Why I like to spend my time in core web technologies

Look at where you actually spend your time in a given day. Is it spent in a testing framework? Cleaning up data? Creating APIs? Reviewing code? Installing a CMS? Setting up CI workflows? Writing CSS? Configuring Webpack?

Whatever you spend your time doing, day after day, is the thing that you will become an expert at. That’s why, as a web developer, I like to spend most of my time in “core” web technologies… things like HTTP, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, the DOM, SQL and others. These are technologies I can invest in because they’re going to be around for the long haul (many of them are baked into browsers, after all). Knowing them well is likely to bring me value for years to come.

Spending time in fringe technologies is like buying shares of AAPL, TSLA, or whatever else is hot right now. It can be fun, and it might be a good investment, but it’s a gamble. On the other hand, those core web technologies are like index funds. Kind of boring, but you can expect them to be valuable in the long term. And for careers, like investing, the long term is where all the interesting stuff happens.