Where did all the fun in tech go?

This is going to sound weird, especially coming from someone who has spent the bulk of his career in "Tech", but that brief period where the media reporting on the tech majors was replete with tales of luxe amenities, like free cafeterias with superstar chefs, massage services (no happy endings - bummer), valet laundry services, and all sorts of fun areas, foosball was not the high water mark, but video games (full cabinets), pinball, climbing walls, yoga classes, and even bowling lanes.

Ostensibly, this was to keep the "techies" working and on campus all the time. I never experienced that, but the reality is that extravegance was limited to places like Google, Facebook, and the hot startups. It was believed that it was necessary to attract the talent they needed.

Yet, that period was an aberration in the history of Silicon Valley. The truth is that the culture early on was built on long hours, stimulants and really icky misogyny. But why the aberration?

Let's go back to the recovery from the Dot-Com bust, and the rise of the platform (or Web 2.0)

The rise of the Computer Scientists

In the mid 'aughts, I was a product manager at a company that made industrial measurement and test equipment, high end inspection and process control equipment. That required a wide range of talents to build and extend our products that included optics, electo-mechanics, and software. I worked with some amazing people, super talented, creative, and it was energizing.

But there was a tectonic shift underway. The rising crowd of kids were being lured into the world of software, and the advent of "Web 2.0" and then the rise of the platforms. First the iPhone turned Apple into a mega-corp, then Facebook, with Google always there, and others that built the platforms that dominate our lives today.

And that led to a lot of competition for the best grads, and hence all these amenities.

The reality

This has led to a drastic oversupply of computer science grads, just as the rise of AI that is "good enough" at coding are putting pressure on.

The labor market is bifurcating, and those that are lucky enough to be employed are now seeing that unless they have the ultimate grind set, they might become part of the permanent underclass. This is the belief that unless you are a master of the machine(s), you will be part of the majority of the population that will always be underemployed, suckling at the inevitable teat of the UBI, becoming the proletariat that writers like Harry Harrison depicted in his "To the Stars" trilogy.

There are even websites dedicated to this, a countdown to the (inevitable) coming of AGI, and the creation of the great unwashed masses of the permanent underclass:

Escape The Permanent Underclass - AI is coming for your job

A living countdown to the permanent underclass: tracking AI labor displacement signals, forecasting the window to act, and asking what you will do before dependency is locked in.

Escape The Permanent UnderclassGreg Brockman

Never mind that the current AI tools, while useful in certain contexts, are definitely not "thinking" machines. Read Gary Marcus if you want a coherent take on the current state:

“CEO said a thing!”

A blistering guide to what lazy journalism too often looks like

Marcus on AIGary Marcus

Thus, to avoid this "permanent underclass" they are adopting the extremes, and terms like Grind Set, and 996 are in the lexicon. Grind set is not a profile on Grindr, but instead a belief that to be recognized and pulled up into the masters of the future, you have to prove how dedicated you are.

This is neither new nor novel, it is how the VC's who rule the funding of the valley "came up" by being the first in the office, and the last to leave, sacrificing all their humanity in pursuit of the almighty goal, hitting it big. And they want, nay, excpect to see it in their founders, and the staff of their portfolio companies.

It is toxic, but it is what the valley is, and it is why places like Austin and Miami never catch on (plus the VC's love their estates in Woodside and Portola Valley too damn much to leave.)

Then, there's the 996 culture. This comes from China, and it means 9:00 AM to 9:00PM six days a week. The expectation that your entire waking life is spent working on the company's business.

I have to point out that I first encountered something like this in Japan in the aughties. My largest distributor for my product was based in Chigasaki, a suburb of Tokyo. The people I worked with got to the office almost exactly at 9 AM. There was a view of Mt. Fuji from the office. When I visited, I got there at 9, and we would have meetings until 1 or so. Then we would go to their cafeteria for lunch. (it was pretty good fare) and then we would go to the lab and work. Until 6 or so, then we would go to a local restaurant for dinner, and back to the office at 7, and work until 10 or 11.

Every day I was there was like this.

Sure, the salarymen I was working with put in 12 or 13 hour days, but the reality is that they only did about 4 hours of work in that time.

It was all virtue signaling, before virtue signaling was a thing.

Anyhow, I don't believe in the permanent underclass, I don't believe AI is going to take all the jobs, but I do believe that these kids are destroying themselves to make the VC class happy. The reality is these captains of industry don't give a fuck about them or thei sacrifices. They should go find regular jobs outside the valley and have a real life. Stop eating Soylent, and killing yourself for the promise of inclusion in the ruling class, because you aren't going to make it.

This was spurred by watching this video. Good Work is a great channel, and a ton of fun to watch.