Surprising similar career paths..
| Drug dealers | Software developers |
| Refer to their clients as "users" | Refer to their clients as "users" |
| "The first one's free!" | "Download a free trial version..." |
| Have important South-East Asian connections (to help move the stuff) | Have important South-East Asian connections (to help debug the code). |
| Strange jargon: "Stick", "Rock", "Wrap", "E", "Stash", "Drive by", "Hit (LSD)", "Source", "The Pigs" | Strange jargon: "SCSI", "RTFM", "Packet", "C", "Cache", "CTRL ALT DEL", "Hit (WWW)", "Source-code", "Microsoft" |
| Realize that there's tons of cash in the 14- to 25-year-old market. | Realize that there's tons of cash in the 14- to 25-year-old market. |
| Your clients really like your stuff when it works. When it doesn't work they want to kill you. | Your clients really like your stuff when it works. When it doesn't work they want to kill you. |
| Job is assisted by the industry producing newer, more potent product. | Job is assisted by the industry producing newer, more potent product. |
| Often seen in the company of pimps, hustlers and lowlives. | Often seen in the company of marketing people, venture capitalists and fund managers. |
| When things go wrong, a "fix" is just a phone call away but may be expensive. | When things go wrong, a "fix" is just a phone call away but may be expensive. |
| A lot of successful people getting rich in this industry while still teenagers. | A lot of successful people getting rich in this industry while still teenagers. |
| Their product causes unhealthy addictions. | DOOM. Quake. SimCity. Duke Nukem 3D. 'Nuff said. |
| Do your job well, and you can sleep with sexy movie stars who depend on you. | Damn! Damn! DAMN!!! |