What CPython Layoffs Taught Me About the Real Value of Expertise
Posted by grandimam@reddit | Python | View on Reddit | 233 comments
The layoffs of the CPython and TypeScript compiler teams have been bothering me—not because those people weren’t brilliant, but because their roles didn’t translate into enough real-world value for the businesses that employed them.
That’s the hard truth: Even deep expertise in widely-used technologies won’t protect you if your work doesn’t drive clear, measurable business outcomes.
The tools may be critical to the ecosystem, but the companies decided that further optimizations or refinements didn’t materially affect their goals. In other words, "good enough" was good enough. This is a shift in how I think about technical depth. I used to believe that mastering internals made you indispensable. Now I see that: You’re not measured on what you understand. You’re measured on what you produce—and whether it moves the needle.
The takeaway? Build enough expertise to be productive. Go deeper only when it’s necessary for the problem at hand. Focus on outcomes over architecture, and impact over elegance. CPython is essential. But understanding CPython internals isn’t essential unless it solves a problem that matters right now.
RedditSlayer2020@reddit
You just figurout capitalism. You are measured by how much revenue you generate now or in the foreseeable future. Capitalism kills true innovation and genius. Resist the ghoul class.
not_sane@reddit
What non-capitalist country do you think is worth emulating?
RedditSlayer2020@reddit
One that doesn't get terrorised by the unites states of America and their cucked puppet states
larsga@reddit
Do feel free to move to Russia. Nobody's stopping you. Enjoy!
HommeMusical@reddit
Wow, that comment would already have been a self-parody in the 1950s.
Given that Russia has now gone all in on Darwinian capitalism, it's almost incomprehensible in 2025.
larsga@reddit
This is a complete misunderstanding. There is no free capitalism in Russia. In Russia political connections determine who gets to own what business, so starting a business is highly risky, since if it is successful chances are high that it will be taken away from the founders. In fact, already over a decade ago, the most effective way to end up in prison in Russia was to start a business.
Pope4u@reddit
What you are describing is "crony capitalism" which is indeed a form of capitalism, wherein the authority of the state is used to direct resources to select participants. It's definitely not communism.
In fact, crony capitalism has worked out so well for Russia that the US has implemented it as well.
RedditSlayer2020@reddit
Russia is not a communist country.
not_sane@reddit
In principle you mean Cuba, but without sanctions? Or maybe Vietnam, but it is pretty capitalist these days.
Sufficient_Meet6836@reddit
The country that China is urging adopt market reforms in order to turn around their latest economic meltdown.
RedditSlayer2020@reddit
Reminder: This is a python sub I just answered out of kindness.
asphias@reddit
i currently work for a government institute in a european country. the value we work for is ''value to society'', not ''profit''.
even before changing the entire system, you can go work for government or nonprofit orgs, or start one yourself.
not_sane@reddit
It is not clear that non-profits are better for society than for-profits. Maybe you could make the claim that private companies that have monopolies are bad, but plenty of non-profits have huge wages and are extremely inefficient (only spend a single digit percentage of income on their mission).
asphias@reddit
sorry, i wasn't specific enough. look at e.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efteling or https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mondragon_Corporation
for examples of companies that do not have ''profit'' as their primary goal, and how succesful they are.
AdmRL_@reddit
European countries are capitalist..? He asked for non-capitalist.
asphias@reddit
it seemed to me like he was denouncing the previous comment. i read his comment as
''if you think capitalism is bad, please give me an example of a working communist country you'd prefer instead. because if you ask me they're all bad because communism sucks''.
i just provided them with examples of how you don't need an anti-capitalist country to avoid being a capitalist ghoul judged only by money
AdmRL_@reddit
And the comment he was replying to was blaming capitalism for everything...?
Your comment would be better stated in agreement with the person you replied to - neither of you agree with the original comment that Capitalism is at fault for America's failings and as you pointed out, our countries in Europe are examples of Capitalism that isn't paid with a human capital.
Sufficient_Meet6836@reddit
Nobody has responded to you with an actual example of a non-capitalist country that has been more innovative than capitalist countries. Weird!
Fun reminder of "innovation" under socialist regimes: Lysenkoism
Literal decades wasted on bad science because Darwinism was a "liberal doctrine" 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Kindly_Climate4567@reddit
Communism even more so: everyone who drives innovation or is a genius is a potential threat to the regime.
RedditSlayer2020@reddit
Is that hearsay? I lived in a how you call it communist/socialist regime for 20 years and innovation was rewarded. Its blatant speculation on your part fueled by capitalist/imperialist propaganda.
Sufficient_Meet6836@reddit
Which one?
henrystandinggoat@reddit
This assumes that there aren't multiple people on these teams that couldn't deliver more than people on teams that didn't see cuts. The truth is good management is rare and big companies can make thousands of bad small decisions and not be affected. Firing these people was just easier; moving people around and creating the most value is hard. Companies like MS are completely carried by cash cows from decades ago.
thegreattriscuit@reddit
The thing I take issue with here is the idea that those people have failed somehow. CPython or typscript core developers WILL BE FINE. They've got serious talent, and remarkable extremely public evidence of that fact. They'll be good. They lost this job, they will get another. Maybe they will continue to get paid to work on those projects, maybe not.
But getting laid off isn't some indicator that you have failed or made a mistake.
Maybe "being laid off and then later unable to get a new job" would be a signal you have moved in a bad direction. and "being laid off and it totally derails your life because you have zero margin and savings in your budget" is bad.
but "dude got laid off" -> "clearly their careers were build on a foundation of sand and you should never do what they did" is crazy.
qckpckt@reddit
The takeaway you should have from this is that you have absolutely no control over whether your employer will fire you or not, regardless of how valuable you are or how high quality your work is. And, that attempting to convince yourself otherwise in the manner that you seem to be is probably bad for your career and mental health.
You seem, like many people, to be clinging desperately to the belief that large organizations like Microsoft know what they’re doing and make difficult but sensible and well-informed decisions about who to lay off and when. They absolutely do not.
I have worked at or for many large multi-billion dollar organizations, and they are all equally mediocre in almost every measurable way, excluding their ability to (sometimes) make multi billions of dollars.
We live in a C- world. We do not live in a meritocracy. There are A+ people in it, but they are not in charge, because those people tend to have decency, principles and a moral code. It turns out that those are exploitable weaknesses, and as such the less scrupulous, the dull, the sycophantic and sociopathic are in charge because they simply lack the moral fiber to be disgusted at their own actions.
nnomae@reddit
If only there was some sort of organisations people could form, a union of employees if you would, that could give them some real leverage over their employers and the ability to act together for the betterment of all instead of constantly having to cross their fingers and pray they aren't the next on the chopping block.
qckpckt@reddit
I could see how unions could help, but the fundamental problem behind what wrote, I think, is that too few of us are willing to use our fucking brains.
