rural area and refusing (or being unable) to work "on-site". He is up against every new grad and every laid off FAANG programmer clinging to the notion that they should be able to work remotely. To be clear, I'm a huge proponent of remote work but I recognize that many power dynamics have shifted in the last few years.
I could offer a number of critiques about things but instead, I'll encourage him to go back and un-delete his AI vlog content as even if he feels the ground has moved, I would likely find his interest in this topic as a positive thing. I would also recommend he move his tech vlogs to someplace where the topic was the focus rather than blending it into other important parts of his life.
tetris11 · 1h ago
what exactly are we transitioning to, economy wise? If it's techno-feudalism, what do the peasant's actually do when they're not needed?
rightbyte · 1h ago
It’s a little weird living in a small trailer when I’m a homeowner, in fact I own three houses
He owns properties [edit: Missread the place]. I think he is fine.
fvrghl · 1h ago
Not NY, NY:
"in fact I own three houses: A fixer-upper starter home in a rust belt upstate New York university city, and a patch of beautiful remote rural land with 2 pretty humble and simple cabins on it an hour from the city house"
rightbyte · 57m ago
Oh ye read the piece a bit too fast.
42lux · 1h ago
Using hands for other things than typing...
adamc · 6h ago
We need a solution to stuff like this. Unfortunately, right now we seem to be cutting everything in sight to help the rich, so... I don't see that help or hope on the horizon.
Stuff of nightmares.
Arnt · 6h ago
PHP is his only language, right? He's in the same situation as Perl-only developers a couple of decades ago.
mnky9800n · 6h ago
Yeah i feel like this guy posts a lot of doomer stuff and it isn't as introspective as it could be. i also feel like posting doomer stuff is popular and so he is trying to monetize the doomer mentality. That leads me to kind of think what he says has less value because i just see any kind of monetization scheme like that as a somewhat implicit bias to whatever is being said. you can't be anti-doomer if you make money on your substack talking about doomer ideas. but also, i feel bad for the guy he lost his job that had a nice salary and didn't find a new one. that must suck. But then I wonder, is that exactly what he is trying to capitalize on? And then you must think, is this what the world has become now that everything is commoditized and we are all part of the Attention economy? Is everyone trying to make money on everything and thus no one is really to be believed about anything? That's one reason why i deleted most social media. It all became a grift and none of it had anything to do with being social.
bizzyskillet · 1h ago
Damn, the last part of this comment was such an epiphany, thank you!
turtleyacht · 5h ago
Not only PHP: "modern technologies I've gone on to learn and be experienced with in more recent years."
He's a 42 year old dude. Looking for a job in software? You gotta be joking. He says he can't clear the 25-year old Steve-Jobs complex SV bro mini-boss. Well, duh.
That's the industry. It sucks you up and it spits you out. It vampires the best years of your life and then you're on your own.
Sorry that the author had to find out, but I think I've seen that coming from the day I was first employed as a junior engineer. I just averaged up the ages of my colleagues and it was blindingly obvious how things turn out in the long run.
Nor "AI" as in "Artificial Intelligence", but "AI" as in "Ageist Industry".
P.S. Look on the bright side: at least you're not a 42 year old woman looking for software jobs. Hah.
I could offer a number of critiques about things but instead, I'll encourage him to go back and un-delete his AI vlog content as even if he feels the ground has moved, I would likely find his interest in this topic as a positive thing. I would also recommend he move his tech vlogs to someplace where the topic was the focus rather than blending it into other important parts of his life.
"in fact I own three houses: A fixer-upper starter home in a rust belt upstate New York university city, and a patch of beautiful remote rural land with 2 pretty humble and simple cabins on it an hour from the city house"
Stuff of nightmares.
Although, there's a Lisp-inspired PHP called Phel: https://phel-lang.org/
And PHP typing with version 7.4.0: https://www.php.net/manual/en/language.types.declarations.ph...
But if the only language he posts about is PHP, I think the source if his hiring problems is clear.