BougieBirdie

Thanks for the kind words, friend.

I know this is a comedy community and I’m not trying to be a bring down. But I also think it’s important to talk about this kind of thing because, well, it’s the kind of thing that corporate america would want to sweep under the rug. We need to normalize talking about mental health because it’s yet another public health crisis that doesn’t get enough attention.

I’m out of that dumpster fire now, but I’m still looking for my dream job.

Join us for tonight’s news at eleven, where we have breaking headlines that water is wet and the pope is catholic.

I once had my employer perform a wellness check when I was having a mental health episode.

I was working remotely, but my mental health was in the toilet. I had a candid conversation with my supervisor where I told him I needed some time off because I had been feeling suicidal. He was an absolute bro, told me I was doing a good job, and that I earned some time off. He agreed that our conditions and the demands from management were absurd. He tells me to just take some time, and he’ll clear the way with HR.

Well, I’m logging off my computer when I get a call from his boss. He’s asking why I’m suddenly taking some time off. I tell him that I haven’t been feeling well, but he keeps badgering me for a specific reason. I tell him that I’m very vulnerable and don’t want to disclose a reason. That’s between me and my doctor.

Well he keeps pressing and he tells me that, “sharing our vulnerabilities is what fosters trust.” So I’m like fine, you really want to know, this job and your management style are making me suicidal.

Tone immediately shifts. He’s going into full damage control cover-your-ass mode. He tells me that I should consider a different career if I’m not up to the task. I’m already having like the worst day of my life (so far) and I start to have a panic attack.

I tell him you know what, it’s not his business and I’m going to call my doctor. Before I can get on the phone with my doctor, HR is calling me. They tell me they have to get hold of my emergency contact to make sure I’m not currently killing myself. I tell them my emergency contact is out of town (unrelated), so they say they have to call the police. I ask her not to, there’s no risk to myself and things have been taken out of context. HR insists that it’s company policy.

So while I’m hyperventilating because my boss pressed me for more details than I was comfortable sharing about my health, they sent a man with a gun to my house to check on me.

I understand that the company is protecting its liability or whatever. But I really felt that my rights had been violated somehow. The police are not suitable to intervene in a mental health episode. I had a new fear that I wouldn’t be able to calm down when the police arrived and I’d end up shot or something.

TLDR - I know this post is fake, but companies really do feel like they own their employees. A wellness check from your employer is absolutely bullshit, but that won’t stop them from trying.

We all hope we don’t end up in the control group.

A lot of the criticism comes with AI results being wrong a lot of the time, while sounding convincingly correct. In software, things that appear to be correct but are subtly wrong leads to errors that can be difficult to decipher.

Imagine that your AI was trained on StackOverflow results. It learns from the questions as well as the answers, but the questions will often include snippets of code that just don’t work.

The workflow of using AI resembles something like the relationship between a junior and senior developer. The junior/AI generates code from a spec/prompt, and then the senior/prompter inspects the code for errors. If we remove the junior from the equation to replace with AI, then entry level developer jobs are slashed, and at the same time people aren’t getting the experience required to get to the senior level.

Generally speaking, programmers like to program (many do it just for fun), and many dislike review. AI removes the programming from the equation in favour of review.

Another argument would be that if I generate code that I have to take time to review and figure out what might be wrong with it, it might just be quicker and easier to write it correctly the first time

Business often doesn’t understand these subtleties. There’s a ton of money being shovelled into AI right now. Not only for developing new models, but for marketing AI as a solution to business problems. A greedy executive that’s only looking at the bottom line and doesn’t understand the solution might be eager to implement AI in order to cut jobs. Everyone suffers when jobs are eliminated this way, and the product rarely improves.

A hammer is beginner friendly, but learning to use a hammer doesn’t necessarily mean you’re ready to build a house with it.

Well, I’m not a psychologist, so I suppose my interpretation might not be correct - the irony mounts.

But from the graphs you shared, it looks to me like the only people who underestimated themselves were the top performers. And from what I know firsthand with imposter syndrome, a competent person underestimates themselves.

I used hyperbole for effect, so I don’t think that if you believe you have zero competence in something because you actually have zero competence means that you’re secretly good at something. If you know nothing about plumbing, don’t try to install a toilet.

But if you’re working in the software factory then you don’t actually have zero competence, you probably have formal education and some experience. Having that feeling that you might not be good enough is a sign that you’re on the right track.

I felt like that early in my career. I used to think that being a rockstar developer was a good thing, and I’d be happy to describe myself as one.

The thing is, a lot of rockstars are really just churning out heaps of unmaintainable code. They think they have a high degree of proficiency, they’re confident in their competence, but there’s a disconnect between what they think and what they produce.

It can be a sign of personal improvement to question yourself when you think you’re doing great. We owe it to ourselves to ask ourselves critically if we can be doing better. Because if we don’t, and we just assume we’re awesome, then we’ll happily churn out sub-awesome cruft.

The insidious thing is that self-criticism leads to self-doubt, and imposter syndrome can be quite paralyzing. But if you learn to control your criticism instead of allowing your criticism to control you, you can achieve higher heights than rockstardom.

Based on what I know of Imposter Syndrome and the Dunning-Kruger effect, it seems you’re at your most competent when you feel like you’re at your least.

So if you’re feeling badly because you feel like you don’t know enough to do your job, take some time to remind yourself that other people who appear to be confident have no idea what they’re doing.

It’s fake-it-till-you-make-it all the way down.

If seeing how the sausage gets made upsets you, then maybe the answer is to petition the government to make less sausage.

Or if you wanted to stick your head in the sand you could block the communities that share that content.

Asking for censorship seems to be coming at this from the wrong angle.

Not that I doubt the locals or anything - and like, fuck Microsoft - but what kind of industrial waste would a data center have?

From the article, it sounds like the facility is still under construction, so I imagine there might be construction waste, but that’s not really my field and I don’t know what that looks like. Runoff cement?

The man with the gun shoots the gun.

The man without a gun finds a gun.

I recommend Dusk to people just for the music.

I mean, the game is good too, but the soundtrack just goes so hard

There’s no reason they can’t hire more staff, give them adequate training, and pay them a living wage. But there is a rea$on why they won’t.

Now that they’re looking to replace as much of their staff with cheaper alternatives, it’s not really surprising that they’d go for the cheapest option. After all, it’s exactly what they do with their human resources.

In order to prepare a meal, you need to be able to afford ingredients, have the required skills, and have the time/energy to cook. So yes, it is cheaper to prepare your own meal, but if for example you’re working three jobs to make rent while raising a child, you’re going to have difficulty finding the time or energy required for cooking. Doubly true if you don’t already know how to cook.

There’s also people without access to a kitchen. If you have to rely on other people to cook for you, you’re extremely limited in options and as a result you’ll likely have to spend more money on fast food and takeout.

Another thing to think about: it’s cheaper to grow your own food than to buy it. Most of us don’t grow our own food - probably because we lack time, knowledge, or land.

A difference of 8F is about 4.5C for anyone unfamiliar with freedom units.

I don’t handle guns, I just like westerns and play too many video games:

Don’t you have to hold the hammer while you pull the trigger to decock it? The trigger unlocks it, but because you’re holding the hammer it doesn’t strike the shell?

So in order to safely disarm you have to pull the trigger, which sure sounds like an accident waiting to happen.

Well as long as Bill says it’s cool, I guess I don’t have to form my own opinion

Surely you’ve thoroughly thought this through though?