A union can push back against the consequences of poor management choices, but if more people actually stopped for a second to think about implications, then there’d be less need to because companies would make fewer asinine decisions.
nnomae@reddit
The idea itself is kind of weak though. Microsoft has over 220k staff. Nobody there is indispensable. You see literal Nobel prize winners leave companies that size and they continue on without a blip. You can be indispensable to a small company, once the company, any company grows above the level of a couple thousand employees nobody is safe. In the entirety of Microsoft there won't be more than a handful of employees, if even that, that they couldn't replace in the morning if they had to. Yeah it might be an inconvenience but they could do it.
As for the CPython team, these guys were lauded in tech talks, their work was frequently promoted and hyped by Microsoft publically. When the company is using their main developer blog to talk about how valuable their work is and the benefit they were contributing what were they supposed to do? Somehow predict that the corporate winds would change and suddenly they would find themselves viewed as unnecessary overhead instead of as vital developer outreach?
qckpckt@reddit
It’s not about being indispensable, that’s not the point I was trying to make at all.
I have no doubt that Microsoft will continue to be profitable after this layoff. At no point was I trying to suggest otherwise.
Someone at Microsoft decided that they needed to let people go, and as part of that layoff decided to lay off a high caliber team doing pretty much universally well-regarded work. Probably among many other talented and dedicated staff. They obviously believe that these people aren’t necessary to the continued goals of the company. Or, frankly, they didn’t really think about this at all.
What this almost always means is basically “how can we improve our profit numbers this quarter compared to last quarter”. Theres little evidence of any provision being given to thinking about what would make Microsoft money beyond that.
Or, how much money might be saved, or earned, from technological refinements or advancement that the CPython team may have implemented.
What actually drives advancement is almost never something that directly makes money. It never has been. But the C- dullards in charge cannot conceive of anything else (actually, I’m sure they could if they used their fucking brains) and so here we are.
octotendrilpuppet@reddit
💯 This script was flipped in the F500 company I worked at for many many years until 2016 when a new CEO under and new mgmt took over. The company played the super long game and crushed competition for almost a 100 years, until a bunch of C-suite profit hustlers changed the paradigm to short-termism.
I wonder if it's the system we've setup that turns incentives to shit or if we're stuck momentarily in a tech stagnation paradigm where aggressive rent-seeking is the only way to quarterly profit growth. Anyway, AI is going to inevitably flip the script across the board in very unpredictable ways lol.
Amgadoz@reddit
Would you mind sharing the F500 company's name?)(maybe through dms) Would love to investigate this.
rcfox@reddit
How would a union help in this case? (Not anti-union, just clueless.)
nnomae@reddit
They can threaten a strike in cases where the company is firing people for no good reason such as for example a company like Microsoft that made $71 billion net profit last year and who spend $10 billion on a stock buyback trying to argue that they needed to sack 6,000 otherwise performing developers to make ends meet.
They could argue for better severance packages (makes it more expensive to sack people than retrain them), threaten a work to rule or an outright strike and so on. If nothing else they can make a stink, picket lines outside Microsoft HQ would not be a good look for the company for example.
Mostly unions just fight for a better deal for staff overall and they effectively give the employees a seat on the board.
vulgrin@reddit
Someone wise once told me: businesses are run by C students while the work is done by the A students.
SwillStroganoff@reddit
This raises the question (as a self proclaimed A student), who is smarter?
The_Tenebris_Charmer@reddit
The one with generational wealth.
Techdude_Advanced@reddit
💯 such is life. Protect your mental health people.
rioisk@reddit
The people in charge are clueless so stop following them.
nicheComicsProject@reddit
This is also why it's important to never allow yourself to "identify with" your company or get emotionally attached. "Loyalty" can only ever be a one way street. It's an abusing relationship if you give them more than you get out and what you don't get today you may never get at all.
SemanticSith@reddit
I tend to agree with most of this. The addition I would make is that the dynamics of this is far more social. In an organisation, in-groups and cliques are far more powerful than individuals. Indeed, those C minus individuals will gain and hold power by influencing the group.
Zimgar@reddit
I agree with your overall sentiment… but I don’t think it’s quite as bad everyone at the top is evil (which you don’t state but allude to), more we don’t know the information they have and the choices they need to make. That is the structures and incentives in place don’t enable the decisions that we would prefer people to make.
ForgottenWatchtower@reddit
I've always explained this in terms of game theory. Take two people equal in all ways except one has scruples, and the other is a sociopath. The latter has more strategies available, and thus will win out in competitions over the long term. Pretty much guarantees the world will only ever be run by the worst of us.
flxvctr@reddit
Not true in repeated coop games. Otherwise you, a multicellular organism, wouldn’t exist.
ForgottenWatchtower@reddit
It is. You're confusing "sociopath" with "psychopath". The former is not obligated to act maliciously. They are free to act exactly the same way as the scrupled individually, and reap the same benefits. But in addition, they are also free to adapt immoral strategies when it suits them.
The Prisoner's Dilemma makes many assumptions that don't map into real life. Such as betrayal always being worth less than cooperation, and players having perfect knowledge of every other player's choice. Don't get me, it's fascinating. But it's a narrow explanation of human behavior, not a model for the real world.
bunchedupwalrus@reddit
Depends on whether they start fresh in each encounter, and most don’t if I remember right?
I know they’ve done simulations showing altruistic but assertive behaviour still wins out
flxvctr@reddit
Yes: https://youtu.be/mScpHTIi-kM?si=7nZN1249EtBtrTL0
MirthMannor@reddit
To add to this: you also have zero control over whether your employer goes out of business or not.
ScroogeMcDuckFace2@reddit
so much wisdom in this post
Goldziher@reddit
💯
ChoiceAttorney5665@reddit
Exactly this. I advise junior engineers to well at work, but ALSO invest in their hobbies, family, friends, or “nights and weekends” projects.
