I was just having several conversations about this with a mixed group of tech people. Several agreed and one who missed the original convo volunteered essentially the same sentiment.
It’s like traffic management. More capacity means more cars and traffic stays as bad or gets worse. In many fields, but especially software, there’s a lot of redundant work being done because there are enough developers that companies think they can almost afford (and exploit people to make up the gap) to do it themselves instead of using something that exists.
If there were just not enough devs to make your bespoke CMS or enough materials scientists to invent a new shade of pink, we would just deal, and more people would work on things that actually matter. Not a larger fraction of people. More people.
It’s like traffic management. More capacity means more cars and traffic stays as bad or gets worse. In many fields, but especially software, there’s a lot of redundant work being done because there are enough developers that companies think they can almost afford (and exploit people to make up the gap) to do it themselves instead of using something that exists.
If there were just not enough devs to make your bespoke CMS or enough materials scientists to invent a new shade of pink, we would just deal, and more people would work on things that actually matter. Not a larger fraction of people. More people.