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Sandals and Ponytails Behind Slow Linux Adoption
Eric Giguere writes "CNet is reporting that according to former Massachusetts CIO Peter Quinn 'the lax dress code of the open-source community is one of the reasons behind the software's slow uptake in commercial environments.' In particular, Quinn blames the 'sandal and ponytail set' for sluggish adoption of Linux by businesses and governments." From the article: "Quinn, who faced plenty of scrutiny over his support of the OpenDocument standards-based office document format, said proponents of open source in government faced formidable opposition from vested interests if they went public."
Its all about class and swagger.
Eventually I think linux and OSS will take hold. I agree with the articles thesis: uptake of OSS (and, for the record, ANYTHING) is affected (negatively in this case) by sandals and ponytails.
In my long career pathetically ended after 21 years by an unfortunate "right-sizing" (let's get rid of the 20% MOST expensive employees in IT, but make sure to get rid of some of the kids too so we don't get sued...), I conducted an ongoing rant/argument/rage/discussion with my best friend at work about the impact of dress. Bob (not her real name) insisted not only are others impacted by your appearance and demeanor, but your very own work and feelings about yourself change based on your dress.
Being a long-haired sandaled techie I disagreed. It took Bob about fifteen years to win me over. I get it now, maybe a bit too late, but it does matter.
For doubters, read Robert Malloy's book. I love and hate this book. It's hard to dispute empirical research... you dress for your audience or risk losing them.
Still I like to wear my rose-colored glasses and think good conquers evil eventually, and still hold hope someday linux along with OSS gains the purchase it needs to be a viable and dominant market force unto itself (it already passes the viable test...).
As an aside: this does take an interesting turn when you consider that the "dress code" for "good tech" is oxymoronic, i.e., while it is true business leaders and decision makers like/prefer business dress and decorum from people they meet and strike deals with, at the same time it's a time-honored tradition that the most savvy and high-octane techies wear cutoffs, sandals, t-shirts (that probably say "fuck you" in some obfuscated way), and piercings. Go figure. (From my own personal experience, I would add, I found little correlation with the raggedy techie look and competence and would even submit many less competent techies cultivated the look as an offset to their less-than-great skills.)
And, now I'm off to install the new Firefox /. extension (God Bless OSS)
Does -anyone- wear sandals and a ponytail anymore? That's kind of cliche.
Specialization is for insects. -Heinlein
quoth the comicbook guy.
-- Boycott Shell
http://blogs.sun.com/roller/resources/roumen/micro soft_old_small.jpg
;)
How did Microsoft become so successful, then?
This message printed on 100% post-consumer recycled electrons.
People who are too shallow to see past how some dork dresses get what they deserve, sheez..
On the other hand, people who don't care whether you wear sandles, have a ponytail, are black, white, asian, a woman, or whatever, will come out ahead, because they'll pick stuff that is best, rather than looking to see if it wears Armani suits.
http://www.welton.it/davidw/
If they think *that's* bad, wait 'till they see 'em naked!
Never judge a book by its cover. Didn't these guys pay attention to their grandmas?
"We are all geniuses when we dream"
- E.M. Cioran
We ought to switch to the teddy and pointy bra model. Madonna seems to be shipping lots of product. :-)
Nobody likes a hippy. Get those sideburns cut, Mattingly!
It's contagious. Adopt Linux and the next thing you know, people are gonna want to trade in their vests, ties, and wing-tips for something that's not painful to wear, and thus begin the unravelling of civilisation itself.
The problem is with idiots who believe that they can judge the quality of a product by the shoes of it's creator. Noone ever complains about my t-shirt, Dickies shorts, and piercings when I'm done fixing their shit... in fact, I'm the one they ask for by name.
Some of us feel that being proficient at your job and being comfortable are much more important than being a shortsighted, uninformed asshole in a fancy monkey suit.
The problem is on THEIR side.
Messiah figures don't work for software.
Linux + Business Suits = Success.
..we raise our children to "not judge books by their cover", and then turn around and do just that.
I understand that by dressing like the stuffed suits would make me more appealing to them, but I don't care about them. They need me more than I need them. I'll always be able to find tech work somewhere. They won't always be able to find a lot of techies to work for them. The sooner they get over themselves and their dress code ideas, the better, for realities sake.
obviously no one's seen my anarcho-goth-punk linux nerd mates...
they seem to go down pretty well, actually - I think their employers are pleasantly surprised at how effective tehy are considering how much time they spend throwing moltovs
I thought it was the companies thinking they could replace their technical management with bean counters responsible for the slow uptake. Managers that think if IT gets on their nerves enough they can simply outsource them to India. Or the fact that many company IT departments are staffed with MCSE's who see every IT problem as a nail for the MSFT hammer.
And here all this time it was sandals and ponytails. Missed it by that much!
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Linux is on the outside looking in; its hard to break into the inner circle of the policy and decision makers.
n/t
... you are in no position to say anything about ponytails and sandals.
And I blame the incompetent PHBs for growing resistance to invasive advertising and draconian computer laws.
This just seems so apropos....
"No...no....hippies all around me..."
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
Of course, it all depends on context. If you're interacting a lot with clients, then you probably want to dress somewhat like them, depending on the situation, of course!
It sounds like someone's jealous that they can't have a ponytail at work.
"If I can't wear sandals, NO ONE CAN!"
So sad but its obvious Quinn is talking about Stallman in sandles. Quinn is the MA open source guy and Stallman is unequivocally the most idealistic, free software guru that has come out of the MA area and the go to guy for all things free software. Who would I listen to, Quinn or Stallman.. Stallman of course. Who has a habit of rubbing "open source" people the wrong way, Stallman of course. Who do you think Quinn is talking about as being a thorn in "open sources" business friendly side? Stallman of course. What a cheap "ad hominem" shot.
I guess this is similar to the gnarly beards of Jobs, Allen, and Woz back in the day. Once they shaved and put on business suits, their companies succeeded. Or was it the other way around?
I haven't worn a tie to a job since 1985. I always dress in clean clothes, I shave and bathe daily, and have fairly short hair. My colleagues appreciate my personal dress code - dark slacks, long sleeve pull overs or turtlenecks. Sometimes I'll wear a nice sweater if weather requires. but suit and tie? Never. Fuck that shit. I intend to keep it that way.
I say fuck the suits.
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
To every suit who doesn't take me seriously because of my appearance (and yes, I do bathe regularly, and my clothes, casual as they may be, are clean and good repair):
Deal with it. I'm smarter than you. I could do your job in my sleep; you couldn't do mine in a million years. You need the product I, and people like me, provide; and good luck finding someone who dresses like you who can provide it. If you prefer to buy crap from other suits, go for it. Your competitors, who are also smarter than you, will happily deal with us long-haired freaks to get the good stuff.
At 37, I haven't suffered any harm from this attitude yet.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
the real reason, right there in the article, has little to do with dress and more to do with the incredible political influence (money) wielded by those who want to keep OSS down. the 'image' of OSS developers is not the problem. it is that the political process has been hijacked from seeking public good to seeking personal good.
there are plenty of suits involved in the OSS movement. but as he says at the end of the article, what got him to drop out of the fight was not the image of OSS but the constant barrage of attacks brought against him by those with the wherewhithal to do so - big business.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
I mean, seriously. They run this stuff? I know we make fun of Dvorak and so forth, but we know that they guy's out to get readers to his portion of the 'Net. This is just a big "Oh Linux sites, link us! Link us!"
This isn't journalism. I hope the next time they're up for some "SuperDuper Web 2.0" award, the judges actually read what they're writing here.
I'm not slagging CNET, they write some good stuff. But these kind of stories and their "newsmaker" celebrity BJs don't add anything of value.
Since when does a developer's alleged mode of dress influence the decisions of those who never meet him? It's yet another excuse: "Oh, those open source guys are hippy dippy slobs with pony tails and sandals! Let's buy from MicroSoft who makes their (sales) people dress up nice!!"
It's bullshit.
Besides, microsofties wear west coast developer attire too, just they don't let them make sales calls. Also, I know damn well what the Apple geeks wear, and it isn't suit and tie. I see them whenever I drive down the DeAnza Blvd in Cupertino. They are definitely ponytail compliant - although some of them their *only* hair is their ponytail, with nothing on top!
use Sig::Witty;
In the last job and some others I've worked, the ones with ponytails were generally the big-boys in admin. Really, one generally didn't notice it, as their attitudes were still professional. Sandals I'm not so keen on (who wears those, anyways), but a ponytail is hardly as damaging as the lack of professionalism some people have. Moreover, I've met quite a few geeks that had rather unpleasant hygiene (see: body odor), which is far worse than the ponytail and sandals.
As for myself, I'm hardly a shirt-and-tie person. I'm not sitting here with a kokanee shirt and shorts, but when your job often involves crawling under desks and in other various recesses where computer parts dwell, a white shirt and tie are hardly functional for the position at hand.
But the stench can tell you a lot.
It may be that, at the current moment, this is what Mr. Quinn sees as the major issue. But it's just the latest battle in the war, and it won't be the last.
I dress well enough at work. Nothing that I can wear without ironing it first, anyways. That battle has been fought and won, but now I'm faced with people who insist on paying the idiot tax - why spend $10,000 on a good FOSS (commercial or in-house) solution when you can spend $150,000 on a craptacular proprietary one? Obviously the proprietary solution must be five times better if they can charge that much.
Of course, that's utter malarkey. Anybody who works the trenches in IT knows that the industry is full of used-car salesmen, and at this point in time, virtually every "manager" I know is far too stupid to know any better.
Red Hat has the right idea. Raise prices. Their stuff is way too expensive for what it offers, but if they lowered their prices, they'd lose sales. Go frigging figure.
(We're a software development shop, and our stuff is priced in the millions. Recently our President and CEO needed to increase the price by an order of magnitude or else risk losing credibility in the target market.)
.. that only people in a shirt and tie or similar "professional" dress are capable of performing their assigned duties to which they agreed when they signed the employment contract. After all, how many of us completely lose the mental faculties (alcohol not withstanding) to do our jobs as soon as we get home and get the jeans and t-shirt on? Come on, raise your hands! { watching tumbleweed blow by }
So, basicaly what the author of the original article is saying is the following:
open source + casual dress = no credibility regardless of the quality of work
open source + "professional" dress = complete credibility regardless of the quality of work
Someone needs to do a study on this. I'm fascinated by the attitiude that some people have that the design of the cotton on the outside of our skin somehow has a direct correlation on the ability for us to maintain our servers through open source. It must be some kind of intellectually stimulating chemical that is weaved into the fibers of "professional" clothing that we absorb through our skin whereas casual dress does the opposite.
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
I, for one, am familiar with the concept of "dress for success".
There's a dress code at my company. It's fairly easily followed, but it's still a dress code.
And there are considerations when going out to customer sites. Some, we could show up in a pair of shorts and a wife-beater for all they care. Others, if we're not in a suit and tie, they look at us funny.
Even so, this argument is an especially large patty of bullshit.
If you're reviewing software, review the damn software. Stop worrying what Joe Slack down the road happens to be wearing while using the self-same software.
Competent managers understand this. And they're usually dealing with (well dressed even) technical staff who do as well.
All the idiots who can't actually grasp the significance of the technology are covering themselves by going "OMG! IT'S WRITTEN BY A DIRTY, TREE-HUGGIN' HIPPIE! RUN AWAY!"
These individuals will, eventually, be replaced by more dynamic individuals who aren't so concerned with what some community programmer in Bumblefuck, KY is wearing.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Free Software is given to you free as in speech, and free as in beer.
If you want us to look the way you want us to look, that will cost you a FUCKING LOT. Start writing big checks, or STFU and stop looking a gift horse in the mouth.
Ungrateful stuffed suit.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
... appearance is more important than, say, performance metrics. Or pricing. Or history of repeated and drastic flaws in the "competition". ... after all, that's the historical behaviour that brought commercial standings today to their lofty position, isn't it?
... at least we're not wasting money on Armani suits when he flings it at us.
> "I blame the IT community, I blame the IT leadership, over and over and over again, about their inability to articulate correctly the business opportunity that we've got here," Quinn said.
I blame the business community for not realising that the "sandals and ponytail set" are the ones who GAVE YOU this working technology!
Perhaps it behooves you to consider, you pointy-headed business morons, that:
- function is more important than form
- the form of which you so disapprove BROUGHT you this function for free
- and perhaps your tiny-minded preconceptions, given the EVIDENCE, might possibly require a little review?
It's like the [RI|MP]AA... they want "fresh, new acts"... but anything that doesn't fall neatly into their metrics and feature matrix equates to "unmarketable".
Horse before cart. Apples and oranges. Insert here your favoured aphorism.
Not to mention the beautiful irony at the end of the article. To justify the investigation into his "unauthorised trips", he says "You can only stand in the public arena for so long and have mud thrown at you".
What's the brown, wet, clingy substance on his hands he throws at the "sandals and ponytail set"?
Vented, I return to dealing with users; exeunt.
There was this religion started by some guy with sandals and a ponytail about peace and goodwill. Suits really didn't like him, nailed him to a tree. Don't remember if it caught on or not....
There was also some strange government of people with ponytails and almost-sandals with the idea of "liberty or death" and "all men created equal".....
I can't remember if either of these things exist anymore, but if they do, I bet the people in them are OK with ponytails and sandals.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
If times get tough and I end up programming business software or something for a living I have absolutely no idea how I'm going to endure the stranglehold of business casual.
Silly Suits' Prejudices Behind Slow Linux Adoption
But I've never been one to accuse business leaders of being all that bright. Sure let's hire the guy in the nice suit, he obviously has it together. You can tell he knows what he's doing because the shoes match the shirt. Not like that hippy Steve whatsisname that was in here a few years back, what a loser that will never amount to anything.
Retards.
Specifically, the marijuana that Quinn has clearly been smoking. There are a host of factors behind the reluctance to switch to Linux desktops: unfamiliarity, MS lock-in, intertia, the confusing array of different Linux distros, not to mention the number of Slashdotters themselves who will tell you that Linux isn't completely ready for the desktop yet.
If Quinn thinks that my footwear is the deciding factor, I wish he'd quit bogarting that joint.
I thought it was common knowledge that an excellent IT setup went hand-in-hand with beards & burrito-stained shirts wandering around the office.
Looks matter in the business world. Maybe they won't after the singularity, but they do now.
Style is always much more important than substance to those who have little of the latter.
Fantasy and superstition should be used for entertainment purposes only.
On the other hand, people who don't care whether you wear sandles, have a ponytail, are black, white, asian, a woman, or whatever, will come out ahead, because they'll pick stuff that is best, rather than looking to see if it wears Armani suits.
That may be hyperbole, but let's not confuse dressing well for work with dressing expensively. Armanis could just as lose as much respect as dressing up in shorts and sandals, depending on the work culture. Ultimately, it comes down to how well the person gets along with the team. After all, you don't always want to deal with a know-it-all asshole, even if/when (s)he is really good. If the company can afford it, they'll fire him (which is what happened here at work). In some places of work (thankfully not here), if an individual comes in looking as if they just came back from the beach, it can be inferred by others that the person has little respect for the work they do.
In the end, of course, it comes to the quality of your work. But if you make it hard for people to want to work with you, eventually a threshold is reached and you're no longer welcome there. You or your ideas.
It's all about oxygen supply for the brain. Lose the neckties. But seriously, he's right: Not dressing fashionably is a symptom of not thinking about the way you're perceived by others. If you don't care about what others want, how are you going to supply the software they need? The Open Source developer user disconnect is classic.
Let's not forget that all of those C-level types currently on trial were very well dressed . . .
I'm not tense. I'm just terribly, terribly, alert.
seems like everyone here is assuming that if you have a suit on, you don't know anything. imagine being in the user community...would you rather interact with the guy that's in the shorts and stained tshirt or the guy in the nicer button-up/slacks (assuming their level of technical knowledge is the same)? in the "normal" world, i might say the guy in the shorts/tshirt, but in the business world? button-up hands down. it's just more professional. i think there's something to be said about perception.
Some of the vested interests are, in fact, hippies. When the government rejects valuable technology because it's not offered by the required jock or yuppie, whose own tech isn't good enough, the government has to change style, not the hippies. Or the government by, for and of the yuppies gets left behind.
--
make install -not war
Sometimes dressing in less "professional" apparel can lose you a sale. Sometimes, it can gain you a sale. I know a lot of the sales guys are somewhat leery of dragging along scruffy looking geeks to business meetings, but from what I've seen it often works to convince businessmen of the credibility of tech. "Wow look at all those piercings, if the company lets him get away with that he must be brilliant!" This works well in smaller, more technical markets I imagine.