Lumpy-Philosopher-93@reddit
I would also advise them to keep their resume updated and apply for jobs even if they're not planning on quitting their current position. Also I would suggest starting a going to hell fund in case things start going to hell.
shopify_app_builder@reddit
The last line hit hard
Sigmatics@reddit
Phew this rings so true. Unfortunately nature has a tendency to not put the "nice" agents in charge, but those that are good at getting what they want
ingframin@reddit
As usual, the main problem is management and the way publicly traded companies work.
maxblasdel@reddit
they don't call it the C-suite for nothing.
qckpckt@reddit
The minus is silent
brunchpoems@reddit
probably the best Reddit comment I’ve ever seen
shexyxx@reddit
Be your own entrepreneur, change the world for the better.
Electronic-Duck8738@reddit
In short, you have zero value as a human being to a for-profit company. Zero.
Accept that and act accordingly.
MsonC118@reddit
Exactly this. I’ve been there done that so many times like I’m sure everyone in here has. We often put people on a pedestal or give the benefit of the doubt when we shouldn’t. C-Suite, Management, VP’s, etc… are all still people, just like you and I. We all make mistakes, we all make stupid decisions, and we aren’t perfect.
black_dorsey@reddit
100% this
FistBus2786@reddit
Preach! So true..
russ_ferriday@reddit
Saved. Excellent summary of it all.
_Answer_42@reddit
I saved this too in printed format, save this comment in case you lose the above one, send me a message and I'll fax you the paper format
chengannur@reddit
Dang.. That last para :-(
pratzc07@reddit
Damn this guy speaks the real truth. You deserve all the upvotes
MeroLegend4@reddit
👆
1939728991762839297@reddit
Accurate
thinkscience@reddit
there is a research that shows sociopaths make good leaders !! and always remember you are a number on an excel sheet in large corps !
neddie_nardle@reddit
"We live in a C- world" is something that could be construed two ways. We live in a C minus world. True. We live in a C suite world - as in a world of managers and executives. Also true.
Amazing the number of business where those who actually contribute, those at the coalface doing the real work are utterly unimportant compared to the mediocrities ruling them. And gawd help you if you, no matter how inadvertently, somehow upset the ego of the mediocre.
bliblufra@reddit
Perfectly worded. You spoke all the thoughts I had in mind
Low-Let-6337@reddit
Its literally as simple as this. If the public/ economy doesn't have demand for it, it will not be a good income winner. That simple doesnt matter how good you are at it or how well you do it, or how smart or brilliant or how many fingers you can put up your butt. If the people dont buy it it is of no use, and when you are making money you are providing for the public a good or service that in exchange they give you some of their money that was earned or given. If people don't feel the need or want to spend their money on that good/service, than it isn't of much use to the general public, and likely not a good career choice. If you can't decipher that I would say you aren't brilliant to begin with.
theacodes@reddit
I mean I'm cool with everything you said- good overall advice and such, but it is important to note that they weren't laid off because they didn't deliver clear, measurable business impact. They were laid off because of shitty leadership that focuses on short term gains that make investors happy. At a company as vast and wealthy as Microsoft, headcount is a neverending shell game that is entirely divorced from profit.
MagicWishMonkey@reddit
That's true for all organizations, if you value having a job you have to learn how to play the game.
deadwisdom@reddit
Def, you are both right. Capitalism is dumb, but you still have to learn how to play it.
AllOSGuy@reddit
In answer to the co-pilot prompt "What is the moral philosophy of a capitalist economic system?"
Capitalism, as an economic system, is deeply tied to certain moral philosophies, though these vary depending on interpretation and historical context. At its core, capitalism is built on principles like individual freedom, private property, and voluntary exchange. Here are a few key moral philosophies often associated with capitalism:
**Libertarianism and Individual Autonomy** – Capitalism emphasizes the right of individuals to make economic choices. The belief here is that free markets allow people to pursue their own interests and goals without excessive government interference.
**Meritocracy and Hard Work** – A common moral argument for capitalism is that it rewards hard work and innovation. Those who create value—through labor, entrepreneurship, or investment—are believed to earn their success in proportion to their contributions.
**Utilitarianism and Efficiency** – Some supporters argue that capitalism leads to the greatest overall good by efficiently allocating resources. Free markets, they claim, encourage competition, innovation, and economic growth, ultimately benefiting society.
**Moral Justifications for Wealth Inequality** – Capitalism allows for disparities in wealth, which some argue is justified by differences in effort, risk-taking, and contribution to economic growth. Others challenge this, questioning the moral implications of extreme inequality.
**Consumer Choice and Sovereignty** – A moral defense of capitalism is that it empowers consumers. By allowing individuals to choose what they buy, capitalism is viewed as a system that respects personal preferences and autonomy.
Critics, however, argue that capitalism can lead to exploitation, excessive materialism, and social inequalities that challenge these moral defenses. The debate over capitalism’s moral philosophy is ongoing and deeply tied to broader discussions about fairness, justice, and human well-being.
What are your thoughts on this? Or perhaps the Answer that Winston Churchill gave when asked what he thought of it, " Capitalism is the worst system, except for all the others that came before it."
It makes me wonder what comes after Capitalism?
MagicWishMonkey@reddit
I really feel that it's important for people to treat their career as an ongoing project. Always look for ways to expand your scope/expertice and grow your skills horizontally rather than going super deep in any specific thing. Be wary of letting yourself get too comfortable.
That's not to say you need to hustle or be one of those annoying people on linkedin, but just don't fall into the "hey I have a job so I don't need to worry about career stuff" mindset.
ECrispy@reddit
do they still have stack ranking - where a certain % of people will always get reviewed as under performing, just to fit a curve?
Such-Let974@reddit
Is this actually based on something or are you just repeating the cope that other posts previously speculated about?
theacodes@reddit
I mean c'mon, dude. They laid off exactly 6,000 all at once. Use Occam's razor. You think they came up with that number bottom up or top down? You think they took the time to find the people that contributed the least to the bottom line or do you think they added people to a spreadsheet until they hit the number? You get fired for poor performance, you get laid off in a block of thousands because of C suite bullshit.
Such-Let974@reddit
That has fuck all to do with what I said. MS doing a blanket clearing out of a whole department doesn't in any way suggest it was for some investor perception thing rather than deciding a project wasn't worth the investment and also just getting rid of the whole thing.
Please, I want to live in a world where everybody isn't maximally stupid.
Shwayne@reddit
How can you say headcounts are divorced from profit right after saying that lay offs happened because of focus on short term gains lol
HommeMusical@reddit
The point is that these people were fired in order to juice short-term, quarterly results, but in the long term, investments in workers tools are almost always very profitable.
(I've been on the Internet for a very long time now, and yet one thing continues to be the same: comments that use the word "lol" are generally poorly thought-out.)
