Syntax error
Coding does not = innovation.
The world is full of great coders, linux stands as proof of this fact. What the world is not full of though is innovators and I am not convinced that that is something that money can buy...
Summer is here again, and technology firms have made a big push to recruit the best young talent with massive salaries and a host of perks. Facebook, for example, has just hired 17-year-old Michael Sayman to code at Menlo Park after flying him out to Facebook headquarters to meet its behoodied founder in person. Sayman got …
Moreover, if a person happens not only to be a great coder but also have the necessary entrepreneurial innovative streak required for such an investment to pay dividends, they are more likely than not to stay around only for long enough to build sufficient credibility and contacts to be able to raise a few squillion from a VC for a substantial equity stake in their own business rather than doing it all for the good of Zuck.
You can't buy innovation, that's for sure. But you can buy people who express traits necessary for innovation and help them build on those traits. Where they ultimately go with those traits is up to them however. At any rate, introducing them to new ideas, people and perspectives, hopefully, helps them discover how to tie all their traits and abilities together and eventually become innovators. It usually takes years after their internship has ended before they get everything working together and some never do get there, but plenty do, eventually.
So they are spending 12 to 15 grand for an intern to code his but off for the summer and he gets to hand any potential IP over to Z8g. It isn't like they are going to pay a patent attorney less if the kid happens to strike gold. Besides, the poor kid is only getting tuition for the next semester plus maybe some beer money depending on where he goes to school.
Even in Texas, where I worked a few months at HQ, I discovered the locals were paid rather well, compared to the UK, but that often came with a different set of expectations (like having a manager who could cancel your holiday with no notice, but also leeway to actually behave like a graduate level employee, and try things, unlike a lot of places in the UK). That was then - I suspect the US tech sector, outside of California, is not subject to so much wage inflation these days).
The median straight-from-university salary here is probably $120k (~£70k); you're talking $160k+ (~£90k+) once you start taking your steps into roles with 'senior' or 'lead' in the title; $200k+ (~£115k+) for 'chief' and/or 'architect', even at a barely-funded startup.
... and there still aren't enough potential hires to satisfy the market.
...is to stop yourself from increasing your cost of life. It should be clear to everybody that such a job is only possible in a tech bubble where everyone pretending to be able to code can get a high paying job.
It makes sense to use that bubble to collect money for your future education, but be aware that the bubble will collapse eventually. Nobody knows if it'll be in 10 weeks or 10 years, but it will collapse. If you are prepared, you can then start studying and you will emerge wiser and without debt.
This post has been deleted by its author
I'm a developer.. It doesn't mean I have enough time (outside of a job and family life) to dedicate enough time to building a product. I can't market the product, I can't do fancy designs for the product.
These things often require a lot of support around developers to make them happen.