I also notice that the work environment at a company is one of the most important aspects in attracting really talented people. Smart people, who love what they do would rather dress like slobs, have free beer, and a ping-pong table than make an extra $20K a year. The environment is worth a lot to a person's quality of life. Now that does not mean just because a company is relaxed it has talented people, but if you are looking for extraordinary people, that is one very visible sign.
I also notice that given a relaxed or absent dress code, the clothing of choice widely varies. Some people prefer to wear a suit every day, even if they are just going to sit at a desk and code for 12 hours. Others will be wearing shirts with fake boobs attached. I have not noticed that either type tends to be more or less proficient.
I know I'm not the only one to have noticed this trend and I know it is something in some businessmen's minds when they are meeting with new partners, suppliers, or customers. The rule that a dress code will get you more sales is not universal and does not apply to all market segments. A dress code might get you more sales, right up till all your talent moves on and your more relaxed competitor starts to clobber you in head-to-head comparisons.
Long hair and pony tails???
well....
Bill Gates is hardly a style guru is he..
Ya don't hear young fellas saying..gee i am gonna stop dressing like Brad Pitt, and dress like Bill
Coz Bill is cool!
Oh no.. not a lot of that going on
i know that TFA is about power dressing, which in theory probably does work, but who wants to be dress like a politician..
And what about Google... (Don't be evil), i thought they were all about comfort not image...and last time i looked they were kinda successful IIRC!
Trolling along, singing a song...side by side
Because everybody knows that a necktie is imbued with magical powers and carries a logical deduction field that emanates modus-ponentrinos into it wearer's brain, thus making his/her software better. As if Microsoft programmers don't wear sandals and pony tails too...
But, it works both ways, If NO ONE reconizes the poorly dressed dork only beacuse of his dress, then he is still screwed as he never gets a chance to prove his worth beyond what he chooses to wear..
Appearance is how the world works. If you want to be part of it, you have to deal with it.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Given a choice between a guy in a suit with a mediocre piece of software, and the guy in jeans that hasn't shaved for two days and smells of pizza with an amazing array of programs - they're going to take the suit. The marketdroids want to see success oozing from the vendor, not an air of dishevelment.
All in all, it's sad to see decisions based on quality of presentation as opposed to quality of product, but with few exceptions, that's the way it's always been - and probably always will be.
Shower. Shave. Buy some button up shirts and a pair of slacks. From my experience, this makes all the difference in the world. Like it or not - it's the way the game is played.
hi mom!
This is the silliest argument imagineable.
In fact, I remember in the 80's people complained about how Bill Gates dressed, and how he used un-adult-like language at times (e.g. "That's cool").
If you want someone who dresses better, pick a different vendor/programmer/salesperson/whatever.
If I ask you, "Is Citizen Kane a good movie?" and you say "no," and then I go and look at your DVD shelf and it's full of nothing but the complete runs of about twelve different series of anime, then I'm probably not going to be inclined to value your opinion very highly.
Similarly, if I ask you, "Do open source and open standards have credible value for my business?" and you say "Fuck yeah dude and anybody who tells you different is an asshole who sucks Bill Gates' cock all day!" and you're wearing a Penny Arcade t-shirt, shorts, four facial piercings, and a ponytail ...
Surely you see my point? So get past your righteous indignation. It's not really all that righteous.
Breakfast served all day!
Having read the damned article, I'd like to point out something that a lot of posters seem to be missing.
Nowhere that I've seen in that article does he say that ponytails and sandals signify anything about the skills, attitude, or professionalism of the people in question.
He is talking about peoples' perceptions, and the need to be politically savvy when selling OSS to those same people.
--- These are not words: wierd, genious, rediculous
INTERVIEWER: Deputy minister, what do you believe is behind this recent increase in terrorist bombings?
HELPMANN: Bad sportsmanship.
"Made up/misattributed quote that makes me look smart. I am on
and tails, the natural dress for a penguin promoter.
Either that or a jumpsuit and a motorcycle helmet.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Because when I open up a software program, I know the way my first impressions are created is by hunting down the people who wrote that software program (often hiring private investigators to do so) and evaluating their visual appearance.
In other news, I spent some time as an employee of Sun Microsystems and you know, it's the funniest thing, I was writing commercial, proprietary, closed source software the whole time, but oddly enough I still went to work with a ponytail and birkenstocks on every day. I wonder how that works? Oh, even odder, have you ever seen a picture of Jonathan Schwartz?
Now, there might be a point here if the object of the advice were to separate the people who create and use open source software from the people who evangelize it to businesses and governments. If the advice were to get some people who wear nice suits to promote the benefits of open source to business suit types in their own language, then that would make a lot of sense. It is indeed quite possible that the public face of open source promoters looks too much like me, the guy who at Sun would have been stuffed in the back room writing the code, whereas the public face of closed source promotion tends to look like Scott McNealy or Johnathan Schwartz (whose hair may be as long as mine, but hey, he cleans up well). I have no personal experience of this; I would imagine that Peter Quinn does. As it is though his advice was quite poorly explained.
"On the other hand, people who don't care whether you wear sandals, have a ponytail, are black, white, asian, a woman, or whatever, will come out ahead, because they'll pick stuff that is best, rather than looking to see if it wears Armani suits."
Okay what you wear is a choice. Your race and gender are not.
Judging people by their choices is completely logical. Somebody that does the sandal and ponytail thing may make a good developer or do well in RnD. They may not do well as a network admin, CTO, or help desk person. A person that dress how they want and doesn't care about how they look may also not care about being on time, meeting deadlines, following guidelines, or security procedures.
I don't care what gender or race you are I do care if you show bad judgement and a lack adaptability. Your statment about being shallow is exactly backwards. How someone dresses for an interview shows a lot more about their attitude than there technical skill. Just like if I do see a developer that is wearing a tee shirt, jeans, and a ponytail I don't assume he can code his way out of a wet paper sack.
How you dress at an interview says a lot about how much effort you will make to fit in and that is important.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
If nothing else, that picture proves that there is such a thing as the opposite of pornography.
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
Then you find out how really evil they are!
And you still don't learn anything about Linux!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
I take it this will be the first "fashion" tag.
Limina.Log
I think a lot of suits make the mistake of thinking of Linux as a unified market force. It isn't. It's just, for lack of a better term, a technology. Saying that the dress preferences of the people behind Linux are holding it back is like saying that you don't see rocket-powered cars because the rocket scientists look nerdy and wear tape on their glasses causing the car company execs to decide against it. It's just silly. Sometimes Linux is the wrong tool for the job. Sometimes strapping a rocket to a vehicle isn't the best way to get where you're going. Slow adoption ultimately allows for more intelligent deployment and utilization. It's not a race.
Hexy - a strategy game for iPhone/iPod Touch
The Reichsministry for Information Technology has conducted a study which shows that the adaption of open source software is held back by what is believed to be ungerman behavior of the authors. It is well known that open source programmers are perceived to not display less swastikas in public or even return the German salute either sloppy or hesitate to return it all.
Goddamnit ScuttleMonkey (?!), this is four days early! Pretty slipshod, even for a /. editur.
It's gotta be the shoes.
The fact is that, as a software engineer, your usefulness to a business is only as good as (1) your ability to work with some difficult-to-understand core technology and/or (2) your ability to document business processes. If you can do both (1) and (2), you're set. If you can do (2), you'll do okay creating glorified databases (maybe). If you can't do either, or if (1) no longer becomes valuable (as happened to a Foxpro programming friend of mine), you're hosed.
I learned this at 28. How you got to 37 not learning this is beyond me.
Finding God in a Dog
set #1
------
1. "sandal and ponytail set"
2. geek (a.k.a. SlashDotter)
3. Einstein
set #2
------
1. "suit and tie"
2. dumb jock
3. neo-conservative Republican/Democrat
Which group of people is more likely to understand technology and its implications for society?
Look closely at the picture of Einstein at the top of the SlashDot web page. If he had attended public school in straight-laced, suit-and-tie Mississippi in the 1950s, the clean-cut students in the class would have laughed at him, bullied him, and probably lynched him. Just look at Einstein's hair and his goofy personality.
this just in:
Working for dress-code-obsessed nazis discovered to be significant cause of stress in people under 30.
story at 11!
sometimes, i wonder if i'm the only conservative on teh intarweb. ah well, back to mah hogs and warmongerin'....
That this is Mr. Quinn's way of thanking the open-source community for all of the hard work done on open-source software and open standards such as ODF. I'd hate to see how he treats the creators of software and standards he doesn't like....
Long hair makes a great social filter. With long hair I find that all of the people I do not want to interact with avoid me. All of the people I would like to interact with are more forthcoming (think girls). Professionally I havent felt hindered at all by it, and I work for a very large enterprise software company.
Hmm, then again, I am always passed up for recruiting at career fairs, ohhh what a shame that is.
In general people used to make the same claim back then - well it was more like 'you have to wear a suit like those IBM sales people' - and now look at all those IBM guys, they're the ones with beards and sandals
No doubt, the dress code matter much.
It's easier to "judge" a product by the dress code of the users than by its real technical value.
Laziness rules the world!
Achille Talon
Hop!
Long haired freaky people need not apply.
No dreadlocks,
no rastafari!
~~ I think it was Pluto Shervington doing a cover of Five Man Electric Band's, Signs.
Linux is already widely adopted, except on the desktop.
If you want proper surveys, instead of one guy's opinion, have a look at OSDL Desktop Linux Client Survey (pdf) which will tell you:
Top inhibitors of Linux desktop adoption:
*Application support
*Peripheral support
*End user training
See also:
Linux adoption
Peter Galaxy.
I'd gotten unsolicited offers at trade conference visits before (when I was casually dressed). But the first time I came out to Silicon Valley for a deliberate job hunt I caved in to my 'ol dad's suggestion and wore a suit to interviews. I didn't get a single offer on that trip.
Don't know what happened at most of 'em, but I later heard that, at one place, everybody was impressed by my tech prowess and wanted to hire me - except one key guy who was SO offended by my suit that he flat-out refused to work in the same company with me, strictly because of it.
Know your audience. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
formidable opposition from vested interests
Ok, just tell all the people in sandals and ponytails to all wear vests . . .
On second thought, I've seen people in sandals and ponytails wear vests. There is generally no shirt under the vest.
Quick tutorial for software buyers:
Jacket and ties are signs that too much of a software company's resources are being spent on clothing.
Sandals and ponytails are signs of software you should pursue.
Pretty simple really.
"vested" interests. heh heh.
There might be something to all of this. Maybe this set who considers themselves elite programmers/coders/sysadmins/whatevers *want* the OSS stuff to be somewhat difficult to use. A barrier to entry to keep the not-as-intelligent-as-me crowd out of what they're doing. A little job security because they're the only ones that understand it. It's no wonder that everytime an easy-to-use distro comes out it's quickly lambasted by every Command Line Loving FreeBSD guru. There's a lot more to it than just the look, it's the entire attitude that hurts it from taking off.
Saving the World: One Drink at a Time
FTFA: Quinn also blamed the leaders of technology departments for not communicating the benefits of open-source software to their businesses effectively.
That's the issue. The whole dress thing is just his little hang-up.
I've gotton the blank look from the bosses when I've mentioned switching to F/OSS. This article has a great reason: being able to transfer documents to different applicatons and systems. What we need is more reasons.
How about a F/OSS sales pitch/reasons to use/why are you using it document on SourceForge?
Saturday is April 1. Slashdot will be shut down. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Most fortune 500 companies still have restrictive dress codes. My IT job requires I not wear jeans, t-shirts, sweats, or otherwise look "unprofessional."
'course I argue as I am usually not in the face of clients, since when do my clothes affect my work or ability to work?
"The man" argues that my colleagues won't take me seriously.
Hell, "the man" doesn't take the female engineer down the hall seriously. Why can't I wear shorts? She can wear a skirt. Guess I could wear a skirt.
/\/\icro/\/\uncher
Where I work our OSS hating Windows and Solaris admins are fscking slobs. I mean, damn, the ass crack on those fat bastards would put your average plumber to shame.
I OTOH wear Dockers and generally dress in "business casual" (unless it's storming, then the (nice, clean) bluejeans come out)) and where I work am esentially an OSS martyr. My peers think OSS (often just called "freeware") is worthless, amatuer crap (even though it powers the core of so many of our commercial systems).
No, what's holding back OSS in my neck of the woods is fear, simple as that. You see any idiot can call Microsoft or Sun when a server isn't behaving. If it's Debian or OpenBSD you have to do something radical... you have to think.
We'll all be customizable, and looking one particular way will take no more work.
The big cheeses kinda listened to me, but not too closely. They asked some really dumb, impossible to answer questions, then I was nearly frog-marched out of there. The problem? I wasnt wearing a suit. I knew everything they wanted to learn, but I didnt look like what they associated with "competence".
They stiffed me on my fee until I threatened legal action.
Addendum to article, before editorial cuts:
Quinn went on to further add that there were too many 'colored' people and 'orientals' working on open source for it to ever be viable in the market. "I mean, really", he mused, "I can see these people doing manual labor, like railroad work, but software development? Please!"
This guy would have fit in well in the 1930's, where it was acceptable to judge people in broad sweeping strokes. To suggest that all open source devs are granola eating hippies is no different than saying blacks are criminals, blonde women are dumb, and polish people are stupid.
Hey, Quinn eat some of your own crap - You are just like all other worthless white CEOs: Stupid, overpaid, and probably a thief just waiting for the SEC to blink so you can rob everyone blind.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
Hot diggity! Finally us long-haired men are getting the recognition we deserve in the press, as the way it was meant to be.
On another, less strange note, I've found the computing industry far more accepting of the casual ponytail/sandals attire, and in many cases helps you to judge the appropriate nerd status for said individual.
But they all say either one of two things and both are true, too bad they are at cross purposes.
1) Iconoclasm and a dissatisfaction with the status quo (with purpose) is what created Linux into what it is. As such, in the context of development it is a prime mover in the community and keeps it a powerful creative force.
2) Businesses do look at professionalism when making decisions, and they decide what professionalism means. Today it means that the interface with the end user must project that professionalism which means suit and tie. Someone mentioned about how some of those with their hands on the IT purse strings are impressed by the dissheveled geek mystique, but I would really question how often this is really true.
The fact is that the business world operates quite a bit off of appearances, maybe more than we'd all like, but if you want widespread Linux acceptance, you're playing on their court. No one's asking a Linux developer to trade in the ability to dress him/herself (or lack thereof) or attend his/her own hygiene any more or less than previously, but if you want to make inroads to the commercial desktop, you've got to play the game a little.
Sell out or buy in... call it what you will... I call it necessary for the promulgation of Linux to commercial desktop acceptance.
I think this depends on where in the USA you are. I think it is California Casual versus New England Suits. Out West we dress less formal, but back East formal is required.
> In particular, Quinn blames the 'sandal and ponytail set' for sluggish adoption of Linux by businesses and governments.
Huh. Me, I blame ineffectual state bureaucrats. Know any, mister former CIO?
Done with slashdot, done with nerds, getting a life.
I happen to be, at this very moment, sporting a ponytail and wearing sandals (no socks) reading slashdot here at work (a well known network equipment company in silicon valley) as I wait for a build to finish.
My boss doesn't have a ponytail but I have seen him wearing sandals on many an occasion.
As a 10 year long ponytail wearing geek who recently went short-haired and is on his way back to long hair, this strikes close to home. Why am I going back again? Turns out it was an easy filter for biggots like this guy. With short hair, people who never gave me the time of day were "really nice". I don't need those people in my life. As to the story, change the perception of people, don't conform to them.
It's not all about class. A lot of it has to do with the lingering dot.com attitude. I work with a lot of dot.com'ers that got all of their experience from companies that failed. They still come in like anything we're doing is old school, and clearly the wrong way to do it, and everything they are doing is the only way to do it. I'm open minded and see the value to wise application of Open Source in development and deployment, but the heavy push for Open Source adoption is mostly coming from computer nerds that all have come from dot.coms that have failed. That's not a comforting message to clients and management.
A little professionalism and consideration for wise use might be good for everyone in this industry.
Slashdot.. where people join together in deliberate ignorance.
If the brilliant insight of this man is true, then why limit ourselves to just the OpenSource community? Certainly, they may benefit the most, but if they benefit at all, then who *wouldn't* benefit?
