Download Coders The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World Clive Thompson

Product details File Size 1387 KB Print Length 448 pages Publisher Penguin Press (March 26, 2019) Publication Date March 26, 2019 Language English ASIN B07DBRNN1Z

Coders The Making of a New Tribe and the Remaking of the World Clive Thompson Reviews

• Clive Thompson’s new behind the screen look at the tribe of coders is by no means perfect. A journalist by profession, Thompson’s chapters somewhat read like a series of loosely connected articles for the New York Times magazine. But these glances at different aspects of the computer programming world do incisively capture the culture for both good and ill.
  
  Written primarily for those who are not members of the tribe, as a data scientist I cannot say I learned much by reading it. But its depiction of the hyper-masculine, intellectually preoccupied, socially inept world of programming did resonate. Of course, Thompson is not the first writer to depict this world. Nor is he the first to opine that the immense amount of harm caused by these new technologies is the result of the blindnesses of this monoculture. But updating readers on the cultural changes in computing from the 1950s to the 1990s to 2019 is important for everyone who has to live in the partially online modern world.
  
  Thompson also makes a concerted argument that the lack of women and minorities in computers is the result of cultural bias and not in any sense genetic. Though largely relying on anecdotal evidence the argument grows increasingly persuasive as the book advances. I wish Thompson had relied more on data and less on personal testimony. Given, however, that this is an issue with significant cultural and financial implications, it’s encouraging to see this position well-articulated.
  
  I ended up thinking after reading it through that the book is a light and mostly pleasant way for those not in coding to understand something of this ever growing part of modernity. Not a must-read but something that non-coders will both benefit from and enjoy.
• <em>Coders</em> is a sign of its times instead of comprehensively covering the topic of code, how it works, and where it comes from, Thompson does some of that, which is to be commended, and a lot of fomenting discord through relentless stereotypes about race and sex. He seems to believe women and some people, based on the color of their skin, cannot code as some other groups can, and that implication is disconcerting, pervasive, and annoying in his book.
  
  But Thompson cannot help himself; he is a creature of the media and he doesn't realize the bogosity of the water in which he swims. Instead of focusing on the product and how it is made, he focuses on the race and gender of the people making it. Software can be written by anyone; that is a topic to be celebrated. Thompson repeatedly misses the forest for the trees of race and gender.
  
  There is a great book stashed inside this performatively "woke" book. Thompson keeps showing us glimpses of that great book, then hiding the great book away so he can repeat bland media formulas about how women and minorities are hurt most. News at 11. If this book is read in the far future, it will be seen as yet another example of the media class's obsessions in this age; instead of focusing on technology and how to build the future, Thompson focuses on media-enabled squabbles. We know that you've replaced church with the church of "social justice;" we don't need evangelizing for it in everything you do.
  
  He claims, "Feminism and diversity are, indeed, sore points in the industry" (22). No, they are not; they are sore points in the grievance studies and media industries. Those are studies bent on complaining; tech is bent on building the future. He goes on to claim that "The racial makeup [of most tech cos] is not more diverse," then goes on to admit that Asians are prevalent in tech. Do they not count as diversity? Why does Thompson systematically exclude Asians? His own racial insensitivity shows here; performative wokeness shades back into the racism it claims to oppose. Thompson says early hackers "admired great code even if it came from someone with no rank at all" (37)—isn't that meritocracy?
  
  Thompson asks, "What makes programming so often inhospitable for women?" He assumes it is, ignoring the vast number of successful women in the field. Why not focus harder on what makes coders, rather than the race or sex of the coders? Because that wouldn't reify Thompson's world view. We get it, Clive you are a moral hero while the rest of us are mere struggling pygmies. Maybe one day we can be as good as you demonstrate yourself to be in this book.
• This is a good history of programming and programmers. I have read much of the historical material before in other books but this book manages to present new material in every chapter. This book seems to be targeted for the non-programmer or maybe someone who works with programmers and wants to figure out why they do things the way they do. First - there is not one programmer type but they good programmers share some common qualities that the book delves into for the reader. When my son wanted to become a programmer I feared there was one quality he did not have - ability to deal with frustration. The book details why that ability is essential for all good programmers to survive and thrive. I loved the book so much I purchased copies to give out to co-workers that have to work with coders.