you can do electronics without having the cops called on you but if you want a job doing that you need a degree (usually) and that seemed like an expensive waste of time. software you can just start doing

— hello again (@bobpoekert) November 24, 2019

Same with infrastructure for me. I was already good at it. I didn’t need anyone’s permission to start doing it, and credentials when I first started were actually a net negative.

It’s changing now, though. Credentials are starting to matter more and bureaucratic pretend work is beginning to dominate. As a result of this the practitioners are starting to get worse (much dumber, less capable of making leaps of thought), so I would likely not be able to break into the field today were I starting fresh.