Coders
Ratings8
Average rating4.1
15
Ratings8
Average rating4.1
Hello, world. Facebook's algorithms shaping the news. Self-driving cars roaming the streets. Revolution on Twitter and romance on Tinder. We live in a world constructed of code--and coders are the ones who built it for us. From acclaimed tech writer Clive Thompson comes a brilliant anthropological reckoning with the most powerful tribe in the world today, computer programmers, in a book that interrogates who they are, how they think, what qualifies as greatness in their world, and what should give us pause. They are the most quietly influential people on the planet, and Coders shines a light on their culture. In pop culture and media, the people who create the code that rules our world are regularly portrayed in hackneyed, simplified terms, as ciphers in hoodies. Thompson goes far deeper, dramatizing the psychology of the invisible architects of the culture, exploring their passions and their values, as well as their messy history. In nuanced portraits, Coders takes us close to some of the great programmers of our time, including the creators of Facebook's News Feed, Instagram, Google's cutting-edge AI, and more. Speaking to everyone from revered "10X" elites to neophytes, back-end engineers and front-end designers, Thompson explores the distinctive psychology of this vocation--which combines a love of logic, an obsession with efficiency, the joy of puzzle-solving, and a superhuman tolerance for mind-bending frustration. Along the way, Coders thoughtfully ponders the morality and politics of code, including its implications for civic life and the economy. Programmers shape our everyday behavior: When they make something easy to do, we do more of it. When they make it hard or impossible, we do less of it. Thompson wrestles with the major controversies of our era, from the "disruption" fetish of Silicon Valley to the struggle for inclusion by marginalized groups. In his accessible, erudite style, Thompson unpacks the surprising history of the field, beginning with the first coders -- brilliant and pioneering women, who, despite crafting some of the earliest personal computers and programming languages, were later written out of history. Coders introduces modern crypto-hackers fighting for your privacy, AI engineers building eerie new forms of machine cognition, teenage girls losing sleep at 24/7 hackathons, and unemployed Kentucky coal-miners learning a new career. At the same time, the book deftly illustrates how programming has become a marvelous new art form--a source of delight and creativity, not merely danger. To get as close to his subject as possible, Thompson picks up the thread of his own long-abandoned coding skills as he reckons, in his signature, highly personal style, with what superb programming looks like. To understand the world today, we need to understand code and its consequences. With Coders, Thompson gives a definitive look into the heart of the machine.
Reviews with the most likes.
I might be biased considering I write code to make a living, but I found this book to be pretty fascinating. I certainly feel a little more validated, as I connected with a lot of the descriptions of programmers in this book. I would definitely recommend this book to people who want to learn more about coding (as opposed to actually learning to code, which is very different).
Fairly boring if you are a coder. I am sure that somehow ironically self-identifies me as a coder.
A very nice book on different characteristics of past few generation of coders, how they differ, evolved and fit into market. This is very useful to both coders, to form a better self image of themselves and colleagues, and to non-coders, to get a glimpse of it's nuances and complexities.
This book is a look at coders and coding culture and every coder and system-thinker will probably love reading it. Because who doesn't love to hear about being INTJs and the joy of efficiency and the frustrations and patience required when chasing bugs. It definitely gave me the itch to go and automate something. All the analogies were spot on, that for example coders have to build and juggle houses of cards in their head while programming, tracking at all times the complex interdependencies, and therefore hate all interruptions that make those houses collapse.
In interesting point made is that coding is a discipline where self-taught people work alongside computer-science graduates. Some examples are brought up that show that anyone with an aptitude for problem-solving and optimization can learn those skills, even later in life. Yet the culture that hypes the ubernerds and mastercoders (10X) is not that welcoming to women/minorities and anyone who sees coding just as a dayjob. Still miles to go, but at least worldwide statistics show that culture is to blame, and that white North American men are not the genetically chosen masters of the discipline.
