It’s NOT funny! With all the AI shit, micro-managers trying to be clones of Hitler, and unemployment to make the line go up, it’s something I’m seriously considering.
It used to be a meme, because every so often a dev left into that direction, even though most devs loved their job. A month ago, I was talking in the office with three other devs when this came up as a topic. It was not a meme anymore, every single one of us had seriously considered it.
17 year IT veteran here. I work on a dairy farm now. It’s a peaceful life.
in finance the dream is usually herding sheep
even though most devs loved their job
This is the crazy reality of tech workers. I work in security and I really enjoy my work, but I’m about two days from rage quitting and making furniture out of wood.
See my comments for advice
Most people are describing a vibe not an actual career aspiration.
It makes perfect sense too. Most tech workers, I assume at least, enjoy building things, but these days the tech you build (or tangentially work on in my case mostly) is fluff. Even if the product isn’t fluff, the tech world seems to try very hard to make sure you feel nothing towards it. You don’t feel like you’re a part of it and you don’t see yourself in the work. The product isn’t for you and it isn’t even for the users, they, and you, are means to an end. The end is money for the people in charge of the company or investors. The natural feeling then is to be drawn to some sort of physical craft, something you make yourself and very tangibly exists. Something you can see yourself and the results of your labor in.
I’m going to probably have to do something else, because I’m losing my mind, but I’m not good enough at making things out of wood and have a house to pay off. I relate to the feeling though and the concept of “I no longer work in software and instead make furniture out of wood”. It’s a metaphor
I went to trade school a couple years ago. Like three or four of my classmates were former programmers who were sick of the AI shit
Shit I’m considering going back to retail!
None of that shit except maybe the AI goes away in a woodshop. Hell, owners probably love AI because now they don’t need to pay a designer and drawer.
The AI reason is enough, but if someone has their own shop, then there aren’t micromanagers either.
Oh you mean a one man shop. Unless you’re already famous it’s just going to be a hobby shop, the furniture market is completely fucked by overseas competition. We made furniture for David Iatesta, which I guess is some fancy ass design house. A ~40 4poster king size bedframe in red oak was our priciest standard option, we sold to them for ~$2.5k, they sanded a little more, and added ugly finishes and sold for $10k+
Yes, that’s what I was meaning. You’re right, it would be tough to make enough money without already having something if a following doing furniture.
Sorry to bag on the dream dude. I highly recommend getting yourself a lathe and a drill press at harbor freight and going town. Both are relatively safe tools (no loose hair/clothing) with no blades, easy to learn, and the range of stuff you can make with those two alone is large. It’s a wonderful hobby, it’s a pretty terrible job. I may still be recovering from the trauma a decade later because I have not built a personal piece since I was fired.
The fat ass that hasn’t physically produced a piece of furniture in 25 years, changes plans halfway through builds, checks scrap for “egregious waste”, nickles and dimes overtime, always has out of scope tasks for anyone he takes a disliking to, I could go on… is absolutely a micromanager. The foreman was paid the most to be in charge on the shop floor, make decisions on the fly, handle vendors and materials purchases, but was frequently overridden by a voice yelling from a lofted office space. Just because they own the business doesn’t mean they can’t micromanage. Sounds like the stuff a micromanager owner would say
I’m thinking more a person that builds furniture, then sells the completed piece. There’s definitely possibility of plan changes part way through when doing custom work, but a solo wood worker either doesn’t have to do custom jobs or can take payment (or partial) up front and not deal with it. I also don’t consider change requests as micromanagement as annoying as they can be.
If you work for yourself, the only micromanager is you, and that’s your own fault.
https://www.iatestastudio.com/product-details/nantucket-lamp-M205
I turned so many of these omg
well as someone who works in a woodshop and has received plans from a client designed by ai, i can saw without reservation that we definitely still need someone to design and draw plans.
also im not sure how to spell draw-er, but a drawer is a little slidey bit in a cabinet that you can put stuff in and close.
A drawer and a drawer are two different things, there’s a word for words like that. You can say Technical Drawer to draw distinction I suppose, or maybe Drafter is more correct but that feels architectural to me. Funny enough Drawers have slides, and so do drawers. I need to take my meds
I recognize that screenshot, pretty sure this was before widespread AI adoption. I can still relate to this guy today, just like I could back when I first saw that comment.
