I suppose I have a hard time empathizing with the archetype of the beginner as presented in this article due to just how markedly different my own experiences developing as a programmer were.<p>I have never relied on the generosity of others to take their time to teach me - nor have I seen it as the responsibility of anyone to carry me along. I&#x27;m not dead weight, I&#x27;m independent and I have things I want to do.<p>One of my first experiences with programming was automating a menial task at my first internship. I was studying mechanical engineering at the time and my older brother had gotten me an internship at the company he worked for in the QA department. I was given the task of testing their in house search engine and recording the results in an Excel spreadsheet. When I got tired of doing it by hand I wrote a script to do it for me - a horrific mashup of PHP and awk and sed and all sorts of other gristle. But it worked. And it was mine. And I put it together by piecing together man pages, internet documentation, and trial and error.<p>After I switched my major in college to CS I was working on a personal project and when my professor couldn&#x27;t give me an answer (he rightly expected me to figure it out for myself) I eventually ended up trawling though Java reference books at the local Barnes and Nobel to find a solution because nothing freely available gave enough detail.<p>The barrier to entry to programming is incredibly low. Anyone with a personal computer or laptop has an unbelievable treasure trove of incredibly high quality and FREE tools and resources to do absolutely amazing things...but that does not lessen the inherent complexity or difficulty of what programming is.<p>I think the attitude that many hobbyists or beginners bring to programming would be unheard of in practically any other sort of hobbyist field.<p>Build a basic knowledge and grow it. Yes. That means making an investment of time and possibly money. I have bought many supplemental educational resources (at first foundational algorithm and data structures and eventually technology and framework specific) because I want to learn. If you do not want to learn no one can teach you. And learning requires effort and engagement that are altogether lacking in many individuals.