All we need to do to improve the economy of the United States is to buy everyone suits and ties and give them haircuts. Bush can initiate this sort of "dot-com-fashionate conservative" economic reform.
Furthermore, with our worldwide lead in fancy suits, we can further reinvest our profits into fancier suits and more expensive haircuts so that our global competition has no chance to ever catch our groove! Meanwhile, the rest of the international community is foolishly investing in education, infrastructure, and technology when they ain't never gonna be all that, baby.
to avoid Open Source.
...
That's like refusing to buy Sushi from people who understand freshness, cleanliness, and how to keep the food preparation surfaces shiny.
Besides, all the hot g1r1s have ponytails
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
MMmmmmmmm, Twinkies and Beer! Hghulbhglubhglubhglubhglubhglubhglub....
Saturday is April 1. Slashdot will be shut down. Sorry for the inconvenience.
... but the suit and tie will cost you extra. Businessmen speak of "money motivated people". Offer enough money to motivate me.
Hey, you can get Linux from companies like IBM, with suit and tie on the sales people and even the consultants that come in to play sysadmin for you. So what's the issue?
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
If anything, the corporate community should learn something from this. Dressing like a "professional" doesn't make you a "perfessional". It just makes you a boring suit that has no imagination or creativity. (I'm reminded of the classic "Lemmings" commercial apple put out to describe IBM bots just doing the same old boring thing day in and day out.)
Maybe that's what the corporate world wants. But the smaller, faster companies know that putting their key producers in little cubicals and crippling their imagination also cripples their productivity. What, haven't people learned anything yet from Google's "al of you can spend this X amount of time per day just having fun doing your own project" strategy?
Immediately, the corporate world should put in these standards:
1) No dress code. Business attire is reserved for "serious" presetation meetings or other times when respect need to be demonstrated. (Literally people should have lockers at work and change into "uniform" when necessary. Otherwise they should be left alone.)
2) Repeated breaks throughout the day. The standard 30 minute lunch break is just pathetic. People are burned out because they work to much, and they are burned out because the mind needs constant breaks in state in order to assimilate and learn new information.
3) People should be able to take a nap during the midday slump when body temperature goes down (see circadian rhythm - i.e. your "body clock")
4) The cubical should die and people should be forced to interact personally much more then they do now. Kill the 5 hours a day spent on the computer (unless you are in an IT job)
5) The workplace should be filled to the brim with high energy rituals and events. People work better when they are in high energy states. Anything which ads negative energy to the workplace environment should be removed.
6) "Nature" should be added. More sunlight, more water, more natural sounds. This immediately relaxes people and again, puts them in an optimal state of free flowing productivity.
I would say the number one reason why the US has fallin behind in technology is a failure to understand how to properly create an optimal environment for people to work in. "Work" should not be work at all- it should be fun. If it's not fun, then people are going to be doing their best, and getting people doing their best should be the major focus of every company.
Call me pragmatic, but I've always evaluated technology on its suitability to the task and rather it accomplishes my goals (price, support, stability, security, documentation, language du jour, whatever), unless I have specific moral objections to the supplier (CEO eats third-world children for desert, and buying said product would give him funds to import eight more children, etc.) Otherwise, if my component was written by Nepalese nudists but it was free, full-featured, stable, and fast, I'll take it. I don't care who wrote it, as long as it works for me.
Those who procure technology based on what color Armani suit the sales guy wore are going to wind up buying overpriced junk. Those who fairly judge technology on its merits and suitability to an application will succeed. Eventually group 1 will catch on once they see the example of group 2.
Because if government officials were this idiotic, there'd be no hope.
Hmm. I don't really care what you look like as long as you can do the job quickly and proficiently and respectfully. But I do care if you reek. Co-workers who offend either by BO or by stinking the place up with perfumes, colognes, booze, smoke, totally piss me off. Jeezus, take a shower for christsake. I might even rather work with a less competent non-stinkin tech than a perfectly dressed dork who smells of cologne, or some perfume, smoke, etc.
Bottom line - if you want to play their game on their field, wear their dammned uniform. (Oh, and use the same postures, hand gestures, idioms and aftershave).
It is, if you're trying to hire sycophants. Personally, I like my hires to have some individuality and creativity. How they dress, either way, says nothing about this to me. A short interview, however, can tell quite a lot. Being personable is important. I guess if you don't have that, you probably need to dress to mask it rather than call attention to it. Camoflauge?
it's a good thing to remember that ties and folded down shirt collars used to be the sign of drug users, rebels, and layabouts, in earlier times.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I'm a tech guy and I come to work everyday in dress clothes. Not a suit but decent pants not jeans, and a button up shirt with a tie. I am not at all uncomfortable in what I wear and I bought it cheap.
I used to do the T-Shirt and jeans thing but I am way happier not having to fight my boss on the issue and not hearing the jealous harrasment of my co-workers. Why go out of your way to fight it? As for quality of my work it is the same if I wear a suit or a T-Shirt.
If some guys in the office should have to IE. Sales and other assorted executives then so should everyone else. If you choose not then you are breaking the rules of your company do not expect them to be happy about it. Who wants a employee who still thinks he is in grade school and can rebel whenever he so chooses without repercussion.
I may get flamed for this but it seems that many of the posters are missing the point Peter Quinn is trying to get across. He used the "sandal and ponytail set" as a figure of speech, trying to point out that many of the open source advocates need have a more professional appearance AND be business-savvy. He wasn't really talking about some programmers locked up in an office somewhere programming, as this applies more to people who are visible. For example, if there's a sales meeting full of suits and the presenter is in a t-shirt, jeans, and "sandal and ponytail set", do you honestly think the suits will take the presenter seriously? Sure, in an idea world, no one will "judge a book my its cover" but this is not really different that a good looking jerk having better chances with the girls than no-go-gook looking nice guy.
Quinn also blamed the leaders of technology departments for not communicating the benefits of open-source software to their businesses effectively.
He has another valid point here. Just look at the posts on Slashdot. It seems that many here think that posting insults and profanities makes them look smarter than they really are. Picture this in your head:
Slashdotter (S): Dude, you really should switch to Linux.
Business Guy (BG): Why should we need to do that? Every Dell we buy already comes with a copy of Windows.
S: M$ is an evil empire and they kick puppies.
BG: That MS sales guy sure seemed nice to me.
S: Only morons like you fall for their shit. I know this because I'm so smart.
BG: I don't see why I need to listen to someone that's insulting me but Windows run fine and all of my clients use Office.
S: OMG! It's motherfuckers like you and your idiot clients that enabled M$ to retain its power. You guys all need to fucking die because to are just too stupid. In fact, the sheer number of cuss words that I used just proves how smart I am.
1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
Peter Quinn, are you smoking crack again?
what makes you think the "ponytails and sandals set" is cramping linux adoption?
maybe if you wouldn't wear such hideous ties, people might start believing you...
take a look at a bell labs publicity photo of UNIX inventors dennis ritchie and ken thompson working at a pdp-11 console(a paper console at that!)... if the room they were working in wasn't so cold, they'd probably be wearing sandals! and shorts! and drinking lot's of yoohoo!!!
shhh... they were in the process of growing their ponytails when they took this photo, but don't tell peter, or he will call unix a frivolous operating system.
in all seriousness mr. quinn, i think you need to wake up. suits and ties and "appropriate dress" isn't going to make a difference in linux adoption. linux and open source technology will/will not be adopted for a variety of reasons: existing technology, legacy systems, budget, skill set, vendors, etc. dress code is probably not even a blip on the radar of consideration.
just a thought, but maybe if you had a ponytail, you might have made more headway with your open document initiative... government people would have looked at you and thought "hmmm, ponytail, sandals, tech-talk... he must know what he's talking about!"
three can keep a secret, if two are dead - benjamin franklin
so give me some friggin money, i'll go get a bath,
cut me hair, buy a suit, shoes, get a life _and_
still write better code than the dicks who take
thousands or millions of dollars to tell you jack shit!
The dress code for computer geeks relates to the kind of people they are and the willingness, nay desire, to keep up to date with latest in computer technology. The requirement for each four days of work you need to maintain a day of education still holds true. Why should geeks change their behaviour because they did the education and like Linux.
If you want a suit go to IBM, where you will get Linux with a tie. You can also go with Novell, and you will get a peguin in a penguin suit. Red hat I am also sure will provide you exactly the kind of corporate reassurance that a lot of people are looking for.
Go to your friendly neighbourhood computer geek and you will get your casual dressing, casual attitude, friendly neighbourhood computer geek. It just happens that Linux is the operating system of choice for your friendly neighbourhood computer geek, nothing more nothing less.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
If only people were that objective.
The truth is that, as a salesman, you have to play to your audience and different audiences have different requirements - in essence you sell yourself along with a product. This doesn't always mean a suit, but you are conforming yourself to your audience.
If a business suit might level the playing field where your potential clients take you that much more seriously, while someone who shows up in stained T-shirk and slack will have to have a product that is that much more better to be taken seriously, why even risk it?
You see it everyday, in how consumers pick products. Usually, lets say in electronics, the more polished products get more serious consideration. Something that looks slapped together or superficialy cheap/chintzy is either not taken seriously or has to be sold cheaper - even if the functionality is better.
If you really like to believe that people are so objective to look past the superficial, I suggest you put some research into "packaging..."
The idea of over-dressing for work, and generally all occasions, is definitely an east-coast attitude. The west coast is well known for dressing down. That's why IBM in New York is famous for the blue suit while Microsoft in Washington state is known for jeans and t-shirts. These attitudes extend beyond business too. I had to argue with my wife, who is from Connecticut, that coming to a birthday party in Seattle in jeans was perfectly acceptable. She just couldn't imagine coming in anything less than a dress.
The best way to dress is in the manner of employees already at the company. Put on that suit when you visit IBM. But, you better leave that 3-piece suit at home to be taken seriously at Microsoft.
Mea culpa.
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
What I took from the article was that it is more about mind-set. Software has to serve a purpose, and in the business world it has to serve a business purpose. (Wow, what a concept.) We geeks tend to look at things from a "Wow, that's cool!" perspective. I say we because I am a software developer myself.
In the business world "cool" doesn't cut it. I'm an independant consultant, and one of the things that has made my business wildly successful is my cognitive dissonance between what is cool/good and what solves the customer's problems.
Whenever I take on a new contract, I immediately begin trying to work OSS solutions in. My development platform of choice is Java on Linux, using Tomcat as the application server behind LVS. I immediately try to get the customer to understand that the money they will save on software licenses will be much more than they have to spend on additional hardware. (Tomcat is great, but it does need a bit more hardware in the enterprise environment.)
Next is where the difference lies: If the customer can't accept my OSS platform requirements, I just work around them. The "sandals-and-ponytail" mentality tends to be one of "OSS or bust", whereas I will use whatever technology the customer ends up dictating that I use. But I don't stop there.
By having advocated a (largely) OSS platform, I can then point out to customers how these tools would have saved them the headaches they encounter later in the project, had we been allowed to use them. I do this tactfully, because my end goal is an incremental integration of OSS tools.
To sum things up, my business approach is:
1) Solve the business problem, regardless of the tools.
2) Solve the problems caused by proprietary tools using OSS tools, and make sure the customer knows who/what their savior was.
One of my current contracts is 100% MS, and is rabidly ANTI-OSS. I'm making headway with them, slowly but surely, and making a bunch of money while I do it.
We all just need to think on a smaller scale. Not just "change one customer at a time," but instead "change one tool for a customer at a time." It is a war of attrition, and in the end we will win.
p.s. I have had the rare customer who says "I don't care what you use, just build BLAHBLAHBLAH." They're my favorites, and get a preferential billing rate.
Unfortunatly they don't always come out ahead. You see while your company may be better, you might not get hired for that big contract because of how your staff dress. Its not fair but its how things work. You see most managers are not techies and most managers are smart, infact I would go so far as to say very smart. If a manager isn't smart it can put other smart managers off, they start to think "hmm I hope he works better than he dresses". This causes the manager to pick the smart guy/company/whatever over the scruffy guy. Its not always true but it is in most cases. The number of very talented people I have seen turned down for jobs because of how they dressed (just for the interview in most cases) is shocking. And not just in one company! Its unfortunate but its the way the world works.
It's interesting to note the bewilderment in the Linux community over why people outside aren't embracing Linux with open arms. They try to find all kinds of explanations: Microsoft FUD, the ignorance of managers, paid shills writing negative comments in the press, and now prejudice about how open source developers dress. Anything but looking at Linux itself. 10 years ago I installed Linux on a PC for the first time in my life and it was an exciting moment. Now, however, I'm forced to use Linux at work. The landscape has changed over the last decade and I have no difficulty understanding why people don't want to adopt Linux without looking to sociology for explanations.
"The White House is not an intelligence-gathering agency," -- Scott McClellan, Whitehouse spokesman.
It's about age.
The underlying social issue here is that the suits were educated and got most of their business experience before computers came into common use. Things like dress code and the idea that business and technology are antithetical are nothing more than glorified generation gap. And I'm being charitable to put it that way - another way of looking at it would be age discrimination.
This is why I keep my hair cut and styled such that the maximum amount of grey is visible. Dyeing out my grey hair would be murder to my credibility with customers and vendors. On more than one occasion I've been selected as the tech representative for my department explicitly for that reason (and have been told so).
Don't kid yourselves, kids. It's us vs. them. The good news, however, is that this is a self correcting problem.
In fact the only problem I see is business people being influenced by irrelevant factors like OSS developers' dress code instead of concentrating on the strength and weaknesses of OSS adoption.
Decision based on appearance is prejudice. I'd expect a successful businessman to make a profitable deal with a hippy, rather than discarding an opportunity because of a prejudice.
---- MISSING MISCELLANEOUS DATA SEGMENT --- [sigdash] trolololol
guess business people won't take jesus seriously now.
please disregard the son of god, he's lying.
there is no salvation, it's just some ponytailed-sandal-wearing-freak, waxing poetically.
instead, listen to the religious leaders who are appropriately dressed. only those who have a clean presentation can provide the truth. and don't forget, you get what you pay for. so it should be expensive too.
three can keep a secret, if two are dead - benjamin franklin
You owe us a license fee for using that line from the 1971 hit "Signs" by Five Man Electrical Band
Pay up or face your demise...muwahhaha!!!...
The real reason for the slow adoption of GNU/Linux is the RTFM wanabee hacker crowd that hangs out in places like linux.com scaring newbies away with comments like "if you don't want to learn go back to windows" If we did not have them, then adoption would go much faster.
A lot of complaints here says something along these lines: "If Business Woman #2 picks XYZ Corp's product over mine just because I wear shorts, she's in for a world of hurt! Their product sucks!"
In this case, we have every right complain about Business Woman #2 and her choice to pick someone who was incompentent but in a suit vs. someone competent in chinos and sandals. It's too bad she has those views.
But you know what? We all lose.
Saying "I shouldn't care about my appearance" is always going to hold someone back. Even if you made small improvements, you'd be surprised at the new, different (better, even?) treatment you will get.
What if dress was the only thing standing between you and a $15,000/yr promotion? What if your haircut was the only thing standing between you being involved with a project or being project lead on something?
The fact of the matter is that an immaculately dressed idiot is not going to fool anybody. But, if you're already good at what you do, and adding a bit of "professionalism" can get you to the next level, you're only doing yourself a disservice by not taking advantage of it. Don't go overboard, just go up one or two notches. If you wear a t-shirt, wear a polo or collared shirt. If you wear a collared shirt, wear a loose tie and sports jacket.
And finally, the idea that by putting on a tie you lose your individuality is ridiculous; it implies you let your apparel define who you are.
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
One of the most feared gangs, with a cadre of lawyers who always dress to kill in court. You play the part in the game of life when on stage and dress in your robe when at home.
The hardest part for companies regarding OSS isn't just their presentation as a person its also their presentation of the product. A lot of the time companies want the supplier to come in, do a nice powerpoint presentation of their product and chat with the tech guys. Its very hard to do that with OSS and even when you can most of the time their presentations are awful. You can tell its been rushed and they don't know how to present anything. Now they are software developers and not marketing guys and that is part of the problem. OSS still needs to be "sold" to the company. Now internal techs can push to get an OSS tool used, lord knows I have tried a lot. I have had some successes but also a lot of knock backs. The company doesn't feel all that comfortable with ME trying to sell ANOTHER COMPANIES product. They ignore the fact there is not other company and its free, they see it as me trying to get my own way and a lot of managers get a bit defensive as its "their decision". My advice to OSS groups is to dress smart (it won't kill you!), be clean (I have seen some OSS devs who have some serious hygene problems) and learn some basic presentation skills so you don't "umm" and "err" every 10 seconds.
