I think the biggest hurdle going from Java to C# is how you think about asynchronous code, more so for desktop software. My last role was C# with me coming from Java and I got a few rude awakenings.
I’m jealous that older generations get to say they wrote their first program on iconic hardware. Computers of my time were much faster, but they were very generic.
Edit: No actually, I can't understand what this is? You are trying to convince me my experiences are wrong. You don't seem to actually want to understand my point of view, so what is this? Why are you wasting both of our time like this?
Striving to build an environment where effort is made to attribute credit where it's due and to strive for equality of outcome for all is what we need to do. You're still picking the 'best person for the job' according to your own biases for what constitutes the 'best' (because how else could it work?), but you're also making an effort to ensure that your team/department/company isn't just all white (straight etc) men.
As a woman in tech, I feel that it isn't actually a meritocracy.
I think people have a habit of assuming men did the real work in a project, so they get a disproportionate share of the credit. People also have a habit of pushing women towards front end work, making the assumption that men are more 'technical' than women. It can be difficult to watch men get all of the credit for your blood, sweat and tears. It's especially bitter when they then say it's a meritocracy and you feel like saying 'what exactly did you contribute to this?'.
The concept of a meritocracy sounds nice on paper, but I think it ignores how humans work. The first issue is that I don't think we are especially good at identifying the best unless it's very easy to measure (sport for example). The second point is that it takes work to overcome your own biases and I think this feeds into how we evaluate 'the best' more than we like to admit.
The person you’re replying to didn’t say the article was wrong or try to discredit with an ad hominem attack, I interpreted as questioning if we really want to hear the opinions of someone so unsavoury and untrustworthy. It’s not to say his character invalidates his past research.