The one thing I disagree with in this is the point about an office. Having an office matters. Being visible from behind sucks, and the open-plan stress means that you spend an unacceptable amount of your leisure time recovering from work instead of actually doing things. I'd gladly take a 10% pay cut not to deal with that. I don't give a shit about having a nice office. I'd be fine with 50 square feet and a small window.
As a programmer, I'd want an office just to have some space where I can get work done. That's not because I'm a true believer or a corporate man. It's entirely selfish: my career will be better if I succeed than if I fail, and these terrible open-plan offices do enough damage to day-to-day performance that I'd rather not be in one. Though I'm a Sociopath/opportunist I generally find that it's usually in my interest to work hard, do my best, and play fair. In a conflict, I'll favor my interests above almost anyone else's, but I also avoid such conflicts as much as I can.
Other than that, I think that the carnival cash metaphor is spot-on. Moreover, I think the spawning issue (i.e. that sociopaths/opportunists don't usually start at the top) is worth note in technology because it's such a young industry. The age discrimination and the Scrum nonsense are all about creating a permanent culture of the clueless/idealist mindset-- at all levels. The VC-funded ecosystem is one where the Sociopaths get to play multiple companies (as investors, advisors, and executives placed into successful companies after the fact) and the checked-out MacLeod Losers (pragmatists) are shut out by the time they wise up. The goal is to produce monochromatically Clueless/idealist companies that the Sociopaths/opportunists in VC can manage from a distance and discard if they become inconvenient.
As a programmer, I'd want an office just to have some space where I can get work done. That's not because I'm a true believer or a corporate man. It's entirely selfish: my career will be better if I succeed than if I fail, and these terrible open-plan offices do enough damage to day-to-day performance that I'd rather not be in one. Though I'm a Sociopath/opportunist I generally find that it's usually in my interest to work hard, do my best, and play fair. In a conflict, I'll favor my interests above almost anyone else's, but I also avoid such conflicts as much as I can.
Other than that, I think that the carnival cash metaphor is spot-on. Moreover, I think the spawning issue (i.e. that sociopaths/opportunists don't usually start at the top) is worth note in technology because it's such a young industry. The age discrimination and the Scrum nonsense are all about creating a permanent culture of the clueless/idealist mindset-- at all levels. The VC-funded ecosystem is one where the Sociopaths get to play multiple companies (as investors, advisors, and executives placed into successful companies after the fact) and the checked-out MacLeod Losers (pragmatists) are shut out by the time they wise up. The goal is to produce monochromatically Clueless/idealist companies that the Sociopaths/opportunists in VC can manage from a distance and discard if they become inconvenient.