It seems useful to evaluate the possibility that the reason OSS has such a difficult time winning acceptance in some quarters has to do with its communist image and development approach. The U.S. is, obviously, very capitalist in nature and culture, even in the government, and I have to wonder if that has something to do with this issue.
Capitalists tend to be very comfortable with the notion of "You get what you pay for." When you try to impress upon them the idea that there's all this great software out there, and it's free! they start to wonder to themselves, "Why is it free? What's wrong with it?" I don't think OSS advocates have done a great job of answering this question, or necessarily even of asking the question of themselves - Why is it free? (A host of reasons, some good, some not-so-good) ...What is wrong with it? (Many things, starting with frequently difficult user interfaces - note I use OSS myself regularly, but only the most ardent fanboy will refuse to acknowledge that it does have its problems and limitations, though it may still be preferable to proprietary software in some or even many cases)
Remember that techies are rarely the ones making decisions about these sorts of issues - instead it is mostly executives, marketers, managers, etc., who may not be willing or capable to make a judgment based upon the technical merits. When they see something free, their natural inclination may be suspicion...
And I'm... too sexy for a sig...
well you can say that dress code and appearance shouldn't matter but your skill should but well dress code and appearance does display skill too. After all doesn't the media hire makeup artists etc... don't they use beautiful women to sell?
You can tell everyone who cares about your pony tail to get stuffed because they are stupid but how many people in the world do you think are really smart and can see through all that? When I started at my first job I got really frustrated with this idiot won't go into details but this old project manager took me aside and said "Hey you're valued so much BECAUSE there are idiots out there, and get used to it because they are the majority!". I think is a person is shallow enough to give your more respect or money or promotion or whatever because you have a nice haircut then you've got to a make a decision are you smart enough to take the opporunity or do you go no they suck they are stupid and you'll ignore what they have to offer.
"People who are too shallow to see past how some dork dresses get what they deserve, sheez.."
Sadly, the likelihood is that nearly all of us are guilty of this in some form or another. I've watched as people right here on Slashdot have summed up a poster's intelligence by how many typos or grammatical errors that person had made. We should all be mindful of the 'never judge a book by its cover' lesson we all learned as kids.
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
IBM used to make their techies wear suits. Then, during the dark period in the late 80s and early 90s when they were struggling to reinvent themselves, they had a revelation: Business-type customers like to see people in "professional" business atire, but this only matters if the customer actually sees you. The rest of the time, it is fine to dress comfortably. Thus sales, marketing, and any techie who happened to be interacting with the business-type customers would wear a suit and tie, everyone else wore what they wanted. Bam! Problem solved! And since then, the "sandal and ponytail set" hasn't stopped IBM from making sales, now have they?
So the fundamental problem, if there really is a real problem behind the article, is that the wrong people are speaking to each other. If you're trying to make an OSS business case to the business-types, then yeah you need a business-type person dressed in business-type clothing to do the talking. If you aren't a for-profit organization who can hire such a person to do the talking for you, then why do you give a fuck if the business types listen or not? The techies will listen to you, and you'll get in like most OSS has gotten in -- via the back door in the server room. If you are a for-profit, then why do you need a cnet article to tell you to "dress for success" and hire a marketing person instead of sending your be-sandled techies out into the field?
I don't know, this whole thing smacks of misdirection. He says it's the poor dress code that's causing the slow adoption, but then makes it sound more like it's politics and "IT leadership" (interpreted to mean some kind of management, shouldn't be wearing sandals) that are to blame. It sounds to me like the real reasons for the slow adoption of OSS have nothing to do with "sandals and ponytails", and "OMG RMS dresses looks like a dirty hippy!" is just an excuse.
The enemies of Democracy are
Hey dude! Dig my new photo:
http://macbeach.googlepages.com/snap2.jpg
I think though, that we are passing, or have passed, the point where Open Source advocates should be thought of as asking for any favors, with respect to dress code, or otherwise.
As a mainframe systems programmer in the 70s I, on occasion, wore pony tails and sandals to work. It was symbolic that I was important enough to the company that I could thumb my nose at any dress codes. Those days may be over (for me anyway) but that has nothing to do with Open Source.
Companies and government organizations that want to be lead around via a ring through their nose (or lower extremities) by Microsoft should feel free to do so. Microsoft is only so glad to oblige (substitute IBM, Apple, Dell, HP or your own favorite IT dinosaur). If Open Source doesn't represent a competitive advantage to companies that adopt it, then screw Open Source. Don't do us any favors please!
As to dress, I wore my hair long and wore jeans and sandals to work because it was comfortable, not because it was fashionable, and not really for the statement that it made. I wore suits when it was called for too. These days I'm sure there are many dot-net programmers dressing like pigs and still toeing the Microsoft party-line. The two issues are unrelated, and always will be.
Creativity and lazyness are different. You can dress creativley and still be smart. I would not consider a dirty tshirt and jeans with dirty trainers or sandles to be "creative".
Here's a completely different point of view.
Yes, the corporate suits are not comfortable with OSS companies, because the folks in the OSS companies don't wear suits. But it's not actually because of the clothing, it's what the clothing implies. The lack of suits tells them that these are technical people in charge, not business people. The suits don't like dealing with technical people, because they don't really understand us. They feel more comfortable with people wearing suits, because people who wear suits are their kind of people.
I just love hearing from our C_Os about how we in development should do whatever the sales/marketing folks tell us, because "if it weren't for them, we wouldn't have jobs". Meanwhile, I'm sitting here thinking, well, what the heck would they sell if we weren't creating products?
Never mind the fact that the sales department has a very regular turnover, and the sales people themselves aren't anything special, just your average ex-fratboy business major who made it through four years of college with an average 0.8 BAC. Nobody blinks twice when they leave, they just replace them. Yet, the company is horrified that I ride a motorcycle, because of the possibility that I may get injured/killed and thus leave them with a serious hole to fill that requires very specialized knowledge.
Truth? They fear us. They know that they are a dime a dozen. Our entire sales department could get hit by a bus tomorrow, and it would set the company back a month at worst. If the engineering department walked out, the company would fold up like a wet kleenex, and would *never* recover.
Imagine if some slob with long uncombed hair vented the merits of a sandwich... would you eat this sandwhich?
Please get a hair cut and some real shoes. That goes for anyone who's working on GPL3 especially.
So you equate intelligence with expensive clothes and designer outfits do you? You must be in management.
You would expect wrong. The first thing a successful businessman would probably think is "hmm, i wonder what my manager will think when he sees this guy, will he think 'omg the guy looks like shit'? Hmm, probably, lets go with the smart guy, if he isn't as good I can always say the this guy was worse"
Sucess is measured by the marketing and bean counter types, If you want sucess they come along for the ride. Just look what sucess has done for the internet, tell business linux sucks and they don't want it, while its still worth having. Wait till linux has stockholders then it will truley suck.
They can have my command prompt when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
I know deep inside that I will rather make it to the top of a company than
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1) get accepted without a lot of social engineering as a kernel contributor
2) be respected in one of the self-centered elite foss groups, like e.g. the german PHP guys
3) <tag class="yourPersonalWish"
So people here really believe humans in business and humans in foss are soooo different? Hahaha!
And don't let me even start with the long cultural history of our western dress codes. Just a hint: A tie wasn't exactly invented by a farmer...
I for one will welcome our men-should-wear-hats overlords, as soon as they come back.
Q: Are you wearing brown lipstick?
A: No! I've got great social skills!
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Excellent point. I try hard not to judge someone by their looks but sometimes you can't help it. I have done this recently with someone new at work (as well as everyone else in my department, perhaps I gave in to peer pressure). The guy needs to take a bath and clean his clothes. Not to mention sort out his attitude. God knows how he actually got the job as he isn't even that good (the manager who hired him moved jobs 2 weeks after hiring him, perhaps it was payback? heh). It is very hard to stop your subconscience from prejudging someone when trying your hardest, I suspect most managers don't even try.
El señor Gates es malo, el señor Gates es el diablo...
From this point on, if you are not dressed in a suit and tie, you will not be able to contribute software to Open Source Software projects.
I predict this will immediately result in a massive jump in both adoption of the software and its functionality, because, as we all know, it is people dressed in suits who are the smartest, most efficient and most productive members of our society.
I mean really, if this is a problem, why hasn't the larger business community contributed some type of ISO standard for dress code, and required everyone developing software for them to comply with it, simply rejecting any software products that have been worked on by people who do not conform?
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
Its the arrogance that some techs have that their appearance should not matter that is a major problem. Look, most fortune 500 companies got that way by doing things in an orderly fashion. Some of this involved having their workforce conform to rules which made it easier to both judge performance as well as attitudes. Businesses are loathe to change something that works. Look at what people term "casual work attire". It runs the gamut but I can tell you this, most of corporate America took a long time to adapt to it and when they did they did so in an orderly fashion.
Many of the guys above paid their dues and some still do. They managed to do it within the system. It does work. Yeah people won't complain about your dress when your fixing their shit but I bet some upper management folks will appreciate your work more if you dress better while doing it. I know, it should not matter you say. Yet it does, by doing so you show respect for the organization and them. Respect is key to the game. What you do on your own time is your business, what you do on theirs is theirs.
Hell if your clothing really didn't matter then why in the hell are you bitching about it? Obviously it matters to you. Whose more immature, the people expecting others to dress appropriately for work or those who this its a bunch of hogwash? I can tell you who is more professional and that is the key to business. Appearance goes a long way, it won't save your ass in the end but it does make many people more comfortable when you play the game by the rules.
If you want to dress a certain way then find an employer who will let you or start your own business. Whats stopping you?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
exactly my point, how you dress has nothing to do with qualities that I would consider to be important. I've seen extremely friendly, personable, intelligent people with a face full of piercings wrapped in the best money can buy at goodwill. People that would, in meaningful way, be an asset to my company. I've also seen such people looking like they stepped out of GQ. And morons of both cuts of cloth as well. Yet you imply that somehow, the rags on their bodies actually indicates something of value about the person?
I'm not saying it's not "smart" to dress for the culture you are trying to join. I'm just saying it's not a real indicator of a damn thing of worth, and as an employer I would hope that more relevant criteria would guide my hiring.
Sheesh, this is a well researched phenomena we've known about for, like, a hojillian years. We even have a name for it. Namely Halo Effect. It's the tendency for superficial traits to cloud our first impressions (she wears glasses, so she MUST be smart). Thanks to belief bias and confirmation bias and a few others, once that initial impression is made, it's incredibly hard to shake. There's nothing to see here. Basically, it's just common sense. No matter how good F/OSS is, if it wants to break into big business and especially big government (government bureaucracies tend to be much more adverse to trying new things), it's going to have to play on their terms. If that means getting a hair cut and dressing conservatively so you can get your foot in the door, so be it.
You just described two of the biggest problems the world faces today, especially when considered in combination.
...it is always better to look good than to be good!
Fuck 'em! Let 'em crash! In the meantime, those companies that can look at the abilities of people and ignore (or, the hell with that, just tolerate) the appearance of competent individuals will prosper. And, more importantly, those that can judge the ability of a tool regardless of the appearance of those who espouse it will continue to suffer from an embarassing surplus of profit due to money not spent maintaining an inferior solution.
Not to sound politically correct or anything but these exact same attitudes (just imagine how it would look to have that darkie at the front desk; it's not us, it's our customers! Or, in the political arena, "I'd be all for civil rights, but they'd vote me out of office!") were used to justify racism once upon a time.
Ever walk around the Redmond campus? Lots and lots of people with long hair and sandals. I've not been to the Apple campus but I'd wager it's about the same except for the really faithful who wear only black turtle necks.
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
Clothing and hairstyle more important than substance? And these PHB's don't get driven out of business by their screwed up priorities? Someone explain to me again why we take economists seriously at all.
Long haired freaky people need not apply.
No dreadlocks,
no rastafari!
It wasn't Pluto Shervington. It was Ras Karbi. The song was called 'Discrimination' and it was a hit in 1976.
When I got hired in 1996 the company had recently moved to corporate casual. I remember "not wearing a suit and/or tie" was an important thing for me. I still work there and I STILL don't own a suit!
The sales guys obviously still dress up, as does higher management...but it's corporate casual at all the sites I've been to. Doc Martins, Cheap Old-Navy Khakis and a nice shirt...button down or 'polo' is perfectly acceptable.
Blar.
I'm a programmer with roughly 20 years of experience. And while I don't have a ponytail, or wear sandals (I don't even have a beard), I am often a little on the shabby side -- jeans, t-shirts and runners. I own exactly one sweater and I wear it every day (Hmmm... maybe I have Charlie Brown complex...)
Anyway, in deference to my advancing years, I thought I should probably clean up my act a bit and look respectible. I asked my friend what she thought. Her comment was very insightful.
She said, "You mean wear long sleeve shirts, nice pants and fancy shoes?"
"Ya. Something like that.", I replied.
"Don't do it. None of the technical people will take you seriously."
Let's not forget that all of those C-level types currently on trial were very well dressed . . .
Hey, when you're looting the pension fund, it's easy to pay for the best.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
Does this remind anybody else of the classic story "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint Exupery?
From chapter 4:
I have serious reason to believe that the planet from which the little prince came is the asteroid known as B-612.
This asteroid has only once been seen through the telescope. That was by a Turkish astronomer, in 1909.
On making his discovery, the astronomer had presented it to the International Astronomical Congress, in a great demonstration. But he was in Turkish costume, and so nobody would believe what he said.
Grown-ups are like that . . .
Fortunately, however, for the reputation of Asteroid B-612, a Turkish dictator made a law that his subjects, under pain of death, should change to European costume. So in 1920 the astronomer gave his demonstration all over again, dressed with impressive style and elegance. And this time everybody accepted his report.
It's called Fashion. I personally don't understand attraction of following Fashion trends, but there it is. Not everyone who looks differently than you do is doing it for attention or to make a 'statement'.
As for your car-buying example...dude...you trust car salesmen?
Blar.
or you will become what you appear to be. (Kurt Vonnegut, Mother Night) If you look like a bum, you'll probably be treated like one. Unless you have an entourage and some fame (not notoriety). It all has to do with comfort. If you have to meet with suits regularly, in their environment, they'll be much more comfortable if you look something like them. If nothing else its a sign of respect. If they're coming to your cave, and they're in a suit they'll feel out of place, too. Business suits are actually egalitarian costumes. A dark suit, reasonably well tailored and clean, looks pretty much the same to all but the most fashion conscious. A $100 suit works as well as a $3000 one. (I won't go into the psychological affect of wearing a custom made suit.) If everone is waring a dark suit and a white shirt and a tie eveyone at least appears equal. Smoothes out the hierarchal and machismo affect. BTW, I have longish hair (most of the time) a beard and prefer polo shirts and chinos. In fact I only own one suit, no sport jackets, and my ties are Garcia. I regularly meet with senior executives from major tech companies. I try, when I can to at least where a sport shirt instead of a polo.
I think your dress might have caught the moron on that one . . . i.e. the one within the clothes. Not dressing up for an interview is nonsense -- if you won't even conform that much, it's a pretty good sign you won't conform to company policies either, which is a good enough reason not to hire you alone.
Basically, I just think that the terminology you used is wrong. You're not catching morons by dressing that way, you're just catching people who might want you to do things you don't always want to do and view your not dressing as expected as evidence you won't. If this is your definition of a job that you don't want, OK, that's fine, but most jobs require even the most dedicated employees to do some things they don't want to do.
What nonsense. I can think of no bigger open source supporter than IBM, a company long ridiculed for one of the most restrictive dress codes in the US. I can remember when every IBMer was required to wear a white shirt and tie. I think they only recently allowed colored shirts. If sandals and ponytails are code words for the political musings of Mr. Stallman, he may have a point. But I doubt that RMS cares about business or government acceptance.
Who says OSS folk don't wear suits? Tux wears a suit 24/7 and he's one of our most recognizable mascots. Chuck, the BSD daemon on the other hand wears sneakers most of the time and look where that's got him.
would you like to have the guy with the bad breath, the shady looks and filthy hair take a real good look around your house? Now why dont you think he's a good plumber? Obviously you can't tell anyone's abilities by their hairstyle, clothing or general appearance. Once you know the abilities it would be equally wrong to ignore them. But don't pretend you are blind to appearance with your own choices.
