amen zwa, esq. on Nostr: Here is a bit of background information—from my perspective—to illuminate this ...

Here is a bit of background information—from my perspective—to illuminate this crisis that we are in, at present.

Before arriving in college, my generation learned the fundamentals of computing on 8-bit home microcomputers. In college, we used 16- and 32-bit DEC minicomputers. In our early careers, we used 64-bit CRAY supercomputers. Those machines may appear hideously underwhelming to the modern eyes, but they were all simple enough that a determined college kid was able to comprehend the low-level details, down to the bus signal level. We lived through the emergence of the modern computing era, as it were. We soaked up the atmosphere, the knowledge, and the history, by osmosis.

These days, I advise (guide, coax, kick, plead, etc.) forty-something senior techies, who are the in-house staff of my client companies, in the DC area. The first exposure to computing these kids had was the Nintendo N64. The second was the Netscape browser. I have never worked with someone from that ilk who even knows how a computer boots up. And, yes, none of them had ever designed a substantial system, from the ground up. All of them had climbed up the career ladder by fixing broken old systems that their predecessors tossed over the retirement fence.

Now, I am certain that there are twenty-somethings today who are proficient hardware and software system designers and implementers—without using AI. But they do not work for my DC area clients.

PS—These forty-something kids, who have young pre-college children of their own, are genuinely worried about whether they would have a career, over the next decade. And they are even more worried about their young children's future.
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