The labour arbitrage theory of dev tool popularity

[eyelidlessness]

This is fascinating from the perspective of a strong inclination to agree with the general political thesis—that business benefits from commoditization or labor—and a strong disinclination to agree with the attribution of it to trends in software preferences.

For instance, I don’t think the component model in UI frameworks is popular because it commoditizes UI developers, but rather because professional developers seek to commoditize aspects of their own work which are rote or neatly fit an abstraction that frees them up to think about more pressing concerns. The same logic would apply to basically any layer of technology which has the same leverage… the only reason we’re discussing this one is because the agreement of its utility is slightly less than unanimous.

[cnelsenmilt]

This largely mirrors my thought. I was unpersuaded that non-technical management grasps the technical aspects well enough to leverage them as described.

[aaroninsf]

Spot on!

[CipherThrowaway]

Feels a lot like a lengthier, polemical way of saying that frameworks become popular because they allow more people to do more stuff more easily. But this is bad because businesses benefit or something.

None of the ideas here stand up to scrutiny. For example, Angular with its more opinionated design and framework approach was a much better choice for regularizing developer effort and making devs fungible. But by all accounts it lost to React, which is frequently criticized in comparison for allowing too much individual variation in development style.

React itself has become increasingly more complex over the years as it's moved up the S curve and the design direction is driven towards more and more remote parts of the problem space. More than ever, it requires specialized knowledge to use correctly.

Svelte - of which the author is a fan - fits his thesis much more than React. Svelte is billed as simpler and easier to learn and use than React, without requiring developers to wrap their heads around concepts like hooks, reducers and suspense.

[Draiken]

> become popular because they allow more people to do more stuff more easily

Nope. Because they allow people to be easily replaced. Nothing to do with how easy or good the framework is. That's the whole point of the article.

[duxup]

It's weird how this starts out with "nobody knows" and then quickly decides that it's "labour arbitrage".

I'm in a position where at times I select a framework for a new product. I'm often picking these frameworks just as much based on the ability for everyone to effectively work with and communicate with other developers easily, as much as the framework's technical aspects.

Franky I'm more concerned with developers being able to work happily and efficiently than "labour arbitrage".

I feel like the author could write off any found efficiency as "labour arbitrage".

[deadbabe]

This author slams React but then doesn’t have the guts to list alternatives.

Standardized frameworks makes recruitment easier – but it stops there. Once you onboard an employee and they spend considerable time integrating into the company and developing specific knowledge, they are no longer easily replaceable. If they are a key component of the team it will be painful to replace them, it will take years to hire someone new and get them back up to that same level. It’s better to just suck it up and pay them more than endure the costs and risks of hiring new labor.

[CipherThrowaway]

Quick check of the bio reveals his alternative is Svelte. Weird since the usual Svelte argument is that it's so simple anyone can pick it up and be effective the next day - unlike bloated old React where each team needs an elite React hooks whisperer to navigate the hundreds of footguns required to correctly render a list without tearing under React Suspense.

[mywittyname]

I didn't interpret the author's statement like that. Clever and ergonomic are compliments, and a tech being past its sell-by date isn't a criticism of its design, but more of a statement about needs changing over time.

[tevon]

This is wild.

And somehow at the end of this he comes to the conclusion that software engineers need a union? We're on of the highest paid, most flexible professions ever.

It seems like the thing missing here is the simple fact that engineers DO have significant bargaining power already, and have CHOSEN to use standardized solutions because they are good, well supported, and have wonderful communities of helpful people.

What happened to this guy? Seems incredibly bitter.

[pdonis]

> engineers DO have significant bargaining power already, and have CHOSEN to use standardized solutions because they are good, well supported, and have wonderful communities of helpful people

How much is this actually true, though? It's probably true in small companies where the engineers might also be the technical managers. But is it true in a large company where management might have little or no technical expertise at all, but still insist on making technical decisions?

[duxup]

I don't even know what the writer thinks a union is going to do.

"No react, that's too much labour arbitrage!" ?

[erik_seaberg]

Market rates reached pretty unsustainable levels, so it's hard to justify complaining when competition (usually not arbitrage by resellers) brings them down. I would love to see a higher bar for quality, but I think that has to start with end users saying no.

[rokkitmensch]

> You can argue about productivity and “progress” all you like, but none of that will raise you back into my good opinion.

Good thing I don't particularly care about this rando's opinions of me!

[sroussey]

Labor wage arbitrage has always been a thing.

Work from home very much encourages it long term, even if not so much short term.

[davedx]

Wow this is about as cynical as it’s possible to be about real, tangible technological progress.

I strongly disagree with the authors conclusions about the technologies and the premise.

This is truly peak HN content.

[bigstrat2003]

I have no real opinion on MongoDB or React, but Electron is technological regress, not progress. Any software made with it is at best mediocre, and more often terrible. The author is quite right to criticize it.

[JohnMakin]

This seems almost tailor-made to be HN bait.

[deadbabe]

No, it can still be more cynical.

[CuriouslyC]

I wish I could downvote this post. The examples are bad (react and electron were 100% user driven hits) and the author is frankly kind of toxic.

[Jtsummers]

We can't downvote submissions, but if you think it's bad enough you can always flag it. Or participate in a flame war in the discussion. Both ways can reduce its position on the HN rankings.