▲ | bitwize 4 days ago | |
> Kids don't want to become engineers as result, they want to become content creators, tinkerers etc. Even rather good students with a lot of potential see all this engineering stuff more as a media career or a fun hobby. Well, let's see, would you rather make your money slaving away in some corporation for absurdly low pay, or pointing a cellphone camera at yourself and attracting an audience of worshippers that could make you squillions with the right sponsorships? The problem isn't the maker movement; it's the broader problem that "influencer" is the new "rapper". Everybody thinks they can do it, and the younger generations are so much disproportionately sicker with main-character syndrome that they think they deserve the fame and riches of the best and luckiest, even though the Cool Career Pigeonhole Principle says they probably won't get it. I mean, ultimately, you gotta love the work itself, otherwise why bother. I love game development, but I know I'm never gonna be John Carmack, or even John Romero. I keep doing it for the satisfaction I get from doing the work. Maybe the maker community needs to emphasize that aspect more to counteract influenceritis. Or maybe we need to instill more of a sense of duty and responsibility in our young people, so that the smarter ones will step up and take on engineering jobs out of a sense of service to our civilization. With narcissism being the defining characteristic of society in the USA, going into the highest reaches of power here, I don't know that that will be possible for a while yet. |