What are the most popular trends in IT today? Artificial intelligence cryptocurrency, NFT – that's what immediately comes to mind when we think about modern trends. It is these areas that everyone is talking about today, and it is these areas that almost every second person who knows at least something about IT is striving for today.

In fact, the desire to start working in a popular, trending field is not a good idea, according to Narek Vardanyan, director and co-founder of TCF.

The reason is simple: if the field is very popular, a huge number of people are probably already involved in it, and it will be quite difficult for you to create a product that will really stand out from the competition and find a stable place in the market.

“If, for example, 1000 people are already involved in NFT, ask yourself: do you want to be the 1001st? It would be much smarter and more correct to think about how you can help these people, and what kind of product you can create to make their life easier. It is better not just to become the 1001st and follow the fashion trend, but to find some solution, some product that will be useful to those who are already working in this trend,” the specialist told NEWS.am Tech.

In the US, during the gold rush, many people sought to mine gold. Some people actually made money off of it, some did not. But who really rose amid the gold rush? Not the most successful gold miners at all, but ... Levi Strauss, founder of Levis, a company that produces jeans for gold miners.

In 1849, rich gold deposits were discovered in California, and people began to come to America from all over the world. Levi then decided that it was not worth becoming another gold miner and it was better to take advantage of the whole situation.

He soon found out that gold miners needed comfortable pants with large pockets where they could put their mined nuggets. He just found a comfortable fabric – canvas, which sold poorly due to the decline in navigation: sailors also went to mine gold.

Levi sold his first pair of thick canvas pants for $6. The number of people wanting these pants grew day by day, and in the meantime, Levi improved the cut of the pants to better suit the wishes of customers.

Already in 1853, Levi opened a workshop in San Francisco, hired tailors, and began to make trousers in large quantities. In 1856, a sign “Levi Strauss & Co” appeared over the doors of the atelier, and a year later an office with a large store was opened in New York. Since then, this business has been growing and developing, and even today, after almost two centuries, it continues to work successfully.

“The Levi’s founder created a product for people already working in a trending field and has been more successful than the gold miners themselves. I think that the same approach should be followed in the IT sector today as well,” said Narek Vardanyan.

According to him, succumbing to a trend – whatever it is – is a bad idea. And this applies to startups, projects, training, and future careers.

“Many parents today send their children to programming courses, hoping that they will have a relevant and in-demand job. However, the fact is that 10 years ago programming solved more problems than it solves today. Today there are many opportunities to create a variety of projects without having knowledge in programming, so the demand for programmers is slowly decreasing and at the same time, the demand for other specialists is growing. IT is not only programming. This area is very broad, and it offers many opportunities for other professionals - marketers, copywriters, managers, and so on. You just need to be able to see these opportunities,” Vardanyan said.