The low-level programmer isn't gone, but over the past decade we've seen the rise of the meteoric rise of the high-level programmer.
For instance working on web apps, when you an extra server costs $400/month (4 developer hours or less), what value is there in spending days hand-optimizing an algorithm (into a form that'll be harder to debug later)?
Another example: writing mobile apps. On a phone today you have 1 GHz of power, but still a very limited interaction model. It seems basically only games actually need to optimize for performance.
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The low-level programmer isn't gone, but over the past decade we've seen the rise of the meteoric rise of the high-level programmer.
For instance working on web apps, when you an extra server costs $400/month (4 developer hours or less), what value is there in spending days hand-optimizing an algorithm (into a form that'll be harder to debug later)?
Another example: writing mobile apps. On a phone today you have 1 GHz of power, but still a very limited interaction model. It seems basically only games actually need to optimize for performance.
...what value is there in spending days hand-optimizing an algorithm...?
Reducing latency?
Throwing servers at a latency problem doesn't usually help (unless a server is overloaded).