Such-Let974@reddit
Where are you guys getting this? Is this just speculation based on the fact that you can't come up with a better explanation for why MS would de-prioritize these projects? Or is there some actual evidence that firing these teams somehow had a huge short term financial impact on their quarterly results?
Shwayne@reddit
In other words, short term profit lol?
dparks71@reddit
I actually agree as a former F500 manager. Microsoft is so large, their services so complex and their revenue and expense streams so complicated that any headcount reduction is basically a good will gesture to the investors to say "hey, we're doing something".
People act like they do advanced analysis on reliable metrics to say "this reduction in expenses by y will affect our revenue by x resulting in z benefit for our shareholders.", but the reality is large businesses don't work like that.
They say "the shareholders are mad, what can we do to calm them down in the immediate future?" and sit in a room and kill arbitrary projects, usually by using a filter button in an excel sheet until they reach a pre-agreed upon number they feel the shareholders will be satisfied with and they won't try to force the board to do a leadership realignment.
Ozzy-@reddit
Sure, I don't think this really invalidates anything OP said though. Engineers are not above "politics and feels". Politics play out in code reviews, and a keen "gut check" is a quality consistently demonstrated by every A-grade engineer I've worked with.
No_Toe_1844@reddit
…in other words, the team failed to deliver measurable impact.
liquidpele@reddit
Having interviewed some people from MS... they need these layoffs, holy hell they have hired some real sacks of potatoes over there.
dubious_capybara@reddit
It's not divorced from profit at all. Each manager is accountable for their team's (perceived) contribution to profitability.
BosonCollider@reddit
They claimed to pivot towards AI while firing their director of AI. I would not read too much into anything they do
dubious_capybara@reddit
Getting rid of unproductive managers doesn't contradict investing in that area.
BosonCollider@reddit
Well, I guess getting rid of senior devs mean you do lose the ability to write code that AI could not write and therefore is a kind of pivot to AI
Ashamed-Simple-8303@reddit
Perceived. Thats the keyword and it means that poltics and social skills matter way way more than technical expertise.
dubious_capybara@reddit
Right. So, not divorced from profit.
turbothy@reddit
"Perceived" doing a lot of heavy lifting here.
Funny-Recipe2953@reddit
This. Yes.
AntiqueFigure6@reddit
Adding to what others have already said, it’s important to realise that the people making decisions like this at a place like Microsoft have zero visibility into the quality of work produced by any of the people just laid off. They’ve simply looked at certain market trends and judged a metric they think is important is more achievable without those teams than with them.
daveythemechanic@reddit
This post is clearly either ChatGPT generated, or written by someone who has a ChatGPT addiction. Not surprising, given that this rash of programmer layoffs is driven by reliance on these so-called “AI” models.
Tintoverde@reddit
I have seen so many posts accusing others of using AI for Reddit posts. How do you know ?
daveythemechanic@reddit
I actually had ChatGPT do this one to kind of double-emphasize the point.
“You can usually spot GenAI writing a mile away because it’s weirdly perfect in all the wrong ways. Like, the grammar is flawless, the sentences flow, and the tone is unfailingly polite or “helpful”—but it often lacks any real voice. It’s as if someone trained a customer service rep to write a college essay after reading a bunch of Wikipedia articles.
There’s also this uncanny uniformity to it. GenAI tends to hedge constantly (“While there are many perspectives...”), over-qualify everything, and serve up an introduction-body-conclusion structure even when it’s not necessary. Even when it’s casual, it’s studied casual, like a robot trying to imitate banter it read in a tech blog’s comment section.
The irony is that GenAI has been trained on real human writing, but it ends up producing stuff that no actual human would write unless they were trying really hard to sound neutral, informative, and slightly bland. It’s the linguistic version of the uncanny valley—close enough to human to recognize, but just off enough to feel wrong.”
mycoffecup@reddit
One of the things I've learned the hard way having been in IT my adult career is besides investing enough in your technical skills (whatever they may be), it's prudent to build a residual or leveraged residual cashflow that is completely separate from your job so that if you lose your paycheck you can still pay your bills without having to dig through your savings.
We've all seen companies lay professionals off even when they were skilled. This is normal now.
RearAdmiralP@reddit
A couple of years ago, another senior guy and I had just finished up some high profile projects, so we were free to do new things. Our boss particularly liked some of the code we had written in our respective projects, and he invited us to take that code and make it available in libraries for internal use.
We work for a hedge fund. Everything is about profit and loss (PnL). While we were working on the library project, my colleague made an observation: "We're getting a little bit far from the PnL." I got the implication. If the guys doing the trading are making the PnL, and the teams providing the tools they use are one step away from PnL, and the teams providing support for them are two steps away, etc., we, with our little library project, were not even in the same room as the PnL. It's not the best position to be in for career purposes.
These days, I work on a trading critical system, and he's working on a project with a major institutional push behind it, and we both feel secure in our positions.
Anyway, those Microsoft guys fell into the trap that we avoided. They got too far from the PnL, so they were disposable when it came time to make cuts.
octotendrilpuppet@reddit
I don't see this movie playing out well lol. In the end, you'll be left with tech debt, lack of tech wisdom and depth, the systems and expertise required for innovation and so on.
I've seen this play out a F500 company I worked at. C-suite was entirely an MBA profit hustler class with their skills misaligned to their core engineering product, tone deaf and not sensitized to technical jargon, so they're not sniffing out danger signals. End result? Many programs got delayed because the talent pool is haemorrhaged, there's very few Yodas left to navigate choppy waters, and many programs are started and stopped whimsically burning frontline people out, AI is treated like "another tool in the toolbox" and so on.
TraceyRobn@reddit
In the old days, big companies had RnD departments. They researched new technologies, things that wouldn't make money for a few years. This sort of research gave us information theory, the transistor, C, and Unix.
These days the time horizon is the next quarter's results and the latest buzzword (AI at the moment).
We've eaten our seed corn.
cheesecakegood@reddit
Part of the layoffs is due to the fact that current law means that R&D has unfavorable tax implications (must be amortized over a few years), because a congressional bill allowing full same-year writeoffs expired.
No_Cartographer1492@reddit
can you ELI5?
cheesecakegood@reddit
The below answer covered it basically. Actually, the R&D provision expiring this year from the 2017 bill was intended originally as a "poison pill" to give incentivize renewing the Trump tax cuts.
The numbers are actually a big deal. Re-fixing the R&D stuff approximately triples the tax relief provided by R&D spending.
