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The Rising Power of Developers

Posted by Soulskill on from the kneel-before-zod's-principal-software-engineer dept.

msmoriarty writes "Google's Don Dodge, GitHub's Tom Preston-Werner, New Relic's Lew Cirne and others recently got together in San Francisco on a panel called 'The Developer is King: The Power Behind the Throne.' According to coverage of the event, the panelists all agreed that programmers — both independent ones and those employed by companies — have more power, and thus opportunities, than ever. Even the marketing power of developers was acknowledged: 'The only way to convince a developer is by giving them a demo and showing them how it's better,' said Preston-Werner. 'The beauty is, you plant these seeds around the world, and those people will evangelize it for you. Because another thing that developers are great at is telling other developers what works for them.'"

14 of 122 comments (clear)

  1. Pat on the back by Noughmad · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Some rich guys got together, told themselves how great they are and how they deserve to be rich. News at 11.

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    PlusFive Slashdot reader for Android. Can post comments.
    1. Re:Pat on the back by aaronb1138 · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Can we please put developers in the back seat as run of the mill production workers like they belong. I respect a minority of software architects, but plain jane code toads need to be getting the treatment and pay of the few steps above fry cook that they are.

  2. it might be true, but not very convincing panel by Trepidity · · Score: 4, Insightful

    A group of successful developers get together on a panel and, surprisingly, everyone on the panel agrees that developers are very important and goin' places in the world.

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    10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
    1. Re:it might be true, but not very convincing panel by Darinbob · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Meanwhile, you get back to work and tell the boss that the new product feature is a bad idea, and you get told to shut up and keep rowing.

  3. Ready for an H-1B increase? by ebno-10db · · Score: 4, Insightful

    programmers — both independent ones and those employed by companies — have more power, and thus opportunities, than ever

    Sounds like part of a campaign for an H-1B quota increase.

  4. Re:Lies by spiffmastercow · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have never met a competent developer who had trouble finding work.

    I HAVE met incompetent out-of-touch, burnt-out, full-of-themselves developers who can't find work. It's this second kind that think they're good but are not and who should be in another field.

    As far as finding work goes, you're probably correct. I have, however, met a fairly large number of good developers who are 10x more productive than an average programmer, but have difficulty getting paid what they're worth.

  5. We'll screw it up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    We (software engineers and developers) are the dumbest group of skilled professionals in the history of skilled trades. No other field, no other economic opportunity has been so badly squandered as the field of software development -- ever.

    Compare software engineers to doctors or lawyers. Both doctor's and lawyers have to pass exams. They are certified by boards of other professionals. If a doctor or lawyer screws up badly enough they lose their right to be a doctor or lawyer. Not software engineers. When a software engineer writes terrible code they are not disbarred and the screw up reflects poorly on the trade in general. No wonder people don't respect our field -- we don't respect it ourselves.

    We've taken the secrets and tools of our trade, open sourced them, and created legions of arm chair professionals around the world who not only reflect badly upon our trade but undermine the very vitality of it. Why spend thousands of dollars to get a degree to compete on Craigslist for $6 and hour? How can we expect our customers to hire good developers when we don't give them any metric to use to rate good developers?

    1. Re:We'll screw it up by phantomfive · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No wonder people don't respect our field -- we don't respect it ourselves. ... We've taken the secrets and tools of our trade, open sourced them

      I definitely don't respect programmers who think they need to keep their source hidden in order to stay competitive.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    2. Re:We'll screw it up by Zenin · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Here's the problem: Most all of what makes a good lawyer or doctor isn't at all about finding creative, novel ways to solve problems. Much the opposite in fact; Creative application of law or medicine is most likely to get you disbarred or thrown in jail. It's much easier to create a quantifiable exam when the subject matter is so well defined and creativity is shunned.

      In software however, it's completely the opposite. Creative, novel application of existing technology and/or the invention of entirely new technology, is a good software developer's bread and butter. It's a big part of the essence of what makes them a good developer rather then a coding drone.

      So how do you create an exam to quantify a good developer? By the very nature of what you're looking for the only "right" answers are "wrong" ones. But which wrong answer is right? That's completely subjective in an exam setting, however in the real world it's much easier to quantify: Your shit works and works well or it doesn't.

      --
      My /. uid is better then your /. uid
    3. Re:We'll screw it up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      That's funny. I think most developers are held in high regard because they have NOT built a mote around the profession like doctors and lawyers.

      I've seen too much doctoring done by nurses, too much law done by paralegals to have much respect for either profession. Then of course there's the whole, "Why don't you take this drug, you know the one with the same logo as the pen you used to sign the form?". This definitely happened to me. The drug? Celebrex, which wasn't even indicated for my condition. I said "no", because even then I was deeply suspicious of the way the drugs are marketed and the way the doctors were pushing them. Surprise, surprise, when this class of drugs was pulled for a while and brought back with a bunch of warnings.

      And then we have the lawyers, writing the laws that become ever more complex so... you need a lawyer.

      If anything, Open Source is a problem because it tends to require a developer for you to get mods in place. If anything, OS/FS makes software more like law, not less. At least there isn't broad consensus among all developers that we have to develop under OS/FS if we don't want to. Both models are allowed to compete, and under some circumstances proprietary wins and other some circumstances it doesn't.

      Professional organization, cert body? No thanks.

  6. Re:Mod parent up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Opposite anecdote: I live in a major city on the West coast of the U.S., and I've never had a period of the last 7 years where I couldn't get a six figure offer when I wanted a new job. And I didn't even have to move.

    The lesson from your travels isn't that being a computer programmer is a bad gig. It's that you shouldn't move to a place where there is only one job. Move to a major metropolitan area, and you can earn a lot of money with virtually zero unemployment in the field.

  7. Re:Lies by Darinbob · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I have been out of work in the past for nearly a year. Lots of people claiming that they wanted to hire me, if only they had the budget. When the economy is bad and there are no job openings, it doesn't matter how competent you are. Maybe a lot of these new people haven't really been in a bad economy or downturn except the current one. Also the fads comd and go, if the current fad is web sites with scripting language of the day, and you don't know web stuff, then all those jobs pass you by no matter how good a programmer you are.

    Some of the people that do the best with getting jobs are the dabblers, quickly learning the rudiments of something and then moving on in a few years when fashions change; client/server turns into palm pilot apps turns into web design turns into mobile apps, etc.

    Also very important to finding a job, is to not be geeky and nerdy. You need people skills and that is not easy to learn for the borderline autism spectrum people who are great coders and hardware designers and mathematicians. You have to learn to NOT be yourself in an interview.

  8. Re:Yep by Livius · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Luckily in 20 years it will still be 30 years away, which will give us a little time.

  9. Yup. Developers are KING by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    ...right after

    1) Shareholders (reason why we're in business)
    2) Customers (who pays the bills?)
    3) Salespeople (who brings in the customers?)
    4) Top management (whose vision makes the difference between a big success and an also-ran?)
    5) Marketing (who identifies and attracts the customers?)
    6) Finance and accounting (who brings in investments and manages the cash so we can stay in business?)
    7) Lobbyists (who ensures that the government doesn't pass taxes and other legislation that would interfere with our business plans?)
    8) Press relations (who gets the word out to Wall Street so we can attract investment?)
    9) Recent college graduates (who will provide the 'fresh blood' and intimate knowledge of technological trends that will carry us into the future?)
    10) Offshore developers (who makes it possible to keep costs down so that #1-9 can be satisfied?) ....