Remember when tech workers dreamed of working for a big company for a few years, before striking out on their own to start their own company that would knock that tech giant over?
Then that dream shrank to: work for a giant for a few years, quit, do a fake startup, get acqui-hired by your old employer, as a complicated way of getting a bonus and a promotion.
Then the dream shrank further: work for a tech giant for your whole life, get free kombucha and massages on Wednesdays.
And now, the dream is over. All that’s left is: work for a tech giant until they fire your ass, like those 12,000 Googlers who got fired six months after a stock buyback that would have paid their salaries for the next 27 years.
We deserve better than this. We can get it.
As someone who started his tech career in the mid '90s, this kind of hurts to see put into words so well.
I started my tech career in 2003 and back then I thought I’d work for a startup, get some options, go public, and retire at 35.
That did not happen, and while I’m making more than most I don’t have fancy vacations or a brand new Tesla.