Generally speaking almost everyone is happy when R&D is cheaper - it means more hiring, and although the government gets less money directly, in practice you'd rather this money go directly back into the real economy than to the government. Also, with worse tax treatment, firms are more likely to just sit on their cash piles instead of hiring people for future expansion
Affectionate-Bid386@reddit
Gemini AI answer, maybe not quite ELY5 ...
The unfavorable tax treatment of software R&D that was introduced a few years back in the USA stems from changes made to Section 174 of the Internal Revenue Code as part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017.
Prior to the TCJA:
Companies could immediately deduct Research and Experimental (R&E) expenses, including software development costs, in the year they were incurred. This encouraged investment in innovation.
Alternatively, businesses could choose to capitalize and amortize these costs over a period of time (e.g., five years). Software development costs had even faster amortization options.
The Change:
For tax years beginning after December 31, 2021, the TCJA requires companies to capitalize and amortize R&E expenses, including software development costs.
This means businesses can no longer immediately deduct these expenses. Instead, they must spread the deductions over a period of time:
Five years for R&E conducted in the United States.
Fifteen years for R&E conducted outside the United States.
Impact of the Change:
Increased Tax Burden: The change significantly increased the tax liability for many companies, especially those heavily invested in R&D. Some companies ended up paying taxes even in loss years.
Cash Flow Issues: The immediate impact on cash flow was substantial because companies couldn't deduct expenses upfront.
Disincentive for Innovation: The new rules reduced the financial incentive to invest in R&D, potentially hindering innovation.
Competitive Disadvantage: Compared to some other countries that provide more generous tax incentives for R&D, this change put US companies at a disadvantage.
Economic Impact: Some businesses were forced to freeze hiring, suspend projects, or even consider layoffs to cope with the increased tax burden.
Rationale for the Change:
The change was primarily implemented to offset the cost of other tax cuts in the TCJA. It was expected to generate significant revenue for the government.
Current Status:
There is widespread bipartisan support for restoring immediate R&D expensing. However, legislative efforts to address the issue have been unsuccessful so far.
Many are hopeful that the situation will be addressed as part of the 2025 tax debate.
In summary, the change in tax treatment for software R&D introduced by the TCJA has had a negative impact on many businesses, increasing their tax burden, hindering innovation, and potentially affecting their ability to compete globally.
Blake_Dake@reddit
companies still have that
microsoft announced some weeks ago that after 20 years of research, they have a working 8 qubit cpu, or whatever it was, called majorana I
google have an r&d department of 5k people iirc
bible_near_you@reddit
To be fair, only exceptional companies could possibly afford those things for a short while. Competition will catch up, monopoly will be broken. Next Google maybe is forming but that's rare.
zazzersmel@reddit
eliminated from both government and corporate purview... in the us at least. but hey im sure were gonna do a hell lot with a bajillion gpus decades down the road right?
vexatious-big@reddit
Well said. There's a good article on exactly this here:
https://1517.substack.com/p/why-bell-labs-worked
onedertainer@reddit
This is the best advice for employees here in the replies. Never be too far from the PnL. Public corporations aren't universities and they are interested in R&D only to the extent that they can see that it is or will be creating value.
Diligent_Day8158@reddit
But what’s the point if all we do is sustain what works? That’s not how real growth happens right? American economy has been getting ruthlessly slashing R&D for a long time now and tech is catching up to that theme.
Odd_Seaweed_5985@reddit
Lol, the C-suite losers haven't figured that out yet!
bigly87@reddit
I have some questions about trading critical systems that mention. Can i Dm?
HommeMusical@reddit
Quarterly P&L. That's why these short-sighted, stupid decision continue. Having better tools almost always pays off even in the medium-term.
pythosynthesis@reddit
I was laid off in the past for doing exactly what my boss asked me to do, which was to implement a new model for the desk that would have been used down the line to support the business initiatives, but the cuts came "now", not "down the line". Guess how much PnL I had to show for my work. My boss even apologized a few years later.
papawish@reddit
Last year my team has seen layoffs. Almost all teams affected.
My team has had 2 net hires lol. We are the golden goose.
Follow the money and stay tied to it
import_awesome@reddit
Work on projects that make money or could make money. Don't waste your time on projects that never make money because they will get cut when the budget shrinks.
prescod@reddit
You are looking at this in too shallow terms. Yes these people were laid off. Will they still be unemployed six months from now? A year from now?
Now compare them to someone who has the generic skills needed to build generic apps that directly make money. The people competing with millions of recently laid off developers with those same skills.
It is not obvious to me that the generic programmer will be more quickly re-employed.
scilente@reddit
This is AI generated, yeah?
Lord_ShitShittington@reddit
Yep, usual GPT tone.
makingplans12345@reddit
So obvious now
moneygobur@reddit
AI is coming for all software engineers jobs. Start making your Plan B’s now.
Sherpaman78@reddit
You are right, and everyone is right, but it is not a natural law, it is a law of Capitalism.
Your value, in Capitalism, is not measured by your expertise or knowledge, but by the value a company can extract from your labor.
Remove the "Capitalism" from the picture and it is not necessarily true anymore.
Cytokine_storm@reddit
Nah, this is true for any society with resource scarcity.
BogdanPradatu@reddit
Just that Microsoft doesn't have a resource scarcity problem.
this_is_a_long_nickn@reddit
A natural one? Not at all.
An artificial “shareholder value at any cost” one? Absolutely yes.
Shensy-@reddit
Which is caused not by any real scarcity, but an artificial construct of...capitalism. Look at the pretty circle.
MagicWishMonkey@reddit
Do you invest your 401k into companies that don’t make money?
Shensy-@reddit
Fucking lol. Lmao even.
I make plenty of money but it ain't enough to help the people I love to not get fucked over every fucking day by the system trying to melt us all down into Peter Thiel's pocket lint. If society even exists when I can use it, a 401k isn't gonna mean shit.
Cytokine_storm@reddit
If only we all lived in the Soviet Union, which had no corporate dysfunction because it wasnt capitalist.
Cytokine_storm@reddit
Microsoft might not, but the individuals getting fired need to have some kind of income yeah? If no one needed to work for shit corps they wouldn't.
liquidpele@reddit
Remove "Capitalism" and there was no point to the job in the first place... enjoy the bread line?
tutami@reddit
Why would Microsoft care about them? When they need someone with that kind of expertise other monkeys gonna jump in a second.
jhaand@reddit
In Europe there are some politicians that say we should have the same software technology landscape as in the US to make a shitload of money. However the software we write over here is really succesfull. Just look at Linux, Python, Nextcloud, Vim and a few others. Unfortunately it doesn't make much money.