(so very, very offtopic, but...)
:-). there are plenty of skinny predators that get along fine with bulging pectorals.
:-)
eating meat essentially means you are a stupid ass man. please let me explain you good for long time fun:
Your points about heroin, etc, aren't relevant because those aren't subject to evolutionary pressure like food is. Food has a direct relationship to survability. If vegetables made a huge difference in how long someone lived, then it should be that people who liked vegetables a lot more than meat should be naturally selected. But they haven't been.
junk science buddy. evolutionary pressure is way too slow an effect to alter diet - it's like saying gravity is why we are muscular. it has an impact, but very negligible in comparison to, well, evolutionary pressures (strongest man gets the mate) in this case
diet and preference is all about resources. our palate evolved to make sure we lusted after fats, proteins, sugars and salts because 50,000 years ago (the last time we were any diffrent in physiological evolutionary terms) these substances were extremely hard to get a hold of - they either required killing something with the equivalent defensive properties of a tank or migrating long distances between scarce and contested resources.
each of these things (fats, proteins, sugars, salts) are now very, very easy to get hold of but our hunger sense for them hasn't underdeveloped yet because evolution is so damn _slow_.
the fact is these foods are now, on average, very very _bad_ for the average persons health, and evolution is starting to grind into action - hence the rise of vegetarianism - but in the mean time most of us are beholden to out of date instinctual urges that are unhealthy.
so the _intelligent_ among us are leapfrogging evolution and choosing not to eat meat. they're evolving, and we're being culled for being unfit for survival. So if you're smart enough to understand evolution, you should be smart enough to short circuit your meat palate. If not, you're an evolutionary chump.
Then look at children. Very, very, very few children enjoy green vegetables. If they were so good for you, wouldn't we have evolved such that children would love them?
junk, junk, junk. children play with themselves in public as well, do you think that replicating it as an adult would be a positive addition to your evolutionary chances? I'm thinking no, dumbass.
- and yes, I eat meat, but in honour of a good rant I'm prepared to be a raving hypocrite to assuage my excoriation fetish. have nice day good buddy! (yes, you need to say it in a pidgin asian accent to make it funny
My father is a Microsoft MVP, and has that picture hanging on his office wall. See the blonde guy on the second row? A lot of people (including parts of my family) thought it was a portrait of me photoshop:ed into the picture :).
I need a haircut.
Thats a foolish statement.
Sales is about confidence. Not about being P.C.
Lets put it in real world terms:
If you were going to buy a Rolex watch. Would you feel more comfortable purchasing one :
a) From a very expensive jewlrey store on high street, at a moderate discount.
b) From a blanket or card table vendor in Times Square, for $5.
Once your wrist turns green a few times - those Armani suits sure start looking nice.
--Ne auderis delere orbem rigidum meum, non erravi pernicose!
Having recently switched from XP to Ubuntu (dual booting) on my home pc there are other problems when considering OSS for business applications.
This will probably get modded trollbait, but hey.
1) Attitude - asking setup and developmental questions on the online forums (several that I've tried) gets you largely flamed as a noob/newb, or accused of leeching with little actual support. Additional to this is the very defensive attitute the community at large has regarding OSS when dealing with actual criticism.
2) Consistency of formats - I guess that this is often seen as a feature of OSS, however in a business sense it is a barrier to OSS in the normative workplace (ie: not just IT Industries) - this problem even seems to go down the the file systems - ext2, ext3, as opposed to a single NTFS. Yes, there are apps that can overcome it, IF you are able to locate them amoungst thousands of wierd little 'fun' abbreviations. Processing addins is another problem with this - rpm vs deb etc. I'm always having to go back to the root tarballs and compiling from there. Not every business has a tech that knows how to compile handy just for processing an update.
3) Hardware support - configuring network printers is just a pain, however may the Almightly help you if you need to install a PCI dialup modem (especially Conexant). It's one of the reasons my home pc is a dual boot. Even Linuxant doesn't have dialup drivers built for the amd_64 builds.
4) Learning curve - most business are reasonably adept at managing systems and processes via windows, where the majority of configuration work is via a GUI, rather than having to learn all the different parameter options and run them through a shell or terminal system. There is a good start from what I've seen on GUI's (Ubuntu, Red Hat, Knoppix), however there is still a lot of work to do.
Also, an observation - everyone enjoys sniping at MS, and yes, some of it's business practices are somewhat arrogant, however the advantage of being a single ivory tower is that everything (software apps) in that tower does actually talk to each other reasonably well. Dealing with *nix is lots of ivory towers, or a tower of Babel, where nothing talks to each other without an interpreter.
Follow the line of thought in the summary and you will see that it is suits that stop open source adoption, not sandals.
/. bug #926803 - Why I can post.
according to the office girls; and you know what it's true.
I have a good mate who is thick as a brick but still managed to get an MCSE - I guess when a company is paying the the big bucks to the training organisation they'd be hard pressed to fail them.
But while he is thick he has great teeth a good tan and dresses like a CEO. so he scores plenty of sweet contracts and rides the fine pussy at those workplaces - at the office I met him at he banged three hott secretaries - but asked me how to spell crowd. twice.
Same thing goes for their marketing people - the MS account managers and biz devs are hot fucking shit. I have no doubt they vet their customer-facing teams on looks - they have a far higher proportion of genuine stunners than you would expect. If I had a 300k contract dangling I would definitely let these hotties pitch to me. pitch it baby... aw yeah
linux techs are ugly fuckers. I know because I am one, and so are you bitches. sad but true
Does the computer nerd with a disshevelled appearance only look that way because he puts his passion for what he does over and above what he looks like? Or does his apparent lack of concern over his appearance imply that there may be other things that he does not care about such as professional integrity, punctuality, or simply doing a good job?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
A guy comes in, cleans a bit of gunk out of your photocopier... maybe 20 minutes of fiddling.
Then drops you an enourmous bill, which gets paid without complaint (out loud).
They man was wearing a suit and looked businessy, so of course he was a highly skilled professional. Not just a guy who dusted a bit of gunk out of the machine.
Not since Marie-Antoinette played milkmaid has looking simple and honest been so fake and complicated.
The orchestra played in the space in Rockefeller Center currently used by Saturday Night Live. However, there was no audience present during the radio broadcasts, save for a handful of people not in the orchestra (radio engineers, NBC executives, perhaps a representative from the sponsors or two).
Despite this fact, every member of the orchestra wore a tuxedo, and Maestro Toscanini wore tails.
Radio. No audience. Formal dress.
The story has stuck with me ever since, and I'd often pondered the reason for this. Remember, this was back when even street dress for a professional musician was a suit, tie, and snazzy shoes. No "business casual" back then.
The best reasons I could determine for this were:
Personally, I'm inclined to judge a person's performance rather than their appearance. But even I can't help but think about appearance sometimes: if a vendor showed up to pitch my company while wearing shorts and a UCSC Banana Slugs t-shirt, my first thought would be "Jeez, he just doesn't care, does he?". The product or service would live or die on its merits, but my opinion of the salesman would be tainted by that first thought.
I think the bottom line is finding the appropriate level of casual/formal dress for the situation. The owner of the surf/skate shop might not mind if I showed up in shorts and sandals to install a POS system, but the funeral director probably would.
k.
"In spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart." - Anne Frank
His Slashdot ID is in the 100,000's, and yours is in the 700,000's.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Doesn't it strike anyone that it might make the job a lot easier if you just adapted to whatever dress standards your customer might like? I'm just a coder, so I don't do a lot of work around customers, but if I am to appear at a meeting I damn well know how to put on a suit. Try explaining something they won't be able to understand to your customers. Do it in a suit, and they probably lay off the really silly stuff. Do it in slacks and slippers, and they won't believe a word you say. Maybe the tech guys would, but you put them in a bad position for supporting you just by looking the way you do.
Once you're back behind your workstation, go ahead and wear your underpants on your head. It's what I do, if not so explicitly, but I'm definitely one of the shorts and sandals type.
It just seems unsensible to me that you try to do your best to keep your code clean and manageable, you go to all lengths at keeping up to speed with technology and then spoil more than you can make up with speed and quality by having one client meeting going the wrong way.
I think you're twisting words and their definitions. Let me give you some examples...
If you are someone who is not willing to come dressed clean for your job...
Please don't equate casual with unclean. There's nothing inherently unclean about casual dress, ponytails, sandals, a t-shirt, etc.
Good appearance not only boosts your confidence...
Definitely, but your opinion of "good" may not be mine. I suspect you're trying to equate "good" with "suit", which is manipulative. If you think a "suit" would boost someone's confidence, please say that. On that note, I don't believe that a suit necessarily boosts confidence -- it all depends on what one's job involves (sitting, assembling, reaching, typing), one's body and comfort, the quality of suit one can afford, etc.
Dress like a homeless person and go to the bank, and dress in a suit and go to the bank...
Absolutely. Now roll the clock back 100 years and replace "dress like a homeless person" with "be a female" or "be a non-white person", and you'll see why simply accepting things the way they are, with old and unquestioned values, is commonly neither the right thing to do nor the path to progress.
(actual logical point)
You realize where 'cultures' come from, right? People select behaviors that seem to work well, and abstain from those that don't, until they have a complete set. So, to make it nice and bolded for you, the only reason cultures exist at all is because they discriminate against each other.
So, what do we call people that identify themselves with a culture and then complain about it leading to discrimination? Hm... complaint of behavior inherent in one's own actions... ah, yes. We have a word for that:
Hypocrite
(/actual logical point)
So, uh, to answer your question: yes. I feel I judge cultures of themselves and not of the shade of brown the majority of the constituents are coated with, so I'll discriminate all i damn well please, thanks. And I obviously think my culture is the best one, because if I didn't, I'd, you know, switch. Which brings me to my next point:
(opinion)
The best culture is the American culture: i.e. no culture at all, or everyone's personal culture, however you decide to look at it. We are US, your cultural and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile!
(/opinion)
...it's really a sad day for America when we require a goddamn ACT OF CONGRESS to make our DVD players work properly. ~
While I follow the dress code of my California based company (beard, polo shirt, chinos, dress shoes), I am well known as someone who "cleans up well" and can readily give a good impression at a goverment or business presentation. I have no problem with this and rather much enjoy having an excuse to dress to the nines. On the other hand, when I'm back to the lab I'm casual again. This works for me.
The key point is respect, by dressing up I'm showing in a rather painless way that I can meet managers or business types halfway and can effectively interface with them. If I'm dressed sharper than they are I've beaten them at their own game and have a point in may favor immediately. It makes them considerably more receptive to my non-negotable issues.
On the other hand folks who made a point of not being able to "clean up well" tend to be rubbing their arrogance in peoples faces. They do it because they assume that they can get away with it because of their awesome skills. Problem is, skills change, and everybody loves to undermine an arrogant bastard, especially when they hand you shovels. Worse yet, they don't see it coming because they aren't able to collect intelligence dressed like that.
Haberdashery is a form of legal social engineering which is fun and easy to practice.
The point Mr Quinn is making isn't that the Linux crowd in general should wear suits. The average programmer isn't going to be doing sales. I personally think the issue is a lack of open source advocates who are business friendly at all. When a organisation wants to move to open source they want to know the company doing it is professional. Having someone turn up in a T Shirt and jandels doesn't do much for their confidence.
Appearance is important, we cannot possibly invest the effort to get to know 'the real person' for everyone we meet. In order to function we need our sterotypes. Its a bit like justice - justice not only must be done, it must be seen to be done. Similarly, quality in service must be seen. Thats not to say everyone needs to be in a suit; but certainly if you are making a open source presentation to a large organisation you should have appropriate attire; or not bother at all.
Not bothering is fine of course - nobody is forcing you to advocate and sell OSS solutions, but if you are in that game, and you do care about getting that contract, then perhaps how you dress will impact your chances.
You never get a second chance for a first impression. Whether you like it or not, looks and appearances are very important. You often must impress someone who is in marketing, a CxO, etc. Those are the ones who majored in partying and had a minor in business or finance, often also were big greeks on campus (I am a BSEE, MBA, greek, and Linux hacker, so I should know). The sad part, they are usually dumber than you but make far more money (can you say bonus?).
I often have to "dress the part" and am frequently asked to "talk on their level" as I get critized for being too technical. Those of us who pride ourselves on our technical capabilities often have little tolerance of the ignorant or PHB's (often one and the same). We have to play by their game (they can't play by ours).
Much has been said about what needs to happen for Linux to succeed. The server room is nice, but the PHBs often don't see the backend servers (remember the post yesterday about the City Manager in OK?). The desktop is critical. Appearances are critical. Overcoming the very polished (read CxO oriented) marketing by Microsoft is difficult.
Most of the middle and upper managers today learned to use computers on a DOS box and thought that Windows 3.x was the greatest thing in the world (so what if it had to be rebooted several times a day). They see Bill Gates as a hero (very rich, they want to be like him). They often never saw a mainframe (old, legacy IBM stuff in insurance companies and banks, right?). They often never saw a UNIX box, or when they did only saw the command line (how backwards, I can do it all from my Windows GUI). MAC was too liberal, often for the artsy, fartsy. They now are making decisions on budgets, software purchases, and in the end what technology gets used. How ironic.
Get a haircut then put on a tie and wingtips. They might listen to you. You can then play games and hack the kernel.... You might further Linux's market penetration (and you might even get to penetrate).
'the lax dress code of the open-source community is one of the reasons behind the software's slow uptake in commercial environments.'
Assuming for the sake of argument that this is true, my response would be that if the clean cut, three piece suit set did more of the actual important work on the big projects, then they would be more visible and this would not be such a big problem.
Therefore, it is the clean cut, three piece suit set who are really holding back the uptake of Free Software in commercial environments.
Assuming what we did, what is wrong with the reasoning that followed?
all the best,
drew
--
http://www.ourmedia.org/node/145261
Record a song and you might win $1,000.00
http://www.ourmedia.org/user/17145
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
...it says more about the corporate set than they think it says about OSS. It's not as though long hair in business is unheard of. The sandals, though,...
"I don't follow anyones lead, and I do as I please"
Sounds like a groovy motto, until you think about it..
Are you going to want to manage someone, who cannot follow?, Probabbly Not.
(If at first you don't succeed, do it different next time!)
They want people that care about the job. Being willing to wear a suit and tie (which, lets face it, no one really _likes_ wearing, or you'd see a lot of people in their underwear and a collared shirt and tie coming out to get the paper in the morning) indicates a willingness to sacrifice personal comfort to see the job done right. Which, let's face it, is a much more desirable quality in an employee than any amount of smarts will ever be.
...it's really a sad day for America when we require a goddamn ACT OF CONGRESS to make our DVD players work properly. ~
"...than being a shortsighted, uninformed asshole in a fancy monkey suit..."
+5 ironic!
...it's really a sad day for America when we require a goddamn ACT OF CONGRESS to make our DVD players work properly. ~
What would a marketer get from contributing? (They generally work for money)
Why would we want to invite the scum in. The day after they sell some fortune 500 on OSS we'll find out what kind of crazy promises they made and scream.
That said some evangalists (Stallman) are the worst enemy of OSS being accepted in the buisness world.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
I agree. Here at the UW, people tend to wear tshirts or turtlenecks more than shirts/ties. Ties get in the way.
And you can always throw on a lab coat when you need one.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Pony tails on men are ugly, dated and lame. If you have long hair, wear it long. If you can't have long hair, a pony tail doesn't make it look clean cut. It looks like a ratty, cheesy pony tail. The only thing worse than a man's pony tail is dreadlocks (gross).
Sandals are for the beach and the park. Men shouldn't wear sandals in public places and certainly not in an office. Who wants to see those nasty feet, much less smell them. The only thing worse than seeing a man's feet is seeing his "junk". Men's feet are disgusting to look at. Cover that shit up.
As for linux.. it is worthless as a desktop and I would never, ever use it as a file-server. A web-server or router at best. But as a workstation... forget it.
I've been upgraded to "bad"!
You want to clean up well. But you don't want to pretent you're something you're not.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
what a developer dresses like, has nothing to do with decision making.
What IT Managers decide upon, is based upon either A) their own experience, or B) the marketing-hyped FUD they read in mainstream 'tech savvy' sites like Cnet, Computer World, etc.
Why should people have to dress in a suit and tie, just to sit in a cubicle and code PERL? I do it in my underwear at home, running a multi-million dollar business (from home), self employed, all thanks to open source and learning online (for free).
my 3 years of internet addiction, now = $3.5m/year revenue, so far.
the only permanence in existence, is the impermanence of existence.
and to think, I thought it was all due to my collection of Lord of the Rings action figures.
