Writing code for the joy of it, those were the days

I’m 62, and write code every day. For free, and I still regularly release apps. Most of my work (not all) is open-source.

I love it.

The secret is that I no longer work for people that destroy my work, treat me badly, or force me to do it in a way that destroys creativity, Quality, and velocity.

Being “frozen out” of the tech industry was painful, but it resulted in the first truly happy work I’ve ever done. I’m doing what I dreamed of doing, back then. Out of necessity, I have a much-reduced scope, but I still get a lot done.

However, all those decades of shipping software, on someone else’s dime, made it possible for me to do things the way that I do it now. It gave me the ability to pay the bills, and the Discipline and habit, to write (and ship) good software.

Yeah, the side of programming I love is when I write code for free, or contribute to open source projects.

> The secret is that I no longer work for people that destroy my work, treat me badly, or force me to do it in a way that destroys creativity, Quality, and velocity.

You are right.

I’m in my 40s and I still do this all of the time. Computers can still be your hobby and not just your job.

This is why I've never taken a coding job despite having played with code since I was a toddler (I'm 36 now). To me, coding is a creative endeavor and I just cannot do creative things for pay/on a deadline. It's the same reason I prefer not to write fiction for money.