Programming

I thought I wanted to work at FAANG in my younger years. After getting flown in for an on-site interview at Google, I decided it wasn’t really worth it to work somewhere with an unethical business model and constantly be in a moral quandary that ultimately my work is contributing to some huge corporation doing shitty things.

I got to try the “free food” and tour the Mountain View campus, but ended up taking a remote job elsewhere. Many years later, I now make probably make 25% less than what I would be making if I were still at Google, assuming a promotion a level above what I was interviewing for, but at least my conscience doesn’t bother me every day. One thing that does bother me, actually, is that a company I worked for got acquired by Oracle, and that piece of shit Ellison now owns a product I put my heart and soul into building. I couldn’t imagine how I’d feel working for a place like that directly.

Also, IMO, working remotely beats commuting to a FAANG office with free food and fun things to do. I can make my own damn food, thank you very much, and I also don’t really want to piss around doing “fun things” at work: I just want to get my shit done ASAP and log off.