[HN Gopher] Why aren't SW developers working on more important p...
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Why aren't SW developers working on more important problems?
Today the most popular industries for "people who work with code"
are IT services, finance, retail, automotive, and gaming. I am
wondering why aren't majority of developers work on higher impact
problems that could allow leaps in humankind's welfare. Why aren't
developers making more conscious effort on solving: -
environmental pollution (recycling is terribly inefficient today) -
education (time spent in classroom does not reflect useful
information we teach our kids) - clean energy (why not put so many
more resources into solar, hydrogen, safe nuclear?) - sharing our
services and resources with our local communities. (social media is
a thing, you can follow an IG celeb on the other side of the world
but we have no habbit of sharing some of the meal we cook extra
with our neighbors or less fortunate) - remove incompetency in
governmental agencies. (why not focus more on how a country
operates by removing power from individuals and having technology
be the final verdict on any decision on anything going forward?) -
healthcare (why not focus on embedded devices that can people use
for self-diagnosing regularly without having to visit hospitals)
Author : goksankobe
Score : 10 points
Date : 2023-11-04 20:03 UTC (2 hours ago)
| sciolist wrote:
| Most companies work in areas where the most money is, most
| software engineers work for those companies.
| jahalai wrote:
| You are overestimating the average SW engineer. The majority of
| SW engineers that work in 'business' are not even capable of
| creating the most basic of software, let along create complex/
| low level systems
| ttymck wrote:
| Who is paying to solve those problems?
| solardev wrote:
| Just one perspective: I'm a web developer who's mostly worked in
| solar and environmental nonprofits for the last decade.
|
| My salary has been anywhere from $32k to $98k (briefly), with no
| equity of any sort, pretty bad healthcare, limited vacation,
| terrible mid management, etc. I was happy with those jobs because
| they felt socially benevolent in some small way, but it's a lot
| less money than what you'd get working for a proper tech company
| that took investor money and spent it on ad tech or whatever.
|
| ---------
|
| And many of those problems you cited aren't predominantly
| software issues to begin with. I think devs have this idea that
| good tech can fix anything, but it's not really true in the real
| world.
|
| Recycling isn't a software problem, for example, but a market
| forces one. It's cheaper to just make most things new, and really
| expensive to dispose of them properly now that Asia doesn't want
| as much of our shit. It was never really economically viable, but
| for a while we were able to just dump our shit on third world
| countries to pretend like it was going away.
|
| Clean energy is a growing sector but there isn't much software
| work, and much of it is outsourced to cheaper countries. Where
| there is software, it's often pretty niche (like solar mapping,
| design, rooftop layouts, etc.) that are graphics and Canvas heavy
| on the web stack, which isn't what most web devs specialize in.
| There is also firmware engineering but only a few companies in
| that space, and most of them aren't in the US anymore.
|
| Education suffers from academic inertia (it's very slow to change
| and management heavy with business minded admins who don't care
| about student experience as much as making a profit), political
| battles, angry parents, and weaponized school boards. Those
| people usually don't care much about the tech.
|
| Healthcare and biotech are growing too, but it's extremely
| difficult to get anything to market because of patents and
| regulatory hurdles. FDA approval is a pain. Not something solo
| hackers and small companies can easily tackle, and also hard to
| build a moat around before big pharma or Fitbit or whatever
| decides to copy you.
|
| I mean, if you give the average developer the choice of a niche
| field working on stuff where they won't really make a difference
| anyway, for a third of the pay or less, while limiting their
| networks and career opportunities... vs just going to work for a
| mainstream tech company, well, it's a pretty easy choice for
| most.
| badpun wrote:
| Developers aren't gods, we mostly don't have knowledge or skills
| to solve the problems we listed. In all companies (except for
| companies which sell software or software-related services, such
| as Microsoft, Google etc.) developers are merely tools used by
| the domain experts who know how to actually solve problems in
| that specific domain. We as developers are mostly not different
| from e.g. accountants or facility managers - we play an
| important, but auxiliary role.
| qup wrote:
| "git gud!"
|
| Seriously, level up. Developers aren't gods, agreed--but they
| can be wizards.
|
| I'm way, way different from an accountant, sorry. I actively
| seek problems where the code is the most important player, not
| the...whatever you said, domain expert? Whatever that means.
|
| I'm not the tool, the code is the tool, and it very much can
| solve big, important problems.
| jpc0 wrote:
| Could you then help us all and write the code that acts like
| a superconductor?
|
| How about the code that creates free food?
|
| I got it, the code the cures cancer, you must already be on
| that one?
|
| I do believe you can write the code that solves global
| warming while you are at it!
| quantified wrote:
| These are aren't software problems, these are people problems.
| Maybe software makes some portions easier.
| robocat wrote:
| Another question is asking why retired people are not working on
| high impact problems?
|
| Many have the free time, the knowledge and skills, and often some
| spare cash for light expenses.
|
| In theory the influence of retirees on science and the arts
| should be huge! In practice not so much?
| an_aparallel wrote:
| software developers are people...they're most likely not working
| on important problems for much the same reasons people shop at
| fast fashion outlets, eat bad food, watch crap television, not
| exercise and so on.
|
| not all software developers (aka people) are that smart outside
| their own domain, or reason well outside their domain. Just
| because you've studied CS and dream in high speed algorithms, it
| doesnt mean you can change a tire, cook a meal, or be ethical. I
| know surgeons/PHDs/engineers who outside their office are
| absolute social clusterf*ks who if you did not know them - would
| not think they held such high positions.
|
| one of the number one narratives i see on this site is "go work
| for a FAANG", or "go work for a startup"...the majority of either
| are either immoral or unnecessary products wrapped in investor
| bait (respectively)
|
| ...for these narratives to be a thing speaks volumes about
| incentives, morality and the like. Yeah i know people need to get
| paid, and life in Frisco is expensive....but...
| moooo99 wrote:
| Questions like those are why I often feel as if software
| engineers often tend to over estimate their impact on a society.
| hasbot wrote:
| None of the things you listed are something more software can
| affect.
| joshxyz wrote:
| yc request for startups covers this
|
| https://www.ycombinator.com/rfs
| toomuchtodo wrote:
| Most important problems are not software problems. Software is
| just another tool like a hammer. Get well off with software job,
| then go do real, meaningful work.
| andrewjl wrote:
| Why aren't investment dollars going towards more important
| problems?
| winrid wrote:
| This. Software devs are just fancy laborers. Laborers have no
| power. We have to go where the market is or we/our families
| starve.
|
| If you want to solve these kinds of problems you can 1. Do it
| yourself, and get funding to do so and 2. Get investors to
| invest in it. But why would they? Solving useful social
| problems rarely gets you hockystick growth.
|
| The government essentially has to incentivize it with
| funding/grants IMHO. Otherwise it does not move quick enough.
| endisneigh wrote:
| Who is going to pay for it? There you go.
| _gmax0 wrote:
| Because the issues you mention are fundamentally problems of
| resource allocation. More specifically, allocating human labor
| towards potentially intractable problems in the absence of
| convincingly enticing incentives.
|
| Maybe withhold making normative claims until you have some
| perspective.
| tomkarho wrote:
| How much are you paying?
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