2023 was a brutal year for layoffs in tech and 2024 has not improved the situation. It can be an incredibly difficult time especially if this is the first time you've been laid off. I was laid off from my first job in tech a decade ago and it's only recently that I've come to realize how much it affected me psychologically.

I came across this series from Joey deVilla, who was laid off from his job as a Senior Developer Advocate for Okta earlier this month. This advice is incredibly important to remember.

If you’ve been laid off — and especially if you’ve been laid off for the first time — you will blame yourself for being laid off. This post is just for you, and it can be summed up as this: you’re probably facing the consequences of someone else’s mistakes.

Laid off in 2024, part 10: Unearned consequences (Joey deVilla/Global Nerdy)

It is hard to reconcile the number of layoffs with the vast profits that the large tech companies have announced over the past few months. It feels unnecessary but it is important to remember that is also a tactic to reset salary expectations in this job market.

I've done a couple of interviews a year to research what the interview process is and how it has changed over time. It is not a process I have ever enjoyed.

Wishing anyone entering the job market all the best.

Penn Jillette has written and spoken about why he was a libertarian in the past. I came across this quote in an interview on Cracked about his attitude to libertarianism has changed recently.

Many times when I identified as Libertarian, people said to me, “It’s just rich white guys that don’t want to be told what to do,” and I had a zillion answers to that — and now that seems 100 percent accurate.

Penn Jillette Wants to Talk It All Out (Tim Grierson/Cracked)

I came across this quote on a post from Jason Kottke's site.

Especially since most minimalists want to keep exactly the economic and police system that keeps them privileged. That’s libertarians for you - anarchists who want police protection from their slaves.

Green Mars (Kim Stanley Robinson)

I listened an interesting interview on the 'Protestant work ethic' and its lesser known, progressive alternative on The Gray Area with Sean Illing. The interviewee was Elizabeth Anderson, a professor of philosophy at the University of Michigan.

She recently published a book "Hijacked: How Neoliberalism Turned the Work Ethic against Workers and How Workers Can Take It Back" about how the unrelenting accumulation of more has led to the exploitation of working people. Whether you agree with the premise or not, it is a conversation worth listening to.

There is also a profile about her in the New Yorker.