--- title: Keep Building Without Getting Paid | daily.dev description: An enterprise software veteran reflects on how the best developers he's worked with tend to have absorbing hobbies outside of coding—baking, welding, restoring... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Keep Building Without Getting Paid | daily.dev og:description: An enterprise software veteran reflects on how the best developers he's worked with tend to have absorbing hobbies outside of coding—baking, welding, restoring... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/n7uGpZSZM.png og:image:alt: Keep Building Without Getting Paid og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Keep Building Without Getting Paid **[Telerik](https://daily.dev/sources/telerik)** · 4 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary An enterprise software veteran reflects on how the best developers he's worked with tend to have absorbing hobbies outside of coding—baking, welding, restoring vans—and argues that as AI agents take on more coding work, the unstructured, unpaid, self-directed learning that happens through hobbies becomes what makes a developer irreplaceable. The piece frames hobbies not as work-life balance but as a source of character, creativity, and problem-solving perspective that agents cannot replicate. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [In an AI world, the most valuable developers will be both artisans and builders](https://daily.dev/posts/in-an-ai-world-the-most-valuable-developers-will-be-both-artisans-and-builders-7nulprehx) · Stack Overflow Blog · 3 upvotes · 1 comments - [Software Engineers are Obsolete](https://daily.dev/posts/software-engineers-are-obsolete-u0mexbdss) · Ibrahim Diallo · 2 upvotes · 2 comments - [The last generation of coders](https://daily.dev/posts/the-last-generation-of-coders-wxynkly8t) · TechCentral · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [Where will developer wisdom come from?](https://daily.dev/posts/where-will-developer-wisdom-come-from--hoexpr7ys) · InfoWorld · 1 upvotes · 1 comments --- Tags: [#career](https://daily.dev/tags/career), [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Keep Building Without Getting Paid","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm"},"datePublished":"2026-08-14T16:13:38.630Z","dateModified":"2026-09-13T20:21:13.513Z","description":"An enterprise software veteran reflects on how the best developers he's worked with tend to have absorbing hobbies outside of coding—baking, welding, restoring...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/78015fefe65dd0fecae9b04599d6353f?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/78015fefe65dd0fecae9b04599d6353f?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Telerik","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Telerik","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/5ee6d4bef8ac4f84886d06f5881963e7","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/telerik"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/keep-building-without-getting-paid-n7ugpzszm","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"career,ai-agents","timeRequired":"PT4M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Telerik","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/telerik"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Keep Building Without Getting Paid"}]} ```