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Open Source is Not a Career Path
codermarc writes ""If you're getting into open source because you see it as a career path, you're doing something wrong." It's not that Linux creator Linus Torvalds thinks open-source programmers should work for peanuts (he doesn't), but rather that they should be properly motivated. Call it software with a soul, if you like. Only the truly passionate need apply."
I learnt to program
forgot about the english/spelling classes though eh?
In general, the PhD is the entry level degree into the field (low level technician jobs notwithstanding since I'd say they're on the periphery of the fields). On top of that, your typical newly minted PhD doesn't make much ($40-50k/yr) as a postdoc. You can quite easily get that with just a bachelor's degree (possibly even a bullshit associate's or certificate of some sort). Even as a tenure track professor most don't earn all that much, especially when you consider the education and hours that have been put in.
In fact, I can't think of one PhD, working off of a single source of income in academia, that is making much money. Sure, taking your PhD to Wall Street to be a quant will get you decent cash, but that isn't really academia anymore. There are others, who have additional sources of income (consulting, books, companies, patents).
I think that the stories of the retiring hookers are a bit exaggerated, as I'm sure most of them do not really save/invest well. Some do, of course, but I'd think they're in the minority. Besides that, $1million is really a pretty bare minimum for retirement (throwing off only $50k/yr in interest).
In reality, getting into a field for a love of it is a luxury few can afford, and (I think) pretty much only simpletons can enjoy. Anyone who is doing any IT support/administration (like some people here), and claims to love it, must have some mild form of retardation. I do what many people would consider interesting stuff, and I even release some open source software (funded by NIH grants). And, although I get some job satisfaction, I could be doing more interesting things with my time.
I think that people who have lots of job satisfaction are the same ones easily amused by shiny objects. It's for that reason that I love to be served by retarded people at fast food restaurants. They love their job, and are proud of it, and actually put in some effort to get your order right. Meanwhile, the teenagers or dirty skins hate you and would love to shit in your food. The point being, in general (there are some exceptions to this rule), you need to be rather simple to be amused by a job (otherwise it wouldn't be a job).
I have long contended that the happiest people in the world are the retards, with the caveat that they fall into the right level of retardedness (functional, but not smart enough to realize how fucked they are).
Down with Saudi Arabia!!!
You coded a Free SWAN application, hooray for you! But that doesn't make you a "geek".
/. a while back. Granted, it may turn out that it doesn't work very well. But it was a very novel approach. And that is worth infinitely than what you did my friend. That is being a "geek". Otherwise you're just like the majority population on /. , a very sharp "manual reader".
You're using a very loose definition of what a "geek" is. What you've done is just work with the tools that someone else wrote. Doing research is "geeky".
Otherwise it's the same thing as reading a ton of manuals and figuring how to do stuff. Your unix/linux knowledge may not be condensed into a regular car/bike manual & you would have to glean it from a variety of sources like friends, internet etc., You may apply your "sophisticated" knowledge to solve customer problems, but it still is akin to what a mechanic does in an auto shop.
I am not berating mechanics. There's honor in doing any kind of work. But what I do take exception to is the increasing number of wannabe "geeks".
If you really want to be a geek, try doing some orignal research. Any thing. Even for fun.
It could be like the genetic scheduling algorithm for the linux kernel that some guy wrote a while back, that was featured in
Wow! +4 insightful? Did you suck the moderator's cock?