Senior engineer of embedded c/c++ here. I have referred to myself a few times on here as trying to live the superposition of the engineer and the goose farmer. Now that I’ve built a palace of a chicken coop and there are grown chickens running around with the dogs betweenn the play house and koi pond, my back yard is turning into a village from a Zelda game or something.
My power tools are newer and more numerous than my computing devices by far, lol. And it’s all higher end DeWalt stuff because using a good tool can be satisfying as hell. Plus I’ve already spent more money on wood, and the tools will last a long time.
The kernel (heh) of truth underpinning this meme is real and profound. If you spend all your time on screens and in cyberspace, if you go beyond touching grass and get your fingers in the dirt or build something physical, it could be extremely good for you. It works great for me!
I’m an embedded software engineer, too. While I love my job (for the time being) I definitely need to do other stuff with my free time. A junior colleague of mine couldn’t understand why I bake my own bread rolls when I could save so much time by just buying them, but I’m sure in time he’ll get there.
I’m convinced that there is a flaw deep down in the basics of our culture that essentially says that success and prosperity and a good modern life all mean that you don’t need to actually do shit for yourself. All you need to do is make enough money at the job where you presumably actually do productive work, then you can pay some person or some company to take care of all the other shit in life.
No doubt it’s a side effect of, if not a primary design feature of, our hyper-capitalist mindset. The ideal citizen is either working or consuming during all waking hours.
Sometimes accomplishing a goal in the way that’s the most expensive and takes the most personal effort is actually the best way to go about it, assuming you count “improves my life” in your ROI calculation and not just the dollars in and out.
Not a programmer but doing healthcare IT coming from the equally mind numbing healthcare side.
…I feel you.
My woodworking shop in my basement is my solace that keeps my out of a mental institution. Most of my electric tools are oldet than I am - but the good ones, often bought during closing down sales from small carpentry companies.
Besides a self build CNC it’s kept technology free by principle. The CNC is just too handy,though.
Not growing goose,but the ITsec wife dreams of raising Capybaras one day.
If you like quality power tools, don’t look into Maffel or Festool. They’ll destroy your bank account.
I’m currently going down the software engineer to woodworker pipeline…
I can count the number of people I know who have done that on two hands… Three people.
Me too! I wonder how common it actually is?
There is just something so very satisfying about making something you can physically touch and hold after spending a lot of time …not… doing that
My DBA friend builds a lot of sets for school productions and community theatre. It’s only a matter of time…
Not me, I’d totally suck at it. I am leaning towards becoming a gardener specializing in super hot peppers.
Same here, went into finish carpentry, and timber framing. I may return one day to code if the opportunity allows, but this isn’t too bad actually.
I know I specifically asked for a chair, and the chair you made is a very good chair, but my use case is actually reaching things in high places and this just doesn’t get to the top shelves so you’re gonna need to make the legs longer, I think.
Living the literal dream. Every software engineers fantasy is to be an artisan carpenter.
My fantasy is to taste-test crisps.
Did that once. Not as exciting as you might think.
My senior always jokes about opening a food truck. One day they’re gonna push us hard enough that we’ll do it, too.
The difference between IT and important jobs, is that I get to drink on the clock in IT. In fact it’s mandated.
At my old job, the IT department had a kombucha tap right at the end of their counter. I always wondered if they considered swapping the kombucha keg out for something stronger.
My first tech job had a beer fridge and a guy who filled it that we all called the Beer Captain.
I swear I must be the only sucker that hasn’t encountered one of these freely drinking tech companies.
It’s not just tech companies lol. It’s funny, the place we would have meetings–when it was a lot of people–was 50% off for the company. It was a nice cantina. Let’s just say my beer mug was a jug and I didn’t have to pay for it lol. >_> one time I was the designated driver sigh. Good thing it was a minute drive and then we would all drink more at the bosses house. Even when I worked in education, no one gave me shit coming in smelling of booze; one day I had to call off after reading my students file. No one blamed me for getting shitfaced after reading that.
