“So, what do you do?”
That, dear good reader. is somewhat an obligatory question whenever a person is chatting with his/her long-time-no-see friend.
When I am asked that by people, my usual reply is:
“I work as a programmer, or to be specific, web developer.”
“Oh, so you are a web developer? Where is it?” usually follows after that. But, for non web-workers, which 90% of my friends or family are, that will pretty much threw them off a great distance, leaving only blank faces and mouths saying, “What is that?”.
Okay, so, that, apparently, is not helpful and nothing but a waste of breath. Being driven by the mindset to keep things practical (and being a lazy that I am), I decided that I should came up with something.. that is easier to understand.
“So, I make websites.”
Sums it up pretty good. Most of them understand now, that I make “websites”, those pages with text and images filling up their screen when they surfed the Web. The problem comes after this, which is to make them understand, that I didn’t actually do the design and is just focusing on the development side. Which is the engines, or the stuff under the hood, or the kitchen, or the electricity and plumbing system or whatever. Chances are slim that I have to go into great length to explain about the details, since most of them didn’t ask, or it probably didn’t even cross their mind.
There are still some, albeit very small, number of people that has never heard about a website (probably know but didn’t familiar with the term?), so most of the response to this are, “Oh, I see.” or “Wow”, which is nice, because it means that they’ve got it.
Along the line of this, I’ve heard something as disconcerting as, “So, you kind of, created the Facebook and Wikipedia? Awesome.” once. That’s like saying to a police, “So, after enhancing their images from the surveillance camera, you locate and use those cool auto-rifles to shoot the bad guys, eh? Awesome”.
“I work in front of a computer”
Correct, because I work in front of a monitor all day. But then so are graphic designers, copywriters, illustrators, animators, cashiers, secretaries. This often ends up with them asking more about the details and me switching to another response. Easy to understand, but still impractical (the vagueness).
“I write web applications and sometimes also server-side scripts to support Flash-based websites”
Bam. End of story. Change of topic ensues.
Comments 3
I get asked this all the time too. Generally I just go with “I make websites”.
Posted 15 Oct 2009 at 7:21 pm ¶I get this a lot as well, except I generally write software (even if it’s web-based) as distinct from websites. Usually saying “I’m a software developer” or “I’m a programmer” is enough, but sometimes people want more.
I had this exact problem with my girlfriend the other night when she asked for more information on what, exactly, my job involves. My first response was that it was too hard to explain, but I was pushed, and after a few failed attempts, ended up with the following: “I take a problem or a process that exists in real life and create a computerized representation of it in order to solve it or make it more efficient”.
It satisfied her, but I couldn’t help but feel that it was completely wrong and misleading. It doesn’t feel like a satisfactory description of what I do, but I can’t think of a better one.
Posted 03 Nov 2009 at 1:23 pm ¶@Damian
I had to read “It satisfied her” twice, to make sure I’ve not misread it. Good for you, Damian, I’m sure that if I was to tell that to people I know, it will only got through 10% of the times. (or maybe not :-s)
Posted 04 Nov 2009 at 12:41 am ¶Post a Comment