The biggest European software company is SAP. And that is only so large because they have a lot of customers that need a solution to optimize their production. Because we actually make stuff over here.
yairchu@reddit
The post insisting context. When were they laid off? Who employed them? I know I can google it but this is just very poor posting
vm_linuz@reddit
Capitalism!
Maximizing profit often minimizes well-being
pioniere@reddit
The perfect is the enemy of the good (enough).
CasualEarl@reddit
Focus on engineering expertise over single language or tool, be excellent and have the ability to adapt and bounce back.
Multi-billion companies don't have magical foresight on board level into what it will mean if people in Typescript teams are let go.
It's not you, you don't have control over that but you do have control over the narrative and story of what happened inside your head and you should always focus on being good ❤️
sammyraid@reddit
Ah! The old breadth over depth argument!
b-hizz@reddit
The python human ecosystem is susceptible to the issues that come with being entwined with academia/open source. Making something cool is worthy of appreciation, but coolness to a software engineer does not always translate to commercial significance. An important career skill is to keep an eye on where your work lies at any given time.
DoingItForEli@reddit
"If it ain't broke don't fix it" is the motto of so many companies.
shexyxx@reddit
Be your own entrepreneur, change the world for the better.
AggravatingBell4310@reddit
We are not just employer slave, if you want to dig a subject, do it, even if there will be no outcome for your employer. You just need to be enough productive to keep your job.
Sufficient_Meet6836@reddit
This thread
After the glorious revolution, we'll all be programmers with no deadlines or expectations!
Empanatacion@reddit
Apples and oranges. Microsoft was paying them to help everybody, not just Microsoft, so they didn't feel like they were spending on something giving THEM value.
But the bigger reason is that they don't give up anything concrete by firing them. CPython will get picked back up by someone, Microsoft will benefit from it, and they won't be paying.
therve@reddit
Not concrete, but that is still a PR failure. They were generating some good image recently with their work on Typescript and Python (and in comparison to other tech giants getting shittier and shittier). This puts them back quite a bit (where they should have remained to be honest).
Empanatacion@reddit
I don't think it will hurt the number of Office365 subscriptions much.
Comprehensive-Pin667@reddit
Not office365. But Azure is a very important source of income and the people who make the decisions whether to host in Azure, Amazon or Google may be technical people who care. Which is why this good reputation that they were getting made sense.
usererroralways@reddit
I highly doubt that the layoff would serve as a material factor, if a factor at all, in the decision to select Azure, Amazon, or GCP as a cloud vendor. A major security breach might influence such a decision, but this event does not appear to be substantial enough to make a difference.
therve@reddit
They hire thousands of devs per year. Each ones cost several thousands to hire. Make this a tad harder to do because you messed up your community image has a non negligible impact.
Schmittfried@reddit
That’s a couple million at worst. Assuming the decrease in interested candidates is even noticeable. Negligible.
rowr@reddit
They've still got Guido on the payroll.
szayl@reddit
Fuck PR, get money
james_pic@reddit
I'm not sure this is a foregone conclusion. Or at least, I'm not sure that someone else will pick up the JIT work that the Microsoft team was doing. The community is big enough that routine maintenance will end up being done once way or another, but the JIT work is big enough that it needs to be one or more people's day jobs for a couple of years.
bestjaegerpilot@reddit
i like working on tooling but those are the first to go. The issue is companies focus on the short term. In this particular example, they're not measuring how TS has been making their org more productive.
If you squint, this also marks the end of TS. It's gotten so complex only a well-funded company will maintain it but that well-funded company just said the hell with it.
It's gonna be a wild west w/ peeps trying to make Rust/Go/C a thing via web assembly.
b1e@reddit
It depends. Tooling that immediately impacts productivity and enables $$$? Usually much safer.
Tooling that only very indirectly helps in some way? Risky.
bestjaegerpilot@reddit
uh typescript arguably enables productivity and yet here we are. they don't care.
related: never been a fan of MS products for this reason
WowSpaceNshit@reddit
The takeaway you should have is that ai coding is better than any human now and will only get better. The people resisting ai coding and calling it “vibe coding” and “ai slop” are the people who depend on their own ability to code and gatekeep the skill until now. The people against ai coding and who don’t use those tools are the Luddite’s of today and will fall to the wayside compared to those who use the ai tools and don’t need to have a deep deep understanding of a certain language.
daveythemechanic@reddit
I have a single semester of coding experience, and my code works better than the crap my classmates were getting from ChatGPT.
The actual, historical Luddites weren’t against technology. They were opposed to the degradation of labor rights and product quality that came with new manufacturing technology. The English death penalty was brought back from legal obscurity to punish them, and they were hanged for their defense of human craftsmanship and the dignity of their fellow workers.
WowSpaceNshit@reddit
Found one 😆
daveythemechanic@reddit
Oh no! You’ve got me! I haven’t cauterized my own ability to problem solve and outsourced it to the lying machine :/ guess I’ll just have to fall by the wayside :/
WowSpaceNshit@reddit
lol I mean well, I think it IS important to have a good understanding of different languages and how they look etc, because if you don’t then the ai tools won’t be of much use. You do need to have a certain level of understanding to use ai tools efficiently and not generate pure ai slop, but actually use ai to help with time efficiency, debugging, etc. if you rely solely on ai to do it all then your not using the tools right. They should be used in concert with your own knowledge and abilities to give YOURSELF super intelligence by leveraging ai tools. I hope that makes sense
UltraPoci@reddit
The takeaway is: fuck Capitalism.
KrazyKirby99999@reddit
Without Capitalism, there would be no Faster CPython investment in the first place.
Consistent-Quiet6701@reddit
Do you know how Python was started?
KrazyKirby99999@reddit
At a public research lab.
I'm referring to Faster CPython in particular, not Python as a whole. Faster CPython was primarily funded and developed by Microsoft.
Consistent-Quiet6701@reddit
No it was a hobby project that Guido van Rossum started without a profit motive. According to people like you Python should never have come into existence.
KrazyKirby99999@reddit
That's objectively false, check the Python website yourself - https://docs.python.org/3/faq/general.html#why-was-python-created-in-the-first-place
Guido wanted a better language for his work on Amoeba at CWI.
The Faster CPython project was created and crippled by Microsoft.
Consistent-Quiet6701@reddit
So Mr. profit motive, where did Guido expect to get monetary compensation for his work? He created the language to make his and his colleagues life's easier, not because he wanted to make a profit.
