How (reasonable is it to try) to start a tech career for a privacy-respecting entity?

I only have warehouse mgmt work experience(which means all IT responsibilities fall on me), but I can't keep away from various programming projects.

I've only dipped into the privacy-sphere of software in the last 2 years, but I've found a earnest passion in my pursuits. My obsessiveness has bled into most friends asking why I haven't pivoted my career, and I don't have a good answer other than I assumed there's no money to be made in it since I never finished my college CS degree.

I will code and continue my projects regardless, but was hoping this community could offer some advice or there experiences with similar endeavors. Thanks

just_another_person,

Do some writeups and post them online, get a public GitHub presence going, and link all those together from some central homepage or LinkedIn or whatever you like. Then try to land some interviews.

tisktisk,

Solid--I like this course of action. If I have an old Github with long bouts of inactivity, would it be better to build a presence with that account or start anew?

just_another_person,

You don’t need to even make your activity public, just someplace people can see relevant stuff you’ve been working on.

Fork some repos, contribute some PRs to some projects you like, and generate some activity if you’d like though. People love to see that.

toastal,

Privacy

Microsoft social media: GitHub & LinkedIn

Which is it?

just_another_person,

Well use whatever you want, the point is showing you have code out there, which is inherently NOT a very privacy-centric act.

toastal,

Exactly. Our words matter & the sooner we stop using Google to mean search or MS GitHub to mean code, the sooner we can start shifting the narritive towards entities that better respect our privacy or even gasp self-hosting. Word choice for social change is just as important for spreading the message.

cows_are_underrated,

Can you suggest some good alternatives for github?

just_another_person,

There are dozens, but none with the same reach of people just poking around to find projects. Some people self-host things.

tisktisk,

What are your thoughts on Gitlab, codeberg, gitea or forgejo? I have only sampled the first 3

cows_are_underrated,

I will check them out. Thanks.

toastal,

Cheeky answer would be: CodeForges ∩ {MS GitHub}^c^ (anything but)

I’ve been primarily using Darcs & a little Pijul, but have been using Codeberg when I need to use Git or just self-hosting via SSH.

Evotech,

You can’t fucking promote yourself in private now can you

toastal,

You can easily self-host your static landing pages. There are decentralized (& self-hostable) social media options—such as Lemmy that you are on now. There is no need to involve Microsoft, & these big places like Reddit, or whatever, someone will eventually repost your content if it is good.

Also you code forge itself doesn’t need to be social media web 2.0. You can keep these separate.

Evotech,

Google and Ms will index it regardless, might aswell use a platform that retirees actually use when looking for candidates

toastal,

What does indexing have to do with actually getting to own your data & not participating in corporate-owned social media? If you want to straight hide it all, you would never post it to the internet. Most of us sought the refuge of Lemmy to avoid these platforms & know our post aren’t harvested to profit for a Lemmy IPO.

Recruiters can find you regardless, but also are not very useful for getting a job versus having a network & the cut they take means you get the shaft if hired thru them too. A platform like LinkedIn is drivel that will absolutely rot your mind so it should be an easy skip.

MigratingtoLemmy,

You could go into infosec but honestly the industry in general does security because of regulations. They consider it a massive cost centre.

Pentesting is always an option but it requires considerable skills. Otherwise just look towards government security contracts

tisktisk,

gov't security contracts sounds like decent job security actually. Thanks for this

CrazyLikeGollum,

If you go that route, and assuming you’re in the US, I’d recommend looking for a government civilian job rather than a contractor position. The pay will be slightly lower, but you’ll have pretty steady pay increases year-to-year, the benefits will almost certainly be better, and you’ll have better job security.

The major downside will be that you’ll likely wind up working for/with a bunch of people who are just trying to keep their heads down and coast until retirement. A major upside will be that you’ll almost certainly be able to retire comfortably.

Evotech,

Management is fucking clueless when it comes to security anyway. Any bozo can get a job as a security analyst add long as they have a few random certifications and like, post cybersecurity news to their LinkedIn regularly with their shit takes

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