I work at big tech (not MS) and yes, the comp package really is that good, though not as good as it used to be. I immediately doubled my total comp when I came here from my last job, and now it’s ~5x. I could retire right now if I wanted, so I don’t care about layoffs anymore.

In a sense, AI is already fucking with everyone’s brain when it comes to mass-produced ads and propaganda.

I don’t know how I work. I couldn’t tell you much about neuroscience beyond “neurons are linked together and somehow that creates thoughts”. And even when it comes to complex thoughts, I sometimes can’t explain why. At my job, I often lean on intuition I’ve developed over a decade. I can look at a system and get an immediate sense if it’s going to work well, but actually explaining why or why not takes a lot more time and energy. Am I an LLM?

It depends on the role. My first job was doing manual QE on Windows, and knowing Linux wasn’t much help at the time, but it did help me transition to a coding role in the same company a year later. I’m now doing platform engineering at a major tech company, but that has a high barrier to entry, which I suspect is the case for most roles that are Linux-focused. If you’re trying to get your foot in the door, I think you should look at job profiles for low barrier to entry roles (e.g. tech support) and try to work your way up.

Probably because the individual engineers working on Takeout care about doing a good job, even though the higher-ups would prefer something half-assed. I work for a major tech company and I’ve been in that same situation before, e.g. when I was working on GDPR compliance. I read the GDPR and tried hard to comply with the spirit of the law, but it was abundantly clear everyone above me hadn’t read it and only cared about doing the bare minimum.

There’s no financial incentive for them to make is easy to leave Google. Takeout only exists to comply with regulations (e.g. digital markets act), and as usual, they’re doing the bare minimum to not get sued.