KrazyKirby99999@reddit
You're arguing with a strawman, I never said anything about monetary compensation or profit motive.
The Faster CPython project only existed because of Microsoft. "Capitalism" may have ended Faster CPython, but "Capitalism" also started Faster CPython.
thinkscience@reddit
they had differences, industry is going towards rust and go and investment into python felt like diminishing returns !
i860@reddit
Clueless.
i860@reddit
Counterpoint: laying off people involved with deep internals and implementation level details of the language that depends on it is suicidal.
ufos1111@reddit
Even microsoft thinks javascript is better than typescript these days lol
grandimam@reddit (OP)
Just curious, how did you arrive at that conclusion?
ufos1111@reddit
joking cause they fired typescript maintainers
nukem996@reddit
I know some very good engineers that went product because it's better long term to follow the money. Once you know maximizing profit is the only goal it can make decisions much easier.
grandimam@reddit (OP)
When you said product? You mean Product Management or Product Engineer?
Kindly_Climate4567@reddit
Working directly on a money making product, not in a support role that is a cost centre.
nukem996@reddit
Yes this. It's much easier career wise to focus on profit only than code quality. Your review is did you work on something that increased profit and by how much? Diff count, optimizations, tests, and pretty much anything else go out the window. AA lot of code in product is viewed as throw away.
btoor11@reddit
My man, you’re either a karma farming bot or got your whole spiel written by a chatbot.
Your opinions do not matter. Because I’d be damned if I take career advice from someone who doesn’t even have the skills to write a coherent opinion without a handhold from Ai.
grandimam@reddit (OP)
English is not my primary language. So, I did use Grammarly freemium for correcting the grammar mistakes. Will do it better next time. Thanks
btoor11@reddit
The hard truth: your post just feels like it came straight out of an LLM — not because of wording or grammar, but rather it has all the quirks of how a chat bot would write in order to imitate a post made by a human.
The sad part? I use Grammarly too.
Now that I know you're not a bot, I apologize for coming in too hard. But I'm witnessing a platform that I love enshittified by its own users. I'd rather see dumb opinions and dumb grammars than perfect posts made by Ai.
Because if I wanted to talk to a chatbot I would've gone to ChatGPT, not Reddit.
grandimam@reddit (OP)
No worries. I didn’t take it personally.
twizzjewink@reddit
I was once let go where I was the lynch pin of the department because my useless boss didn't like that I wasn't a yes person. The department collapsed shortly after.. he got transferred to a different department. I think everyone else was disposable.
Corporate loyalty is overrated
fullouterjoin@reddit
Microsoft is no friend of Python and no friend of labor. They are literally making hand over fist, throwing money around like candy on Halloween and still they fire these compiler teams (while at the same time gutting many employees with 20+ years of loyal work).
Boycott MS.
dada-engineer@reddit
On the other hand these people have such deep expertise that they are likely to easily find a job. Not sure if this is true when you are scratching the surface of all the things
pratzc07@reddit
I doubt this is as easy as it looks to be honest. As OP said most companies don't care about experts if they can get another candidate that has some expertise of the domain and its right for their current work they would go with that candidate rather than overpaying for an expert.
kylotan@reddit
The problem with that is, while it's very good career advice, it's not ideal for the development of technology that requires deep understanding and solid foundations.
A lot of the problem we have in computing, from critical ones like security, to less critical but widespread ones like poor performance, come from people focusing on shipping first and correctness later.
There needs to be a better way.
pratzc07@reddit
Yes, but you also need to bring food on the table. Current climate as OP says is that if you cannot produce any "value" you are deemed worthless even though what you are working on could be something that produces a lot of benefit in the future.
Miserable_Bad_2539@reddit
You can also look at it as getting paid for some number of years to do something you wanted to do while developing advanced skills on someone else's dime. I'm sure their work was more fun than relentlessly chasing job security by always taking on the least risky, least interesting projects. And I doubt any of these folks will have too hard of a time finding a new job.
looneysquash@reddit
The hard truth is that this is just another example of short sighted selfishness destroying the world.
A better Typescript compiler is a tide that rises all boats, but the board and shareholders want to raise their own boat above the rest.
Rather than seeking to always appear valuable to the fickle corporate overlords, you should seek your own power.
Form a union. Organize. And vote for representatives who will have your back.
Inside_Jolly@reddit
Or unless it makes you avoid creating new problems.
pbecotte@reddit
Can't help but wonder if open source is on the way out. Tragedy of the commons and all that- the fundamental technologies it's more cost effective to hope someone else builds it for you.
BosonCollider@reddit
No, in the case of microsoft this is like 1 million a year for improvements that save them billions in operating costs. This is 100% a non technical manager problem
oxidiovega@reddit
It just taught me that Capitalism is gonna be the end of us pretty damn soon at this rate. but Hey, at least we are deriving business value for the share holders
adappergentlefolk@reddit
and you produce sloppy chatgpt generated posts OP
LaughingIshikawa@reddit
It's is both true and not true.
As a professional, you're applying your expertise to the problem, in order to come up with a solution for whomever is paying you. Deeper expertise means you can more often come up with better solutions for more people - faster solutions, cheaper solutions, more performant solutions... It's good in a broad sense.
I think you're more right than you're wrong though: companies are short sighted, and if anything they have been getting more shortsighted recently. To some degree that's necessary focus, but in many ways it's lack of vision. Regardless, it's far safer as a professional if you're able to demonstrate the immediate value of your work - ie tangible momentary benefits tomorrow, the next week, or next quarter.
SeamusTheBuilder@reddit
This is a bleak, dark view of the world. Let's play this out, what if everyone did this, where is the innovation? Where is the curiosity?
This is a middle management view of the world and I encourage you to rethink some things.
HeavyMaterial163@reddit
Welcome to capitalism. So long as we encourage profit motive, workers will never be safe and will always be overworked and underpaid.
geneusutwerk@reddit
This feels like a LinkedIn post
ChinCoin@reddit
The tech industry has just become a shitty place to work in, in the sense that you have no stability. Almost all companies employ the "how do we make our quarterly results better by firing people approach". This is the new normal and it sucks.
Eu-is-socialist@reddit
If only that would be the case.
ShepardRTC@reddit
Honestly, I lost a lot of respect for Microsoft for doing this. And doing it while the team was off to a conference. Cowardice the entire way.
yangzhou1993@reddit
Job security is dead in the age of AI.
