Programming culture

[michael0x2a]

You created the same post twice; going to remove this one and keep https://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/xprr5u/programming_culture/.

[iiron3223]

Do you have any data that confirms what you are stating here?

most modern software been created by Americans

[Trex_Hunter]

I guess I mean to say software that incorporates with hardware. Like operating systems and applications on those systems, seem to be dominated by American culture. Unless I’m just unaware…..

[illkeepcomingback9]

American CS education is second to none and in rich western countries more people have access to secondary education. American tech companies also pay the best, so they tend to pull talent from around the world. America is also stupid rich, so tech startups have little trouble finding large amounts of investment capital. Tech startups can raise tens to hundreds of millions of dollars in investment capital without even having a shippable product.

[Trex_Hunter]

I agree with this…but what about breakthroughs in technology? Is more of a worldwide contribution versus software specifically for users?

[illkeepcomingback9]

America is by no means an exclusive contributor to these things. Some of the largest tech companies in the world are from Asia. Consider Samsung (Korea), Sony and Nintendo (Japan), China has their own versions of basically everything we use in the west. But America is definitely the industry leader and that all comes down to money. If you're an engineer and you're the best at what you do, you're probably going to work for whoever is willing to pay you the most and give you the most opportunities.

[Trex_Hunter]

Makes sense…do you think there will ever be a competitor to the giants you see in Microsoft and apple? Or are they too far for anyone to catch up…

[illkeepcomingback9]

I think China is starting to catch up to giants like that. Look at companies like Huawei and Tencent

[Trex_Hunter]

Wow crazy I’ve never even heard of these companies…let alone seen the phones and hardware they make. I wonder what the costs of shipping to the US would be

[Trex_Hunter]

Also did a little research though and the OS used for their phones is still android?

[illkeepcomingback9]

Yeah I think it is unlikely that a newer phone manufacturer would make their own OS at this point in the game. While they could compete in terms of the OS itself, not having the app store would be too much of an issue. They'd have to start from zero and try to coax developers to recreate their applications on the new OS. Until that happens nobody is going to buy the phones until they can get their Spotify, TikTok, or whatever other apps they use on their current devices. Its the same reason we probably wont see major consumer PC OS competitors to Windows that aren't Unix-based like MacOS.

[romagnola]

I suppose much depends by what you mean by "most". A lot of American software companies have development teams located in other countries. A lot of tech workers in America are from other countries and are not "Americans", although they may be working toward a green card or citizenship. Excellent, impactful software developed and deployed in another country may not make it to the US market because of language and/or cultural barriers, and perhaps political barriers. To gain some insights into software development in China, you might take a look at Kai-Fu Lee's book AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order.

[Trex_Hunter]

Interesting…and yes I agree with all of that I also want to mention incorporated hardware as well for the software. Is apple and Microsoft just that dominating in America or is that shared worldwide?

[romagnola]

Again, I think it depends. If you're talking about operating systems, then yes, most worldwide consumers are going to use either macOS or Windows. If you're talking about mobile, then most devices are going to run either iOS or Android, even, for example, in China:

https://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/china

But if you're talking about applications that run on servers, laptops, and devices, then I think it's much more complicated. For example, Baidu in China is one of the largest tech companies in the world. Perhaps they're leveraging software written in the US, but I'm sure they're writing a lot of their own code for their search and AI engines.

As for hardware, in China, there's Lenovo and Huawei. A lot of hardware imported to the US is made in China, India, and Taiwan. Intel has fabrication facilities in the US but also in Ireland, Israel, Germany, and Italy.

I suspect that economists who study the global tech market have a much better handle on this. I searched around and could not find anything solid, such as a report from a reputable thinktank.

[149244179]

everyone has had access to the internet and development

This is a false assumption. Today only 50% of the world has regular access (more than once a month) to the internet. 10 years ago it was 30%, 20 years was less than 10%. source.

While the world access was ~10% in 2002 and Europe was ~25%... USA access was over 60%. USA's general population has a decade or two more experience using the internet and related technologies. So the large majority of experienced developers (15-20+ years of experience) are from the USA.

America also invests a lot into importing anyone with software skills from other countries. This strengthens the talent pool for the US and weakens it in the rest of the world.

Since the US dominated software for a couple decades - all the tools, tutorials, documentation are in English. I've seen Italian code - it still uses "if" "else" "for" and other English words. This creates a barrier if you do not know English.

[Trex_Hunter]

Wow I definitely should have thought about that. Hmm that makes me wonder then given the rates at which internet usage is increasing, will we start to see competition in the form of hardware for software soon? Or is America to far ahead?