Working on products people hate (www.seangoedecke.com)

submitted 3 weeks ago by codeinabox@programming.dev to c/programming@programming.dev

13 comments fedilink hide all child comments

If I were a better developer, would I have worked on more products people love? No. Even granting that good software always makes a well-loved product, big-company software is made by teams, and teams are shaped by incentives.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] EnsignWashout@startrek.website 13 points 3 weeks ago

Perhaps it's just me, but to me this article feels like belittling the problem by not differentiating between "hated" products and "harmful" products.

Exactly!

Hated product? Oh well. My paycheck still cashes.

Harmful product? Oh shit. Sorry boss. I'm still working on that. It's been confusing, but we almost got it. Annnyyyy day now, boss. Pretty sure we will get it on track next sprint. Or the one after. (Source: I once got well paid to "accidentally" kill at least one truly shit-head idea. It probably cost me a pay raise, but I left soon after for more money, and I'm still proud of that every time I reflect back on it.)

this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2026

21 points (73.3% liked)

Programming

26634 readers

80 users here now

Welcome to the main community in programming.dev! Feel free to post anything relating to programming here!

Cross posting is strongly encouraged in the instance. If you feel your post or another person's post makes sense in another community cross post into it.

Hope you enjoy the instance!

Rules

Follow the programming.dev instance rules
Keep content related to programming in some way
If you're posting long videos try to add in some form of tldr for those who don't want to watch videos

Wormhole

Follow the wormhole through a path of communities !webdev@programming.dev

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

snowe@programming.dev

Ategon@programming.dev

UlrikHD@programming.dev

bugsmith@programming.dev

Spyro@programming.dev