Out of interest, what makes you think it was ever not this way? I recently reread the Isaacson Ben Franklin biography and one thing which struck me was how much time he put into crafting his public persona.

The comment up this thread holds true: human attention is not evenly distributed. That doesn't mean, however, that there's an imperative to "network" or build a "personal brand" – plenty of people gain a deep satisfaction from excelling at their craft.

Maybe I'm seeing the past through rose-colored glasses, but it seems there was once a time in Silicon Valley when you could make it big as a pure technologist and not have to always be marketing and selling yourself. Maybe I'm just fooling myself.

As a pure technologist you'll never be Steve Jobs, at best, if you're exceedingly lucky, you might manage to be Steve Wozniak. However, Steve Wozniak's fortune and minor celebrity status owes a great deal to Steve Jobs, whos success in marketing and selling himself was so great that it earned the name Reality Distortion Field.

If "make it big" just means a giant pile of money, there are plenty of millionaire pure technologists at Silicon Valley companies whos names are never told; the thousand or so that were created when Google IPO'd are basically unknown. Forbes had a recent article advertising Craigslist competitors, but reading between the lines, Craigslist has minted some of them, but they're entirely nameless among the wider population. If thats your definition of "making it big", then it's possible, but if you want broader recognition, I don't know that it's possible.

Maybe I'm being unimaginative, but outside of Steve Wozniak I can't think of any pure-technologists with household name recognition. The closest that comes to mind is Elon Musk, but unfortunately for you, there's plenty of marketing going on. I'd bet a large number of readers even here won't even recognize the name Vint Cerf.

Maybe you feel marketing is about lying, maybe selling yourself feels icky. However they're skills like any other; refusing to learn and use them would be like refusing to learn or use multiplication.

Read Sam Altman's praise of Greg (gdb) (http://blog.samaltman.com/greg) who is quite the gifted technologist, but the praise is for his dedication, on both technical and non-technical talent.

I'm not after recognition or household name recognition--quite the opposite. I'm just a normal, unremarkable technologist who's getting old and wondering whether I should have spend the last 20 years blogging and self-promoting rather than quietly polishing my skills. It feels very uncomfortable that "Becoming a tech celebrity" has emerged as a legitimate path to advancing in one's career.

EDIT: Not saying these celebrities don't also earn their keep through their skills. It's just disappointing how much of a factor self-promotion is.

I haven't been around here very long so I defer to your memories :) But my suspicion is that if it's not the technologist marketing herself, then someone else is marketing her. There's almost always more to these things than meets the eye.

In a valley of smart and motivated people, discoverability will always be a challenge...though I don't doubt it's much more competitive now than ever.

What you are seeing is the result of the big push to get everyone into tech several years ago. You didn't have to market yourself in the past because there were more jobs than people. Having ability was enough to have wanting employers find you. Now, skilled professionals are everywhere. Employers don't need to make the effort anymore.

It may have not been called a personal brand, but I think it's fair to say that many past inventors, scientists, generals, artists, etc. who we remember today were pretty adept at self-promotion.

I think that depends on what your interpretation of "making it" is.

There area millions of quiet, confident, competent people across industries. People who reliably turn out high-quality products and are well-paid for their work. They get on well with their colleagues and progress with their career at a decent pace. You just don't hear about this much. Doesn't this count as making it?

I'd say that the reason you hear more about people who are well-known is essentially just because they are well-known :)