Amazing to read about the Recurse Center [1]. It seems to be some kind of artist-in-residence, but for programmers.
I've spent some time in residencies as an artist, and it's amazing how much it helped me to open up new perspectives. It'd be nice if there were more of these opportunities to do nonsensical (i.e., non-commercial and non-competitive) things in science. I'm sure it's beneficial to society or at least for the lucky individuals who get accepted there.
If Recurse sounds fun and magical to you - it is! And you should consider applying :). You can always defer your acceptance until the timing works out. It's free (they make money via job placements, but when I applied I was clear that I wasn't looking for work). I've been meaning to write a blog about my time there - here's what I would want to say:
The best thing that Recurse (RC) did for me was help me get in touch with my own taste. When I arrived I was making games that were pretty "normal" - Flash-style games with high scores and weak themes. While there I got weird. One of my first projects was an abuse of the OpenSearch spec to make a version of Wordle that ran in the Firefox address bar[1].
It was the perfect place to build something like this - folks were encouraging and supportive and interested; it made me realize that people were interested in the type of thing I actually wanted to do. I think I shipped 8 games during my 12 weeks at RC. I wouldn't have started making the types of things I now make without RC. I think plenty of folks have similar experiences across all sorts of techy things, not just games. Kinda like finding product-market fit but for your own interests.
RC also connected me with a bunch of folks that were doing similar things. The community is huge and kind and weird in the best way. It is like a writers' retreat but for people that want to program (and become better programmers).
I am probably coming off as shilling RC hard and I suppose I am (although I'm not being paid for this - I'm just a grateful alum). I'm literally typing this from the RC space right now (I occasionally stop by to chat with people in batch and work).
I also attended the Recurse Center years ago, but it didn’t quite click for me, which was surprising because everyone I spoke to had such positive experiences there. Even now, I find it hard to pinpoint exactly why it didn’t feel worthwhile for me.
Perhaps it was the location. New York City is expensive, and although I had enough savings to justify taking unpaid leave from work, many things seemed unreasonably priced. New Yorkers also have a reputation for being unfriendly, which added to my feeling of disconnect. Despite hearing glowing reviews from others, I didn’t quite mesh with the environment at Recurse Center, similar to how some visitors to the city might not feel entirely welcomed during certain encounters.
On the bright side, some of the residents and alumni [1] have become quite well-known in the tech industry. You might get lucky and find one of them around the space, which could lead to some really insightful conversations. During my time there, I had the chance to meet people like Robert Lefkowitz [2] and Filippo Valsorda [3], which was pretty cool. They definitely added some interesting perspectives to my experience.
The School for Poetic Computation is an experimental school in New York City and online supporting interdisciplinary study in art, code, hardware and critical theory. It's a place for learning and unlearning.
I've spent some time in residencies as an artist, and it's amazing how much it helped me to open up new perspectives. It'd be nice if there were more of these opportunities to do nonsensical (i.e., non-commercial and non-competitive) things in science. I'm sure it's beneficial to society or at least for the lucky individuals who get accepted there.
[1] https://www.recurse.com/