You’re not the only one, I’ve been with quite a few startups and before that I worked with VC’s to help get new portfolio companies rolling with IT. Never have a seen it, I’ve only heard of it.
It’s probably for the best, I predict I’d either drink too much or complain that they only buy crappy beer :)
Same with the neofetch dev, saw all this AI crap coming and just jumped into farming
…and no mandate to use AI to increase productivity
I was a programmer for 25-some years but I haven’t written a line of code since 2019. I now get my engineering jollies from the used school bus I converted to a motorhome and from the house I bought three years ago and am finishing up renovating. For money I drive a school bus, which pays about 1/6 of what I used to make but is infinitely more satisfying. As far as retirement goes, I’m hoping to die a painless death before AI replaces all the CDL jobs in the country. I think AI will work fine for school buses, mainly because kids are easier to replace the younger they are.
Ok, I had to reply because this runs parallel to my own retirement plans. What’s the easiest path to a CDL? What’s the cost and length of time instruction to actual licensure? Any caveats or roadblocks (pun not intended, but I’m not editing it out).
I know I can look this up on different school websites, but I wanted to get a first hand accounting of the process. My currently ill-defined goal is to be a bus driver for the local transit company (rural). Some F550 with a bus body, and some actual buses.
Do you have a Class B or C? Passenger endorsement, I’m guessing, too. Would it be wise to get a class B just in case I needed to pivot to driving something else, like a commercial dump truck for construction?
Sorry, lots of questions, I know.
Some school districts will train you for the CDL, and some even pay you while you’re training (mine didn’t at the time). My training didn’t take very long because I already owned a used school bus and knew how to drive it, at least. You have to take four standardized tests (general CDL, airbrakes, passenger endorsement and school bus endorsement), have a driving exam, and take a 14-hour special school bus class (this is all in PA, at least). The standardized tests aren’t super-difficult, but you do have to actually know the shit, you can’t guess your way through it and hope to get a passing grade. I just crammed the free online tests over and over until I was getting 100% on them. I think it was maybe a month and a half between when I started my training and my first day on the job, but that was with not doing a whole lot each day. My district was (and still is) a weird combination of desperate need for drivers with a frustratingly slow pace of actually training people.
I have a class C. I wouldn’t bother with a class B unless I actually needed it.
I did this, except I actually have better pay and benefits than I did working in tech (I was a low paid web developer, now I am a highly paid finish carpenter). I was just warning my coworkers today to get ready for the wave of ex-programmers hitting the trades.
You were really getting shafted as a web developer and likely could’ve made a lot more… But on the other hand I’m glad you found something you like more. I still prefer programming, with or without AI assistance, to just about any other work I could do. I have a gig where I generally get to solve slightly different problems every day (very wide domain) and I have no idea what other job could provide this without being in danger from LLMs.
I know a few carpenters of the self-employed variety and I gather it can be a very rewarding job if you’re into it. I could never, I need more stimulation for my ADHD, I need to be able to do a week worth of work in 2 hours when things are overdue, it doesn’t really work in carpentry lol
You were really getting shafted as a web developer and likely could’ve made a lot more
I don’t think you know how much experienced finish carpenters get paid.
You’re right, but I can’t imagine it being much more than 100-150k?
raises hand
Construction is nice. We mostly demolish things. It’s good exercise, fun, and keeps the demons at bay.
My dad went from db management to running a grocery store.
My one friend is now becoming an HVAC technician
We’re getting more analog every day
From database management to people management!
Well he owns and runs it with my mom. No other employees (barring me helping him)
The AI-related bullshit definitely sucks the fun out of programming, but carpenters still have to deal with customers…
Programmers still have customers - you just work for the same company as they do most of the time ;-;
Exactly, becoming a carpenter still retains one major issue with the programming profession. Several programmers I know even have to deal directly with the company’s customers (though they tend to complain more about their own management).
I read “DBMS” as “DSBM” at first.
I need to get out more.
I read it as BDSM… Not sure what I should do…
Get in more
🤘
The RSS feed shouldn’t be added. It should be the primary application.
I’m going into plumbing. I’m done with this shit.
Shit is my shit now, and it’s much nicer.