There are 10 types of people in the world; those who can read binary, and those who can't.
Seriously I've been using PHP for years now and have never met the PHP developers or had them over to dinner to help promote it to me. So what's the big deal? Its like saying you dont want to use sourcecode cuz the developer who created it is bald.
that just gives businesses less concerned with appearances and more concerned with performance an advantage. companies that still expect suit-and-tie professionals to deliver their software are going to lose market to upstarts without such hangups.
I might wear a jacket, if the weather makes it appropriate, but if I do it's usually the tweed-professor-costume, not the 3-piece-banker costume, and I usually wear the formal black Birkenstocks instead of Tevas. At trade shows, the real costume choice is usually whether to wear a T-shirt from a project that's long-dead but interesting, or just a plain shirt, unless I've got booth bunny duty in which case I'll wear whatever color scheme and shirts the marketing people want to use so customers can tell staff from visitors.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
The dress code (or lack of) observed by Linux and Open Source proponents isn't the problem, even the unprofessional image at can produce isn't the problem. The attitude of the "Sandals and Ponytail" set is the problem.
"Sandals and Ponytails" are associated with the carefree California lifestyle. This is also associated with fanboy know it alls. This just doesn't mix well in a business environment.
"Sandals and Ponytails" are some of the most inflexible people out there. If it doesn't conform to their moral view of the world, then it doesn't exist to them. This doesn't mix well in a business environment.
Introducing a new technology, especially a new OS into a business environment is all about supporting legacy applications. Changes have to be introduced incrementally. This is a big challange with open source OS's and software. Too often the answer is "rip that out and replace it with an open source version." That doesn't fly with the business types and the "Sandals and Ponytails" just cant understand why.
As long as the "Sandals and Ponytails" refuse to listen to business types and vice versa, open source will continue to struggle.
If someone can't be bothered with simple grooming and looking presentable... why should I believe that person would bother doing a good job with their work. How you look says a lot about what you do with your time (or don't do). When I see a lazily, sloppily dressed person, that is an indication of their personality. You should be able to spend time on your appearance AND your work. If you skimp on one, I'd bet you skimp on the other. When you dress like a lazy bum, it is reasonable to suspect you work like a lazy bum. It is a fair and accurate conclusion. I know plenty of hippy dressers and they all fit that mold.
I've been upgraded to "bad"!
This guy is an idiot. The first time I made a trip to Redmond to work with M$, I was an engineer at a startup using Linux as our core OS. My biz dev guy and myself, walk in to meet with a Sr Product Manager at M$ in our khaki's and polo shirts and the Sr PM is wearing a white t-shirt with the sleeves literally torn off and ragged jeans with guess what? Sandals!!! This article is the most ridiculous I've seen in a long time.
if you wear a suit and tie, clients will bend over and drop trou as they give you their wallets? Well, yes, I think the corollary is true too. If Steve Ballmer wore sandals and long hair, and maybe a nose ring, the patsies in corporate wouldn't buy a thing from him.
But I've got the graying beard down pat (currently in medium-length mode as opposed to ZZTop mode), and I'm wearing the black Tevas today to go with the black jeans, as opposed to the formal black Birkenstocks I wear to customers or the brown ones I wear with bluejeans :-)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Oh yeah - that reminds me ...
I need to buy some new black leather Birkenstocks right away !!
(I can't believe they first started making them in 1774)
Because if you are going to wear sandals, wear Birkenstocks.
Fashion Tip:
------------
Wear black socks with them.
(any other color looks funny)
Does -anyone- wear sandals and a ponytail anymore? That's kind of cliche.
;)
Sandals & ponytail are a cliche. To be wearing them is cliched.
I leave it to the Frenchman who comes after me to correct my lack of accents
The suits.
They're everywhere.
They've been running things for about 80 years and look where we are.
Be afraid, be very afraid.
loyalty above all, save honor
The real question is: Why would an employeer want to hire someone that dresses like a child?
I've been upgraded to "bad"!
"It is, if you're trying to hire sycophants."
No it is all about judgement. If you go to an interview to be a network admin for a bank wearing a NIN shirt and flip-flops then you have very poor judgement. If you go to an interview to be a network admin for Slashdot wearing a Windows Polo and penny loafers... Probably a bad choice unless you also have a tux pin.
Judging a person by the choices they make is really the only way to judge someone.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
-:!)
A mohawk is the closest I can get to multicolored without resorting to ASCII escapes....
Infuriate left and right
Boy, I'm glad I'm in advertising. Instead of sandals and ponytails, my creative team has tatoos and facial piercings. My boss is a very butch lesbian. She's the one in the Brooks Brother suit.
I take them on pitches with me to Fortune 50 companies all the time. Never had a client complain about their dress while praising their campaign ideas.
Perhaps it's the words coming out of the mouth, not the shoes and hair... the screaming corporate antidisestablishmentarianism that comes out of the extremes of the open source movement doesn't paint a good picture of "reliable vendor"
I've always thought that someone should right a book explaining Unix to business types. A full chapter should be devoted to the fact that in the UNIX world (whether developers or system administrators) a person's competence is inversely proportional to their level of dress.
So a new manager of a UNIX group should look around. The guy who is wearing ten-year-old sandals, with jean shorts, and a t-shirt you would be embarrassed to wash your car with. That person is your best employee, learn to kiss his or her ass.
Think Deeply.
Latching onto subcultures is pretty typical human nature. The corporate softball team is a subculture; the PTA is a subculture; the local church is a subculture. It gives people a sense of belonging and generally, looking at social structure you see that views on appearance, subsets of morality and so on are quite flexible and usually are readily adaptable to belonging to a given subculture. Actually, the ones that you really need to worry about are the ones that can't find a social group to latch on to. Believe it or not, relating to goths or ravers or punks isn't nearly as fundamentally different to relating to suits as the guy that wears polo shirts, but can't talk to other humans.
I personally think the European underground techno scene is a lot of fun. I really enjoy dancing all night on weekends. To an extent I look the part. But this doesn't keep me from being one of the lead developers in the LinuxLab at one of Europe's largest software companies.
Why don't I take on the appearance that's typical for the European IT industry? Well, honestly, I'm not that far from the default, though I do have hair down past my shoulders and tend to have kind of a grunge-nouveau look. But the more important thing is that I'm established within my field. I feel like my accomplishments speak for themselves and if you're not the sort of employer that's willing to look past my long hair to the long list of cool things on my resume, then you're not the sort of company that I want to work for. It is in a sense a statement -- it's a statement saying, "I'm good at what I do. I'm not going to be a cookie cutter cog in the corporate environment. You do need to have some flexibility, but if you're cool with that, then I can probably do good things for you."
This sounds like FUD to me.
I work in the UK as a civil servant and my department has quite a large take up of open source software - everything from MySQL through JBoss, Eclipse, Ant, and Firefox. Running on a variety of operating systems, including Linux and *BSD (as well as the usual commercial suspects).
Tools for the job, and supportability are key, not what the developers wore. Hell, most of our own devs wear jeans!
Sales is about conning people, gaining their confidence, getting them to like you. Any con man knows that the pitch for every mark is different. The first step to conning someone is figuring out who they are. When you know who you're selling to, then you know how to sell to them. A good con man can size a mark up in under 5 seconds and have him eating out of their hand in less than a minute.
But you don't have to be a master con artist to appreciate how this works. The best example is a job interview. How would you dress if you were going to work for IBM? What sort of body language would you employ? What pseudo-persona would you invent to best match your understanding of the kind of person they are looking for? How would you alter these things in response to your perception of the individuals conducting the interview? How would these things differ if you were looking for a job at Amazon? At Google? As a construction worker? Or as a fry cook at the local Bob's Big Boy?
Most people understand these things intuitively. The need to alter your presentation of yourself to fit your audience is something most discover when they're still toddlers. Unfortunately most hackers (!cracker) are addled with "the knack" http://home.pcisys.net/~tbc/sounds/dilknack.wav and as a result just don't understand why the middle aged man in the nice suit reacted negatively to their Hooters T-shirt, greasy hair, and 5-day shadow -- not to mention their personality quirks.
Selling ANYTHING is 50% selling yourself, and that means understanding your target audience and being able to manipulate them.
Another example of this is picking up girls. What do you do? You show the girl what she's looking for. Figuring out what she's looking for is easy, all you have to do is study her for a few minutes, even less if she's with her friends. Assume the persona that is going to pique her interest, and go in for the kill. Dishonest? You bet, but it sure beats lame pick-up lines, unless of course pick-up likes are part of your schtick.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
Quinn blames the 'sandal and ponytail set' for sluggish adoption of Linux by businesses and governments.
That might be true, but it sure beats the viagra PEZ dispensers, mohawks and phallic attachments worn by spammers.
Carbon based humanoid in training.
You have to dress for your audience. I've met with business people and politicians to talk about physics and funding and if I'm not wearing a suit, I'm wearing something not far from it.
Meeting with other academics, or even people like the Regents of the UC system requires good, practical lab attire (sadly, not sandals).
The difference being that one group wants to see that I actually put science first, and will be returning to the lab any minute to make great discoveries. The other group wants "respect" or something like that above all else.
And the average manager still dresses like that. I feel over dressed wearing a geek logo polo shirt, and jeans instead of shorts (even in February.) Quinn ought to visit MS some time.
Well you don't exactly want to do business with the Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons do you?
Absolutely. Now roll the clock back 100 years and replace "dress like a homeless person" with "be a female" or "be a non-white person", and you'll see why simply accepting things the way they are, with old and unquestioned values, is commonly neither the right thing to do nor the path to progress.
Being female or non white is not a choice. If you choose to dress / act / speak a certain way, I will choose to judge you based on your choices.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
I don't think I've ever seen a linux sales rep wearing sandals, nor a ponytail. Suits or business casual is the only type of apparel I can remember seeing on any of the reps from redhat, novell, etc.
Open Source is not such a model. Rather it is a group effort, and a partnership among developers, distributors, and users of software. You aren't required to join the party, but it certainly helps its cause, and your own. Merely being a software leech is like showing up at the party, taking one of the kegs, and leaving. Oh, and then complaining about the quality.
By the way, I say "Windows users," because although they would claim to be experienced with computers, they have no knowledge of computers at all, but merely of Windows and GUI applications hosted upon it. Therefore, all computer programs must work and act exactly like Windows if they are proper computer programs.
It's rebels vs evil empire all the way: the rebels wear ragged clothes, are almost always dirty looking while the evil empire minions are almost always wearing tight and sometimes even downright cool outfits.
:)
Star Wars and Matrix depict the situation nicely.
I think ideology and freedom go hand-to-hand with poor material condition...
I don't feel like it...
must be really slow today.
Victory shall be mine!
I want to disagree with you, but I can't. I can't count how many times a contract was won at a strip club. The boss's corporate card bill must have been enormous. But, hey, it worked. Oh, and don't forget to hire your potential customer's son as an intern. Teamsters and longshoremen are saints compared to the tech and aerospace industries.
That should make a good story. make sure you post it whjenever you find the salesperson who'll shut the hell up and leave you alone. I am sure many people would like to know where we can find such a mythical creature.
Dare you to say that under your username. Fucking coward.
This is one of the most messed up bunch of comments I have ever seen....anywhere.
Why go fast when you can go anywhere? O|||||||O
I'm not.
If Quinn thinks that my footwear is the deciding factor, I wish he'd quit bogarting that joint.
...
I dunno, man
If that stuff leaves him F***ed up THAT bad AFTER he comes down and tries to go to work, I'd rather he smokes it all up himself.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
I dont get it, why should we have to wear nice suits and our counterparts in the Western world have to wear anything but cool?
God gave Linux, the devil gave BSD, and a hacker gave Bill the MS-DOS - anonymous
open source is just a bunch of tree hugging hippees. Long live M!cr0s0ft and Bill and may they grow bigger and stronger!!
IBM turned themselves around by cutting out low-margin commodity businesses - PCs, hard drives, and more recently, laptops.
And what did they replace these low-margin businesses with? You guessed it! High-margin consulting (with consultants dressed in suits). The strategy shift could not have happened at a better time - Sarbanes/Oxley almost tripled the need for these types of services in the US.
Sure, IBM still sells a lot of "Big Iron" products, but they pay make a lot of money by selling billable consultant hours.
Dress code had very little to do with IBM's success.
-ted
he didnt say it was that kids dont respect software updates anymore and that when he was a kid nobody was talking about penguins and "the internet" software updates was all we had!
back then it wasnt even software it was cardware!
Slow government adoption of OSS has nothing to do with pork and patronage no sir. It's all about how those people dress.
What a crock.
Or look at websites?
Long hair and sandals used to be the cat's ass, but no more.
Now if you don't have short little dreads you aren't shit.
A black man with short dreads is the ultimate in coolness and hipness AND technical ablility.
Any AOL commercial can confirm this.
-ft
I keep running into people that use that term, and don't seem to know it's meaning. Being 'professional' means that you do the job in a competent way in a timely, cost effective fashion. Professionl dress is clothing that allows you to complete that job in a competent, timely, SAFE, cost effective fashion. Ties and white shirts are absolutly unprofessional for IT guys that crawl around under desks. Suits and ties are also unprofessional for virtually all blue collar workers, which like it or not, we coders are. To be honest, I would never trust a guy in a tie to touch my computer, and with good reason. While I have met some very competent managers and sales people whole dress in suits and ties, when it comes to coders I have known, cost of clothing and quality of code has been mostly inverse of each other.
The sooner the human race is rid of this vile intrusion into our wardrobes the better. What you are wearing very rarely has anything to do with your productivity unless you're a salesman or dealing in PR.
--The universe will not be altered by forum threads, even those which are very wry. --Tycho Brahe (Penny Arcade)
If linux were made by minority transvestite single mothers that were gay, I bet it would take off.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
Its slow to be adopted because it sucks.
Wherever I go, I've found in decent sized organizations the ones that look the least presentable but have managed to stick around a few years are among the best. Not because of anything intrinsic about the unkept look, it is because those are the ones that are good enough that the uptight suits couldn't justify firing in a million years *despite* the look that really rubs them the wrong way. If you don't dress very well and aren't bulletproof with respect to your technical merits, uptight suits up higher will find a reason to replace you with a more visually acceptable candidate, even if technically they aren't quite as good.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
Sometimes it is valuable to have a good team that doesn't need to be led.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
.... its how good they THINK you are.
Applies everywhere, to everything.
The foreskin mechanically helps to open the woman. It moves hair and labia aside, spreads the vagina open. lets the penis enter with less dry abrasion. Generally, the foreskin helps you get started.
The foreskin also has estrogen sensors. (you can feel the estrogen, like heat/cold/pressure/etc.) No other part of the human body has this feature.
Do you find it odd that very few adults with foreskins want to be circumcised? In any case, one ought to let a person choose for himself if he likes to be sexually mutilated.
I am not at all certain I understand the problem. As I read it, the Linux and open source communities are not driven by the goals of market share and profit. Rather, they are driven to provide quality software at no cost, along with the means for other users to use, share, and modify that code. Maybe they see a niche that needs filling, maybe they just like coding - the reasons are not important. What is important is that they don't give One Tight Shit about whether Linux etc. is being adopted by the business world. Whether or not that happens is completely, utterly irrelevant to the ongoing development of their software. If Peter Quinn is concerned about it, that's his deal. What, exactly, does he feel are the consequences that will befall the open source movement if they don't take his advice? Are they going to stop developing Apache just because the head of IT at, say, Sears thinks it's put together by some dude with a Prince Albert? Is the NSA or Merrill Lynch going to stop using Linux because Dan Lyons makes a bunch of jokes about smelly hippies in Forbes? If you can't make a cost- and quality-based argument to convince accountants, CXOs, or politicians, I don't know what to tell you. I don't understand that bullshit world, and I'm glad I'm not a part of it.
I find it hilarious that some in the business world are trying to use ignorant statements like this as some sort of blackjack with which to intimidate the open source dudes. "You guys better shape up or we won't use your software!" To which the obvious reply is, "That's fine, your decision makes no difference to us whatsoever. If you change your minds, however, Apache, Linux, MySQL, ethereal, snort, and any number of other wonderful programs are available to you at no cost, any time day or night. Good day to you, sir." There's no leverage in this situation because they don't understand that while outward appearances trump everything else in the business world, they don't make any difference at all to the people who actually write the software. If your company believes this, that's fine - you will get the IT you want, and the IT you deserve. I'm sure these people would be shocked to find out that IBM, Merrill Lynch, JP Morgan, Novell, Dreamworks, Lucasfilm, Pixar, the NSA, and the United States Armed Forces , among others, all use software written by scumbags who have long hair and wear t-shirts while they work, because everyone knows that anything done by someone with a ponytail is shoddy and unreliable, and will never be accepted by serious professionals.
