In restless dreams I walked alone
Narrow streets of cobblestone
Beneath the halo of a streetlamp
I turned my collar to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light
That split the night
And touched the sound of silence
It is fun to revisit memories this way, a digital stamp in my weather passport, where everything can be contained in a forecast and Stockholm sits between Vilnius and London by sheer chance. It has also been a way to feel close to people I love while traveling, to know whether it is raining where they are.
As with most technology, this is artistry by committee. There is no Thomas Cole waiting in the wings. But someone has to animate the stars, to decide when to streak one across the screen–to play god in our pockets.
I’ve come to the conclusion that “enterprise web development” is just regular web development, only stripped of any joy or creativity or autonomy. It’s plugging a bunch of smart people into the matrix and forcing them to crank out widgets and move the little cards to the right.
In these structures, people are stripped of their humanity as they’re fed into the machine. It becomes “a developer resource is needed” rather than “Oh, Samantha would be a great fit for this project.” And the effect of all this on individuals is depressing. When people’s primary motivation is to move tickets over a column, their ability to be creative or serve a higher purpose are almost completely quashed. Interaction with other humans seems to be relegated to yelling at others to tell them they’re blocked.
Reading “AS PER THE REQUIREMENTS” in tickets makes me dry heave. How did such sterile, shitty language seep into my everyday work?