Abolish Silicon Valley: How to Liberate Technology from Capitalism

by Wendy Liu

But after a few weeks, the thrill of the perks had worn off, and the monotony of the work had crushed my initial enthusiasm for converting to full-time. I couldn’t explain why, but merely the idea of going back there felt soul-crushing. Neither was I inspired by the idea of doing a master’s degree, which I saw as my next-best alternative. Of course, this raised the question of what I would not consider to be soul-crushing, but thinking about that felt like looking down a steep cliff at an unending fall. The main problem was that I no longer knew what I was supposed to be optimising for. I’d spent most of my life trying to succeed at whatever academic challenges were placed in front of me under the unquestioned assumption that it would all eventually pay off. And yet, the life that I saw stretching before me through the windshield of the Google bus did not look especially enticing. I felt like I had done everything right, yet the reward seemed hollow. There had to be more than this.