In today’s tech world, it’s easy to be dazzled by trends, venture capital headlines, and the next AI-powered shortcut to easy money. Hype cycles move faster than ever. Yesterday’s breakthrough is today’s boilerplate. But in the middle of this rapid-fire innovation — or, let’s be honest, imitation — one principle keeps me grounded:

I only care about tech people who build with heart.

That doesn’t mean sentimentality. It means intention. It means designing with empathy, coding with conviction, and solving problems that matter, not just those that trend. Heart shows up when a developer chooses ethical boundaries over gray-zone growth hacks. Heart shows up when an engineer stays late, not for a KPI, but because someone’s accessibility feature has to work. Heart shows up in open source contributions done for the love of a better ecosystem, not a better résumé.

Too often, the spotlight lands on those who chase virality — the drop-shippers of code, the AI prompt bandits, the startup founders more fluent in pitch decks than their own tech stack. But while flash can get you followers, it’s depth that earns lasting respect.

And depth takes time. It takes heart.

In a world spinning on speed, the real rebellion is to care — care deeply about users, about craft, about consequence. It’s not just about what we build, but why we build it, and how we treat people along the way.

So here’s to the creators, the maintainers, the quiet builders. The ones who still feel something when they deploy. The ones who choose substance over spectacle, and put humanity at the center of their code.

We see you.

And you’re the reason tech still has a soul.