This is part 2 in my “Software and its Discontents” series. This series is the product of my asking a bunch of folks about the current state of software engineering, the sense that it is not going well, that people are disillusioned and frustrated. In part 1 I talked a bit about the macro economic trend, namely the end of the decade of cheap money for tech investments, which is driving this conversation, and shaped some of the changes to the industry over the last decade.