In one tiny nod to the suit-and-tie crowd, however, if they want the textbook example of the childish arrogance of the bedroom coding crowd, look no farther than BitchX. You, sir or ma'am, are either a twelve year old kid, a stupid, childish asshole, or both. What are you, in fourth grade? "Dude, I'm going to call my program BitchX! It'll be totally awesome!" Fuck you, child. Why didn't you call it CuntTalk or FaggotyFaggotClient? Maybe you could have made a fart joke for good measure. I know, I know, you didn't write it for the business community or for grandma's desktop. You wrote it for those who weren't too shallow to be put off by appearances. You sure showed us, we are totally impressed by your non-conformity.
If he'd been on the major Sun campuses--you know, the second largest open source contributor--he'd discover that most of the employees are definitely not wearing suits... and that includes the CEO and COO. Current issues aside, I'd consider Sun as being quite successful in the corporate world.
Shady car salesmen wear suits. Drug kingpins wear suits. The heads of Enron wore suits.
A man in nice suits sent our military into Iraq after WMDs that weren't there.
The former thug leader of Iraq wore suits.
So what does a suit prove again?
unkempt beards, the occasional trenchcoat, fannypacks (my favorite), belts with multiple cellphone clips, and publically visible multitools for the world to see. ahhh, some day these kids will learn to be socially acceptable. wait... no, who am i kidding?
SHAVE IT. maybe you'll get to kiss a girl someday.
Posting anonymously for obvious reasons. What about people suffering from Phimosis? I had to go through an operation to fix that problem, and I was already an adult at the time.
"Quinn, who faced plenty of scrutiny over his support of the OpenDocument standards-based office document format, said proponents of open source in government faced formidable opposition from vested interests if they went public."
I spent 10 years trying to save the tax payers money by promoting open source solutions within a government agency. For my trouble I was underpaid and denied promotion, and eventually wrongfully terminated under trumped up offenses. "[F]ormidable opposition" is putting it mildly. Promoting open source within government agencies is a good way to get screwed -- even without the pony tail and sandals.
Eric Giguere writes "CNet is reporting that according to former Massachusetts CIO Peter Quinn 'the lax dress code of the open-source community is one of the reasons behind the software's slow uptake in commercial environments.' In particular, Quinn blames the 'sandal and ponytail set' for sluggish adoption of Linux by businesses and governments." From the article:
My response to this is f 'em -- if they're so shallow that they ignore technically superior solutions because those who create and promote it don't dress the way they like, they can keep getting ripped off by traditional commercial software. If you're willing to sell out your wardrobe for political expediency, you would be well served to stop promoting open source too and focus on mastering corporate politics so you can get a managerial job with high pay and little work.
People still think I'm weird for wearing socks, though.
Stuffy Business types not hip enough to grok LInux benefits... headed to "Acid Tests" to start getting it.
The conclusion? It's not that OSS developers need to change the way they dress. Rather, it's that the people demanding suit and tie must be kicked out. Decision makers need to start making decisions based on the quality of the product, not on the clothing style of the people developing it.
lynchy thingies that Einstein might have been subject to.
Plenty of people at microsoft go to work in shorts and t shirt. When I worked there I got made fun of for wearing a buttoned up shirt (short sleaves) a few times, seems that I looked like someone from accounting. The lax dress code is pretty pervasive in the computer field whether you are working on proprietary or open source...
Generally the places that expect you to dress up are places which are not technology shops at heart, which is to say it isn't a core part of the business.
Why do computer science guys dress so sloppy? Well,
1. We work long hours alone in our offices.
2. We *have* offices for the most part. If you're stuck in a cubicle, and your neighbor Dafnie can see you, you might feel more pressure to take off your "I spend all my reward on whores and ale" T shirt.
3. We *think* for a living.
4. Few women at most companies. No matter what the other factors are like if you have more than a few good looking coworkers, you can be sure that people will start coming into the office better dressed and groomed.
I'm sure most of us are too young to recall the Get Clean for Gene campaign in 1968. But, I think the 1968 Chicago Democratic National Convention speaks volumes about where these calls to cut the hair end up. Certainly that time and place was a locus of dozens if not hundreds of millions of factors but whether or not to grow long hair is a deeply personal and passionate subject and that's because even more than the clothes one wears the style and length of one's hair speaks volumes about one's political position.
This is not a simple algebra of long hair equals liberal while short hair equals conservative. That sort of generalization is generalized enough to be as good as saying nothing at all. But within the delicate and complex intricacies of personal politics that are as unique and varied as each individual on Earth, we can say one thing --it does mean something. The style in which one wear's one's hair means something to that individual. What it means exactly cannot be generalized. But it does mean something to the individual who chooses to wear that hair style and that's the whole point. People absolutely have the right to make their own choices about how they want to appear.
When someone comes along and says you can't choose that style because I don't like it or I'm saying that society doesn't like it so you better not choose that --that's looking for trouble. THat's oppression. Even if people go along with it, the results get ugly nonethless. The problem is not how much hair people do or don't have, the problem is oppression and the addiction to controlling other people's appearance and behavior.
But this guy is just an old geezer ready to retire. He looks old enough to have voted for Johnson. So, whatever.
What he doesn't know is that there is actually a trend in the United States today towards long hair that hasn't happened in many years. I notice these things as I haven't cut my hair since I was eighteen and I'm almost forty now. For many years it was rare for me to see a fellow long hair. But since the war started I've seen crowds of younger kids go from shaggy to little ponytails and I'm starting to see some braids out there.
Now, you might think I'm biased, I am, but if you don't believe there's a trend then I have a little Google for ya. Go to Google news and look for Regis. Regis is a parent company of Vidal Sassoon, The Hair Club and dozens of hair salon chains located around the country. This quarter they didn't make their numbers. Their official explanation was that there is a nationwide trend towards growing long hair which is cutting into their profits.
Don't believe it? Go look for yourself.
If you're so much better than everyone because you don't eat meat, then why can't you find the shift key, dumbass? Ever heard of capitalizing the first word of each sentence? It will make you look more intelligent, but that's not saying much.
I know this isn't "the truth", but there sure is some smoke here:
* If you don't care enough about fixing something simple like your appearance, how can I trust you to with my complex business? It is complex to me, that is why I want help, right?
* If you care about me, why do you meet me looking like you don't care? I'm supposed to be important to you, a client with money, yet you treat me with disrespect by not showing outwordly by dressing up that our deal is significant to you.
Let us hire Bill Clinton to market OSS...
God and religion are distinct
So if I use Linux and am not a muggle, can I pay 95% less tax?
The government is a scam. The only reason to give them a thin dime is that they have all the guns. --And that all the dimes were made by them.
I wonder what would happen if you set up your own money system in your community, (and thereby, stop using banks and traceable, taxable income, and only donate your cash and time to whatever system of government your community agrees to establish in your region). . ?
Oh yeah. They'll call you communist and anti-capitalist, stir up all the dumb 'mericans with time-tested propaganda, and then burn you down Branch Davidian Style.
Golly! You can't have people opting out of the tax grid, now can you?
-FL
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
The better young people seem to be well-dressed. Not necessarily conventionally dressed; they may have tats and piercings. But they have some sense of style. To be a useful programmer today, you must have some sense of style and design. Almost everything has a graphical component today. (Command line fanatics: you're obsolete.)
Actually, when recruiting programmers, I usually ask them, by e-mail, to send me a thousand lines of C++ code they're proud of. Most of them bail at that point. Some send back terrible code. ("Your code sample has been received. Your first buffer overflow is on line 56. Thank you for your interest.") And once in a while, you get a good one.
None of the ones who sent in good code showed up with beard, sandals, or a pot belly.
Those little blue "flip-overs" Walmart makes its staff to wear, can hardly be called a uniform. It's IMHO a disgrace to force your employees to wear something so ugly and cheap. But those are the two Walmart keywords, so it is probably fitting (the words, not the uniforms :).
Browsers shouldn't have a back button!! It's all about going forward...
Of course it [w|sh]ould however if the choice is between a scruffy person and a smart person who are pretty much equal you are not helping yourself by not dressing smartly.
A while back I was invited to a FLOSS convention in an Arab country where RMS was a speaker. So he shows up, as usual, wearing his red shirt with sandals ( he was even bare foot at one point as I recall). So he does the usual speech, what freedoms the GPL guarantees, why patents are bad, and bashes Microsoft along the way.
He finishes and we all leave. On the way out I overhear two people speaking to each other, from the looks of it one is a big shot political personality, probably a minister, and his secretary. The minister was wearing a suit that probably costs more than the income of a couple of families for a whole year in that country. The conversation goes like this:
Minister: So who's this guy again?
Secretary: Sir "Seedy in Arabic", this is the American guy that made the company called "Lie-nooks" and he is challenging Microsoft.
Minister: Hmmm, well from the looks of it he's not doing so well...
I just chuckled and moved along. Thing is even the LUG members over there, who had a speech to give, were all wearing suits which is sensible since it was a highly government sponsored event and they didn't want to look like a bunch of slackers.
The sad part is that the minister would have been more convinced if RMS was wearing a suit, I can't even imagine RMS in a suit, and looking like a marketting puppet from a mega-corporation from the states.
All too often, software that is great in concept gets overlooked because the interface is clumsy, ugly or intimidating. The same applies to people: you may be brilliantly talented, but if you show up for an interview or meeting looking like you've spent the night in a dumpster, it's not going to make a good impression. Regardless of whether it should or not, appearance matters. Making the effort to be nicely dressed and nicely groomed is seen as a sign of respect and professionalism. If you want to game the system, you have to figure out how it works first. Women have known how to dress for effect for longer than history can record. Time for men to catch up.
I completly agree. Businesses and governments better adopt sandals and ponytails faster if they don't wont to fall behind the leading edge of the technology. Their rigid dress code face formidable opposition form the hight tech community.
Goths are stupid.
confirmed.
They keep from conforming to social norms by conforming to the norms of a subset of society. Goths are so totally non-conformist... and that's what makes them cure cancer.
With perhaps a dab of paranoia: Most of us work in some sort of company of individuals where at any given moment, there's a finite amount of resources, titles and booty. Some people will fight, and fight dirty for those resources. Even when fighting dirty, one needs some sort of weapon/ammunition. By dressing stylishly conservative, 98 times out of 100, you've eliminated your personal style as a weapon to be used against you. You can't conceivably guilt trip every person you will ever meet into accepting your quirks, so this is something one ought consider when building a carreer.
My solution: Find a company without politicians (hard to do, but I've done it). This way, whenever I wear a suit these days, I do it because I look like a million dollars - and not to placate the trolls in the shadows. Makes me happier in a innocent sort of way.
It's the person on the inside that counts. If you have a problem with what I'm wearing, it's your problem. Just like it's your problem if you have a problem with the colour of my skin or what's between my legs. It's your problem, and you don't have a right to take it out on me.
..... or clothesism.
But, some people just have the idea in their minds that there are two types of people in the world, good enough and not good enough, and that they can be told apart visually. That idea can manifest itself as sexism, racism, homophobia
Just because a person can change their clothing more easily than they can change their sex or the colour of their skin, does not mean that this is legitimate grounds for discrimination. In fact, I would say the opposite: as long as the sin of clothesism is perpetrated, there will exist some justification in some people's minds for racism, sexism and all the other -isms out there.
The obvious answer is to unify the sex discrimination, race relations, disability discrimination, gender preference discrimination and all other similar laws into one new law, making it a criminal offence to discriminate against any person on any grounds beyond aptitude for a particular endeavour. Your would not say to a black employee, "Look, can you try to stay out of the way this afternoon, please? We've got some important new potential customers coming around, but they're Ku Klux Klan. It's not going to do us any favours if they see you here."
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Everyone has to outgrow their founders and visionaries at some point. In our case, the sooner the better. We don't need another tin foil RFID tag stunt. Not that I don't agree with the sentiment, but that sort of thing is the EFF's fight, not the FSF's.
It's apple employees who have ponytails and sandals, not the open source crowd.
We learn our reactions through our culture and our personal experiences, and then we react without thinking or choosing when we perceive stimuli to which we have learned to react. We might even be unable, upon trying to choose to react otherwise, to change our reactions because they are so deeply entrenched.
For example, if I take out a knife and walk toward you menacingly, you are going to react by being frightened. Even if I say, 'I am only joking' you are still going to be frightened. Why? You are just choosing to react that way right? Wrong. People are not little atomic, liberal, choosing machines. We are made by our environment as much as we make it. We do not choose the reactions we have learned, that is why it is a 'reaction' rather than a 'choice'.
Similarly, we learn stereotypes. We learn racial stereotypes, gender stereotypes, this is why it is so difficult for many people to overcome them. People who have deeply entrenched racial stereotypes are like people who have developed strange phobias, they may come to realise that they are irrational but they cannot just 'choose' to suddenly rewire their brain, although they may be able to do it painstakingly over the course of a long period of time.
We learn cultural meanings. And a suit has a cultural meaning; a clean shave versus a beard has a cultural meaning; scraggly hair versus neatness has a cultural meaning. Everything has a cultural meaning. The way that society has to work, for purely logistical reasons if nothing else, is that most of the time, people have to conform to each others' expectations rather than every one of us having to constantly change our expectations for the exceptions. This is why for example we don't see nudists coming in to work naked. People can scrape by dressing like shit, but they still don't break the rule of wearing clothes.
Nevertheless, what they wear has a cultural meaning, and people do not react to it as a 'choice', they react to it through a learned reaction, they same way they react to everything else through a learned reaction. To go in to work dressed like shit and say 'Why don't you overcome your prejudice, man?' is absurd individualistic tripe. Get over yourself.
This simply BS of the highest degree. When large organisation investigate open source technologies, they do not interface with the likes of your run of the mill or guru linux developer. They use commercial interfaces, wearing suits and selling oss as enterprise solutions. If you goto CA and they set you up with Linux, you are really unlikely to see a pair of sandels. If you are using enterprise Linux and paying $$$ for a support contract, you are not going to interact with penguin wearing hackers. We are an articulate bunch and those that go off dealing with high profile clients on large projects are sensible enough to wear formal trousers and at the very least a shirt. If you're lucky, there might be a penguin tie. That was jest. In reality you'll see suits and hear enterprise buzz words. And whether the employee wears sandels or not is down to company policy. A lot of high caliber oss developers wear suits to work. Yeah, I missed the days when I'd wear my vectorised BSD daemon t-shirt, but you have to write an adapter or standardise to whatever API is expected in a given situation. We do with code and we do it with clothes. Obviously you can spot the geek with the short tie and belly bulging shirt who has just been to an interview, but in a couple of years he'll refine his interfacing skills or remain in the background. That said, the person interfacing with large institutions is probably barely technical and mostly good at selling stuff.
If only those people at Google would only get their act together and start acting and dressing professionaly, then maybe Google would make some money and their stock would go up. Jeeze. [/sarcasm]
"Flee at once, all is discovered."
Despite all of the sociological/antropological-prejudice/lifestyle discussions, I think that the people who made the point about dressing up for talking with the customer are the ones that got it right. Namely, dressing up for the customer is like dressing up to go on a date, it is a statement for "You matter to me". When you really care about somebody you will effect changes in small details of your attire to please them, and this is exactly what you are doing by dressing up to go to the customer. You don't have to necessarily put on a suit and a tie, but going well-shaved (or nicely trimming your beard if you have one) in well ironed clothes (rather than that "Unix Rocks!" scruffy t-shirt) says that you have taken the time to please the customer.
Please bear in mind that the way you dress in your workplace has nothing to do with that, because if you are a programmer and you are expected to do long hours of coding, well your workplace has become your second home, and it is your right to feel comfortable there. But that too is true only to a certain extent. Nobody is an island, and most companies where large projects take place, there will be a team of people doing the job alongside you, so taking the time to look pleasant to your colleagues also states that *they* matter to you, but there you are supposed to be among friends, so as long as you are not doing anything completely anti-social (like lacking personal hygiene to an extent that others notice...) sandals and lack of shaving will not be such a problem.
www.meneguzzi.eu/felipe
I would definitely buy from the woman in a cheerleader outfit and stripper heels.
