AI /Reid Hoffman interview: “revenge of the English major”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Standup for English major’s because we have rites, too. Some one have to know the difference between stationary and stationery and be able to conjugate the pass tense of verbs. You only think your a good writer but I know and you’re colleagues know that you write runon sentences and has terrible grammer spelling and use age even though English is you’re Native language and you even have a collage degree.

Bad troll. Hope your kid can find a job with the millions of CS and engineering grads every year. Maybe the $75k you spend a year will be worth it and they won’t get disregarded for someone at San Jose State.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Standup for English major’s because we have rites, too. Some one have to know the difference between stationary and stationery and be able to conjugate the pass tense of verbs. You only think your a good writer but I know and you’re colleagues know that you write runon sentences and has terrible grammer spelling and use age even though English is you’re Native language and you even have a collage degree.

These issues are taught in k-12, not collegiate English. University English is about tracing from Chaucer and Shakespeare to Pound and Zukofsky to understand literary tradition.

English is a field of study spin up fairly recently for students who couldn't hack Greek and Latin. It is not a hallowed tradition of any sort. Chaucer for example is a hackneyed imitator of much better Italian writers. He's in the English canon because he's in English. He would not be an important part of any reasonable survey of important Western authors cross-language, there are just too many better competitors in continental lit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Standup for English major’s because we have rites, too. Some one have to know the difference between stationary and stationery and be able to conjugate the pass tense of verbs. You only think your a good writer but I know and you’re colleagues know that you write runon sentences and has terrible grammer spelling and use age even though English is you’re Native language and you even have a collage degree.

These issues are taught in k-12, not collegiate English. University English is about tracing from Chaucer and Shakespeare to Pound and Zukofsky to understand literary tradition.

English is a field of study spin up fairly recently for students who couldn't hack Greek and Latin. It is not a hallowed tradition of any sort. Chaucer for example is a hackneyed imitator of much better Italian writers. He's in the English canon because he's in English. He would not be an important part of any reasonable survey of important Western authors cross-language, there are just too many better competitors in continental lit.

That’s great and all but has nothing to do with my comment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

[Anonymous]

Anything STEM will still be in demand. This includes CS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

English majors aren't usually gregarious people who like to chat with people. Sales people are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Standup for English major’s because we have rites, too. Some one have to know the difference between stationary and stationery and be able to conjugate the pass tense of verbs. You only think your a good writer but I know and you’re colleagues know that you write runon sentences and has terrible grammer spelling and use age even though English is you’re Native language and you even have a collage degree.

These issues are taught in k-12, not collegiate English. University English is about tracing from Chaucer and Shakespeare to Pound and Zukofsky to understand literary tradition.

"Literature" especially "Old Literature" is a small part of English department.

https://english.umd.edu/academic-programs/undergraduate/english-ba

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

English majors aren't usually gregarious people who like to chat with people. Sales people are.

It’s not even that…sales doesn’t give a shit what you studied…or even graduated from college many times.

There is no preference for any specific degree for sales but rather do you have a sales personality.

Unfortunately, as anyone in business knows, sales staff has a ton of churn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think they already are asking for english, history, philosophy and classics.

No one wants a CS coder....

They prefer coders than can communicate clearly and concisely. The biggest challenge in programming is collecting requirements and communicating those requirements to the rest of team.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

English majors aren't usually gregarious people who like to chat with people. Sales people are.

It’s not even that…sales doesn’t give a shit what you studied…or even graduated from college many times.

There is no preference for any specific degree for sales but rather do you have a sales personality.

Unfortunately, as anyone in business knows, sales staff has a ton of churn.

pp here.. yes, exactly. That's my point. It's about type of personality, and most English majors don't have that type of personality to go into sales.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

English majors aren't usually gregarious people who like to chat with people. Sales people are.

It’s not even that…sales doesn’t give a shit what you studied…or even graduated from college many times.

There is no preference for any specific degree for sales but rather do you have a sales personality.

Unfortunately, as anyone in business knows, sales staff has a ton of churn.

pp here.. yes, exactly. That's my point. It's about type of personality, and most English majors don't have that type of personality to go into sales.

Nice sweeping generalization.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they already are asking for english, history, philosophy and classics.

No one wants a CS coder....

They prefer coders than can communicate clearly and concisely. The biggest challenge in programming is collecting requirements and communicating those requirements to the rest of team.

+1 People who can communicate clearly, and effectively are the ones who end up being the face for the team. But, that doesn't mean such a person doesn't need to know the tech part. They do.

I've worked for a FAANG for many years on the tech side. I understand the business side enough to be able to effectively communicate with them, but I also know the tech side. That makes me an invaluable member of the team.

I know some English majors who went to great schools. They all have grad degrees and don't earn that much. But, they do like what they do. So, there's that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am a liberal arts major who works in AI. You cannot be scared of coding for substantive roles in AI, but key roles in which I see a lot of liberal arts majors thrive are product - figuring out that to build, developer advocacy /community roles that are critical for open source, and documentation - now incredibly important as folks are sic-ing copilots on documentation to write code. And of course sales- folks don’t realize that in tech sellers often make more than most of the Eng team at a similar level of experience.

Agree on sales

English majors aren't usually gregarious people who like to chat with people. Sales people are.

It’s not even that…sales doesn’t give a shit what you studied…or even graduated from college many times.

There is no preference for any specific degree for sales but rather do you have a sales personality.

Unfortunately, as anyone in business knows, sales staff has a ton of churn.

pp here.. yes, exactly. That's my point. It's about type of personality, and most English majors don't have that type of personality to go into sales.

Nice sweeping generalization.

Yes, there's a reason for that generalization. Also, most English majors are female.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they already are asking for english, history, philosophy and classics.

No one wants a CS coder....

This isn’t true. Everyone wants coders, there’s just a lot more of them.

We don't need many now with DeepSeek.....
AI will do the coding.

Just like how AI has replaced accountants, teachers, doctors, and lawyers.

AI has not replaced lawyers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think they already are asking for english, history, philosophy and classics.

No one wants a CS coder....

This isn’t true. Everyone wants coders, there’s just a lot more of them.

We don't need many now with DeepSeek.....
AI will do the coding.

Just like how AI has replaced accountants, teachers, doctors, and lawyers.

AI has not replaced lawyers.

AI can't replace you. We need AS for that task.