What if the secret to landing your dream job wasn't grinding LeetCode, but building software for fun?

Matias went from creating Counter-Strike levels as a kid in Buenos Aires to becoming a creative developer at Vercel—and his path was anything but traditional. Starting with graphic design, teaching himself Blender's old game engine, and eventually building an emoji programming language "just for fun," Matias proves that curiosity beats curriculum every time.

In this conversation, we dive deep into:

- How childhood game modding led to a career in creative web development

- The process behind building award-winning websites (Next.js Conf, Daylight Computer)

- Why WebGL and shaders are underutilized on the web

- Building a multiplayer racing game in React (yes, really)

- Going from zero to teaching Frontend Masters courses

- The "useless projects" that became career-defining skills

- Why WebGPU has him excited to play again

The golden thread: Keep experimenting with what excites you, not just what seems useful. That random shader experiment? That weird Webpack project? They might be exactly what lands you your next opportunity.

Perfect for developers who feel guilty about their side projects, designers wanting to code, or anyone who thinks their unconventional path isn't "right" enough.

#webdevelopment, #creativecoding, #webgl, #react, #vercel, #careertransition, #softwaredevelopment

Check out Matias’s Frontend Masters Course: https://frontendmasters.com/courses/winning-websites/

Frontend Masters Online:

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About Us:

Advance your skills with 250+ in-depth, modern software engineering courses across frontend, backend, data, cloud, and AI taught by engineers who build real systems at scale. frontendmasters.com

This podcast interview with Kyle, creator of Web Dev Simplified, covers his journey from discovering programming late in high school to building a successful YouTube education channel and transitioning from agency work to full-time content creation. He shares insights on learning, career decisions, teaching philosophy, and the impact of AI on programming education.

#webdevsimplified #webdev #webdevelopmentCheck out

Kyle’s YouTube Channel:https://www.youtube.com/WebDevSimplifiedFrontend

Masters Online:Twitter: https://twitter.com/FrontendMastersLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/frontend-masters/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FrontendMasters

Instagram: https://instagram.com/FrontendMasters

About Us:Advance your skills with in-depth, modern front-end engineering courses — our 150+ high-quality courses and 18 curated learning paths will guide you from mid-level to senior developer! frontendmasters.com

Sabrina Goldfarb works at GitHub on billing systems and the Copilot AI tool. She made a career change from video editing to software engineering and started her tech journey with Frontend Masters' HTML/CSS bootcamp about eight years ago, which sparked her passion for coding.Sabrina co-founded Circulart, a fintech startup collecting data from emerging market central banks.

She balances her GitHub work with managing the startup's technical architecture, crediting AI tools for making this possible by condensing what used to take a week into a day.She's passionate about teaching and giving back, driven by remembering her own eight-year struggle to break into tech. She advocates for creating your own opportunities and being persistent. Learn AI alongside coding fundamentals. Security and code understanding remain important, but AI proficiency is now essential. She encourages automating repetitive tasks and staying open to new technology.

Check out Sabrina’s Practical Prompt Engineering Course:

https://frontendmasters.com/courses/prompt-engineering/

Frontend Masters Online:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/FrontendMastersLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/frontend-masters/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FrontendMastersInstagram: https://instagram.com/FrontendMasters

About Us:

Advance your skills with in-depth, modern front-end engineering courses — our 150+ high-quality courses and 18 curated learning paths will guide you from mid-level to senior developer!

frontendmasters.com