Comment by blowski

Also, good programmers don't necessarily make good mentors.

But I imagine these problems aren't unique to the software industry. It can't be the case that every blacksmith was both a good blacksmith and a good mentor, and yet the system of apprenticeship successfully passed down knowledge from generation to generation for a long time. Maybe the problem is our old friend social media, and how it turns all of us into snobs with imposter syndrome, so few of us feel willing and able to be a mentor.