Jubijub@reddit
In one sentence : always understand the link between your work and where you paycheck comes from (ie where the company earns the money that pays you). The more convoluted / unclear that link is, the more you are at risk if a down cycle or vicious cost cutting exercise occurs.
No_Challenge_9867@reddit
Just chill. They must have by now have got absorbed in different roles or will get soon in Microsoft itself.
Wh00ster@reddit
This is great, but also like basic knowledge 101.
It’s why research does not pay well unless it’s been clearly monetized.
DadAndDominant@reddit
That has always been the truth. Meritocracy is a lie, because there is no merit; your value is only measured as the difference betweeen the costs to hire you (input) and costs of what you produce (output).
Real late stage capitalism just isn't meant for humans to participate in, just a selected few to reap all the benefits. It is commimg faster and faster.
floriv1999@reddit
While what you said is generally true, there are a few other things to consider. Mainly short vs. long term profits and the size of the organization. For optimization work larger orgs benefit a lot more. If e.g. somebody squeezes out half a percent in performance this means millions of dollars saved for an org like Microsoft. You can easily calculate it if you have their internal data on it, so it is a measurable profit. Therefore it makes a direct impact. But it might take some time to add up, making it more of a medium to long term investment. In a startup having somebody on the CPython or TS team would not make so much sense, because they have less cost associated to running these languages in production, so the upfront cost of paying them their salary is not worth it. But somebody else can always optimize it right? As the salary is pretty negligible compared to the savings you are better of being in control of what is implemented when, giving you the most gains and also the highest (soft) power in the project, which can be useful for many things. Then there is PR. Companies like MS have giant PR teams for more or less appealing PR campaigns. I think doing stuff like developing TS benefits the perception of MS in the technical community. It is relatively cheap PR for them. Remember Advertising etc. are really expensive.
But why do they still lay them off? Because managers are also humans and doing layoffs is tending and cool now. We are way less rational then we always think we are. Also internal politics in large organizations are a whole different beast. It could be the case that the teams are paid for by a different part of the organization then then one who benefits in the end. Managers mostly decide what's best for them and their part of the organization, compared to the organization as a whole long term. So paying for somebody who benefits another part of the org makes no sense for how their side of the business looks on paper. And maybe in the end some decisions are just stupid and made by people who rose in the hierarchy without being very competent. That also happens a lot on large organizations.
mm_reads@reddit
Or just stop providing technology for profit-only capitalism.
Better yet, start gunking up AI.
AI is just a tool. Until it is a tool FOR people, and not a dehumanizing & destructive environmental force, it's just a weapon to expedite human misery.
florinandrei@reddit
TLDR: Not making the rich people even more rich? Chop-chop your head.
fgiohariohgorg@reddit
That's Capitalism: you get what you deserve, as long as you're convenient for me. Sad that people are dumb enough to just care for $
SEC_INTERN@reddit
Obviously ChatGPT generated post.
grandimam@reddit (OP)
Not entirely. But I did use Grammar correction tools for help.
fredandlunchbox@reddit
This isn’t always true.
In times of abundance focused on growth, research, optimization, and structure gain importance.
numerical_panda@reddit
Buying impact using technical debt.
charmquark8@reddit
The takeaway: unfettered capitalism is shit.
jake_morrison@reddit
It’s not about business value. Managers would have more, relatively junior/average developers than fewer, more highly skilled developers. This lets them build a fiefdom with more people/budget. And they want cheaper, more disposable developers with less leverage.
float34@reddit
Yeah right, then these fuckers ask you to go "extra mile" for nothing, to prove your dedication.
tthrivi@reddit
This is where innovation dies. Fed is pulling away. Companies don’t want to fund long term projects. Decline of the US as a leader of innovation and technologies.
Fabulous-Possible758@reddit
Yep, people are just resources to be allocated by a company and most of the time the people making the decisions will use apparent revenue as a qualifying factor when cutting costs. That’s… every job in corporate America.
edeltoaster@reddit
A hard but reasonable truth.
BogdanPradatu@reddit
The hard, but reasonable truth is that no matter how good you are, how hard you work, how passionate you are, all it takes is a few percent drop in stock price and you're gone.
I bet there are less capable employees in Microsoft than these guys, that haven't been layed off. They could have fired some other guys and replace them with these experts, but they didn't.
The python guys were hired to work on CPython, that was their job. If Microsoft felt like it doesn't bring value to them anymore, they could have repurpuse them, but they didn't.
Most people don't get to choose on what project they work on. It's just chance.
grandimam@reddit (OP)
Yes.
BirdTurglere@reddit
Those people can probably walk into another job though. And with inflation being the way it has been they’ll probably get a pay boost doing so.
Not trying to down play layoffs. Some of those people might have wanted to settle down etc and that’s definitely unfortunate. Microsoft’s loss for always chasing hype.
But if there were only 100 python jobs left on the planet they’d be in a good spot for them.
Just being a grunt doesn’t give you that security.
SailingToOrbis@reddit
Yeah the business executives never give a shit about how good the technology is, but all they care is how much money that you can make out of it.
ElderberryPrevious45@reddit
In other words : In life it matters more what you do than what you dream of. Also, some dreams are wiser to leave that way, just dreams, because you never know all.
t1x07@reddit
Well said, I think it's one of the hardest things for programmers to actually focus on the value proposition of their work because it's so easy to get lost in optimising and tweaking things. There's a reason why there's so many memes about programmers spending hours to automated tasks that take minutes
Ok-Willow-2810@reddit
I don’t disagree with what you said! Just being very, very knowledgeable in a highly specific domain doesn’t guarantee that all work in that area is worthwhile. Work needs to bring value to a company. However, I’m also a little unsure of what the longer term impact of this sort of thing is. I for one really appreciate open source and community works and I think it makes the ecosystem better. Will this noticeably shrink the ecosystem over the next 5 years? If it does, would that have a negative impact on future market share? I don’t know how to answer that question and there’s many other factors and it’s really tough to measure. However, it also makes me wonder if things that are easier to measure and point to clear value are always the best strategy? It could be that some more complicated things to explain or see the impact of have a lot of value, but it’s simply tough to explain. I’d caution against assuming something is tough to explain or too specific doesn’t bring value. That being said, I have no way easy way to know or measure whether these layoffs fall into the category I explained and how it truly affects profitability for Microsoft.
I see it as Microsoft maybe placing less value on helping the open source community, which I personally don’t love. Maybe it won’t necessarily be bad for the open source community though in the long run? Maybe it will. I don’t know how to know that, but I like open source and I don’t like seeing layoffs. Wish the economy was simply undeniably booming!