Wouldn't you?
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
Given that it's the corporations who'd profit quite considerably from adopting Free Software more, and no so much the other way around, I'd say he has it backwards:
It's the outdated and irrational reliance on basing technical judgement calls on clothes instead of technology that is holding the business world back in their adoption of Free Software.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
A made to measure suit is more comfortable than mass manufactured clothing. You can look good and feel good at the same time. And a lightweight woolen suit over a 100% cotton shirt is about as cool as anything you can find to cover yourself with.
In most "advanced" human cultures it's illegal to discriminate on the grounds of:
1 Race.
2 Skin Colour.
3 Sex.
4 Sexual orientation.
5 Physical Disability.
7 Age.
However personal choice of attire seems to be amongst the last bastions of acceptable discrimination.
And just why is it that the "acceptable standard" is always based around the preferred attire of a fat, middle aged, white man with no discernible dress sense and who's probably spent one half of his life being dressed by his mother and the other half being dressed by his wife ?
(And now I'm off on a good rant) Have you seen the fat fools in their golf wear ? or in the utterly embarassing "casual wear" they occasionally wear on the rare "team building" events in the pub ? The mind simply boggles... but hey it that's what floats their boat more power to 'em. (yeah I know I'm sterotyping heavily here but this is the mindset we're dealing with...)
Personally I look forward to the day when the mindless majority wake up to the idea that the packaging is not the contents, that people are all different, and that this is a GOOD THING. Diversity breeds innovation. Conformity breeds stagnation. We need suit wearing, small minded, twits as much as we need poinytailed, sandal wearing geeks. The two should just learn to see the good points in each other and get along... Or have a war when us geeks will seriously kick the suits asses (after all who invents all the good weaponry ?)
And people wonder why aliens never bother landing... when most humans can't even cope with members of our own species who have a different taste in haircut or pants.
Pah.
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
The article is just one idiots subjective opinion. This is what happens when management is responsible for technical purchase decisions - the decisions are based on any number of superficial criteria (i.e political).
Its not all that accurate though; in my experience, open source software is usually considered right along side commercial software; if its adopted, its because it does something better; if not, its because the commercial software does something better. Whether its open source or not doesnt end up influencing anything unless theres a good probability the code may need to be tweaked in the future. Most all places Ive worked use a mix of both. The exceptions have been just that: exceptions.
The article is somewhat interesting from a cultural perspective, though. It seems that the behavior normally exhibited by groups of 13 year old girls in malls is now being seen as 'mature'. If it really is seen as rational to make purchasing/business decisions based on nothing more substantial than social bigotry, then its a good time to become a used car salesman - the patsies are lining up at the door. After all, pretentious self important people exist for others to use and exploit. The single largest reason to not let your ego get out of control is that it becomes a weapon others can and will use against you.
'How dare you come in here with that long hair and those jeans and try to sell me that pneumatic hammer gun? This standard hand-held hammer works just fine; you seriously expect me to pay attention to someone who couldnt even dress decently to show me his product?'
'Ok dumbshit, never mind. Scuse me, I gotta jet; Ive got a meeting with your competition.'
The Mac has always been the fag computer.
That's what happened to him too, wasn't it?
With a fancy dress you can do anything. I've got to get me one of those Supreme Ruler Suits:)
Defining Statistics and Social Research
Listen up kids!!
,iron it and then hang it up you've got a shirt or trousers that you can ware at least twice before you need to iron them again.
We live in a world where bling is the thing. When J.Crew looks form models for their catalogs they look form people that are easy on the eyes and are not going to detract form their cloths. Sure some male models may have long hair but it doesn't look like a rats nest. The same goes for LLBean. Long haired gernola eatin hippies that look nice.
I've said this before in another post.
Van Husen is your friend. They sell nice looking well fitting cloths (invisible elastice waist-bands for you chubsters) that are wrinkle-free. Wrinkle free means if wash it, dry it
The prices are not bad.
$40 Will get you a nice pair of trousers and an Oxford Button-down.
$50 will get some nice expand-O waist Trousers and a Button-down.
Another $50 will get you a blazer.
If you don't own a blazer buy one. Get a Navy-Blue one because it will go with any shirt and trousers.
The other cool thing with Van Husen is that there cloths are designe form modularity. You can mix-and-match their stuff and you'll still look good.
If you're really on a budget Target has a line of cloths called Merona which need a little more ironing but look good and won't break the bank.
Face it social perceptions out weigh your skills and knowledge.
Anyway all of the above information is useless if you don't shower and comb you hair!!
BTW- I'm not gay, I've just been married for too long.
I like-a do-the cha-cha.
One of the most popluar men on the face of the earth wears a red and white suit, has a big fluffly beard, wears a stocking cap, is over weight. I think someone needs to cut the ponytail/sandal crowd some slack lest they find a lump of coal in their stocking.
TT
... Hitler wore a nice pressed suit, his hair cut short & shiny boots - Jesus Christ had uncut hair, a beard and sandals...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Peter, perhaps the slow adoption of open source could be attributed to poseurs like you spending 5 million taxpayer dollars on crappy CA products...pass me the sandals and ponytail...
I think that several people have stated it or parts of it, but here's my take:
Does the sandles-&-ponytail nature of OSS development effect it's saleability?
No
Does the lack of 3-Piece-Suit-Wearing face men for those OSS projects effect it's saleability?
Yes
The people who ultimately decide on which software is going to be used are the 3 piece suit MBAs.
Do they care what the techie in the basement wore when they wrote it?
No
Do they care what the man in their boardroom is wearing when they try to sell it to them?
Yes
I've been a tech for 20 years now in 3 different industries (Bio,Chem,& now IT), I've had to deal with everybody from the schmo who resurfaces FTIR-TIR plates to President/Owners who want to know why they can't successfully run a water catalized coating on an unsealed unit in the middle of a weeklong thunderstorm. The cruel reality is that people divide the world into US and THEM a lot more than they will admit, and the most obvious way to see that someone is an US is how they dress.
Best advice I ever got for interviews? Find out how you are supposed to dress on the job everyday and show up to the interview 1 step higher.
Job is casual - dress business casual, the job is business casual - dress business, etc.
The other thing is dress for your audiance. You show up for a tour of the sewers in Armani, everyone is just going to think you are a pompus asshat & not give you any respect. You show up in cutoffs and a T-shirt for a board meeting, you are a bum who can't possibly provide them with anything usefull.
Of course there are times that people are just nucking futs about the dress-code. One company I worked for made us wear button-downs, dress-slacks, dress shoes, and ties - to work in a lab with liquid adhesives and rotary presses. Their reasoning? They had expanded the sales office space to surround the lab and we were now 'Office' people because customer's might see us.
Same company once called a company they had been doing business with for 15 years and told them to cancell all the orders and never send another salesman. The reason? The salesman had shown up with a well trimmed beard.(Everyone knows you can't trust people with beards.)
Well, so I'm not strictly speaking, a techie. But as a University student, I have had occasion to notice the difference that different styles of dress have on my own behaviour.
For instance, once while having terrible trouble focusing on writing a paper, I decided to take the indirect advice of an old Bugs Bunny cartoon: I dubbed an old hallowe'en witch hat my "essay-writing hat" and put it on. I was focused, not due to the hat, but due to the power I imbued it with. It's silly, but even now, it still works. I feel like I can write better and quicker when wearing the hat than when not doing so.
If you associate a suit and tie with working, it's likely that you'll work better while wearing them. It's purely psychological, but people are fetishistic like that. Exploit that symbolic potential all you can!
Here's some consulting dress codefor professional Oracle Database consultants. That could teach something for OSS about how to look in front of a customer. And how important is to look good when customer is *NOT* seeing you.
Emacs is good operating system, but it has one flaw: Its text editor could be better.
I would not be bothered. Or does he have 'tools' in his pants too?
What person will donate an airborne act of love?
Simple answer. I know it's cliché to say this, but to me it's very true.
Not everyone in a suit is an arrogant asshole, not is everyone wearing casual clothes is trustable.
If you consider that a women wearing a suit is automatically a lying hypocrite than you are no better than the suit guy who doesn't trust you because you're not wearing a suit. Perhaps the girl in a suit dresses like that because she likes it. Who knows? I sure don't assume to know her motives for dressing that way.
My parents did their best to bring me up as a meat eater, but I never liked the stuff. You can ask my mother about the battles to get me to eat bacon, pork, lamb, liver, ...
As soon as I moved away from home and had the chance to make a free choice without requiring that they cater to my whims, I stopped eating meat.
So I really don't believe that meat has any unique appeal.
Now, cheesecake on the other hand...
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
The very first review on the page mentions that the book doesn't include any details of the methodology or the research results. On that basis, it's pretty easy to dispute. In fact, it's a worthless "because I'm an expert and I say so" book.
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
"Professionalism", it's about conning people - Making people judge you favorably by only your appearance - not your skills, or actions, or integrity. That's where the problem really lies, in the active deception by many individuals!
I've heard it multiple times before, whom would you trust to buy your product from more?
A well dressed man holding a snazzily packaged set of eggs, or a dirty jeaned farmer holding a wicker basket of eggs?
The well dress man, naturally. But in this situation, the well dress mans' eggs could be tainted, and farmer's could also be perfectly healthy.
[Now, I'm off to lift my le... Um, visit... at another place.]
I somehow stumbled upon this while doing some research in college. I decided after reading through all of the articles that most of us have been cheated, and if I ever have a son, it'll be a decision he can make when he is older.
australian project gutenberg is better than the original.
"Put your message in a modem, and throw it into the cyber-sea." - Rush
Maybe it's just because of being raised in a rural western small town but when I see someone wearing a suit, who isn't actually engaged in running a large company, my thoughts are "what's he trying to sell me?" and "why does he have to dress up to do it?" Immediate suspicion.
but then again, I'm about as far from a CEO as you can get. They probably think exactly the opposite that I do, so the article's probably completely right.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
A person that dress how they want and doesn't care about how they look may also not care about being on time, meeting deadlines, following guidelines, or security procedures.
I see this argument advanced all the time whenever a topic like this comes up. I've never understood it. How the hell do you correlate those two things? What do they have in common? Inquiring minds want to know.
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!
The open source community as a whole respects function above form, and regards true professionalism as the ability to produce results. The center of gravity in most open source subcultures incorporates a meritocratic value system, including tolerance of individualism and respect for others, which can be construed as professionalism in the best sense, whereas personality and fashionistic bigotry and posturing can be understood an unprofessional in the extreme. The opposition of these viewpoints is essentially irreconcilable. I rather expect business culture to change, than open source culture to change, because business culture also has a figure of merit, measured in cash, and will change in order to adapt to the society, while the principles of open source culture run deep into values of human dignity which are not mutable over the short term. Businessmen need to sell things to others in order to continue in their project, and so they will adapt to the value system of the surrounding culture. That includes, and in the large is being increasingly influenced by, the deeper human values expressed in the open source movement.
-I like my women like I like my tea: green-
This is OT and apropos of nothing, really, but as I was reading your post, "Sultans of Swing" cycled in on iTunes. Meaningless synchronicity.
Mad props to you for hanging out in the Euro underground techno scene.
I'd studied Art & Design in college, and wound up in sales at Walt Disney World. Not much more than minimum wage, boring crappy job. So I looked at the want ads daily.
I'd taught myself to program in assembly and was looking for something in IT when I saw an ad for a job at a game company (this was back in the days of the text adventure and Pac Man). They wanted someone who understood programming that had an art background.
So I called the number and talked with the fellow who owned the business, a man named Scott Adams. He seemed impressed with me over the phone and set up an interview to meet the staff and see the facilities.
I wore slacks and a button down shirt. Working at Disney meant I had shorter hair then a US Marine and no facial hair, not even a little mustache.
All the people there had long hair, and dressed in tshirts and jeans.
I didn't get the job. I'm convinced that if I'd worn jeans to the interview I'd have been hired.
Did you see the tie the guy was wearing in his picture on the article? Its pretty tacky for someone concerned with personal apperance.
I do, and so do a lot of people. You can justify it however you want but the fact remains that it is prejudice.
I am not a business drone.
I don't do business drone-like things. You know what I mean by that--have endless, usually pointless, meetings (not to mention "pre-meetings," whatever the hell those are), generate tons of paperwork in an effort to appear like I'm actually working, and rely on charts and graphs to know my position in the world. I don't treat automobiles, houses/neighborhoods, or wives as some kind of a status symbol. I'm down on the metal, doing what I do best--sculpting in pure electricity.
So, I don't feel any particular need to dress like a business drone. I think it's a good thing for me to dress in such a way that people can tell the difference, so they know what to expect.
Socially aware? Please. My social contract with the world at large is not to show up naked. That's it. Beyond that, it's all up to me. The world can deal with it, because the world benefits from what I do. [You better believe it--what I've done over the past 10 years, in concert with a small team of very talented people, has revolutionized a very large world-wide industry.] If the world wants what I have, then the world deals on my terms. I didn't ask to be in the game, and nobody offered me an opportunity to determine the rules. Ipso facto.
For the record, I don't have a ponytail and I don't wear sandals. I also don't wear long-sleeved shirts, or dress pants. If that gives the business guys an aneurysm--GOOD.
Image That is all.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
'Course as the metaverse expands eyes will become more-or-less obsolete...
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
Here's another huge education process: getting people to reserve judgment about others until they know something about them. Something relevant to the task at hand.
Why is it a given that the powers-that-ben't (yet) are the ones that have a lot of learning to do?
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
Once I stopped and questioned a guy I didn't recognize in a suit in the "highly secure" central computer area of a law-enforcement agency - he claimed to be a security auditor, but I escorted him to upper management anyway. I was the first and only person who questioned him. Walked right into the facility, past guards, electric locks, security cameras, key badge entries, police personnel and computer operators. In fact, most people he spoke to helped him move around the building.
Thieves often parade as "suits" in office buildings - they steal laptops and other valuable equipment. They know that if they "dress down" they'll be questioned. Usually staff will help them by providing dollies or carts - astounding!
So next time you see a strange "suit", be suspicious of him. Treat him like a potential well-trained terrorist or thief and keep him at arms' length. The same goes for well-dressed software consultants who will rob you blind with a smile on their face!8-))
It's my experience that being part of one of these subcultures identifies you as a creative type. The cultural references and accepted norms of behaviour are very different.
Just imagine the office watercooler:
If Bob had long hair and sandals, these awkward conversations would be avoided.
Simple I said "may". And it has to do with judgement. Going for a job interview and not making the judgement call to dress any old way you want shows an act of bad judgement. It also shows how much effort that a person is willing to put in to get the job.
I used to think like you but experience has taught me that attitude at the interview is important. Another thing I have learned is someone that dress in an expensive suit, is perfectly groomed, and acts like they are doing you a favor coming to work for you is usually a waste of time. This is just what I have learned from 15 years of interviewing and hiring techs.
Depending on the job I would say the best impression is made by dressing well. Acting like you are excited about the job. The other thing I look for are people that don't know what they don't know. I often ask a question that I think there is not a chance in hell of them knowing for the level I am hiring for. If I get a good honest, "I don't know" that is a BIG plus. If they make up crap that is almost an instant don't hire. Again I have found that people that think they are experts are the hardest to teach. It is almost seems that someone that says I know a little about say networking often knows more than someone that says they know it all.
Again it all comes down to judgement. If I can get an entry level employee that can make good judgment I usually have a winner. What they don't know they will learn. When they have a problem they will ask. When they need to be depended on they can be. When they make an error they learn from it an tend to only make that error once. A person with bad judgement can not be depended on, can not learn, and will make the same error over and over again because the never see it as their fault.
The other thing that people that don't hire people don't understand is just how hard it is if you make a mistake. For me letting someone go is really painful. They may have left a job to come work for you, they have a family, and bills just like you do. Telling them that it just isn't going to work out really sucks. Before I hire someone I want them to have the best chance of being a keeper I can. Just giving someone a shot that doesn't have a chance is often the worst thing you can do for them.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
So it's NOT about money? All the pin stiped suites in the world won't save your business if you don't watch the bottom line...
"Your superior intellect is no match for our puny weapons!"
1. i eat meat
2. i say so in the post
3. the capitalization thing is redundant. if i put two carriage returns or a period+space before a sentence, then you know it's the start of a new sentence, so why bother to do what MS Word/Outlook does and automatically capitalize. i.e. capitals=ballmer-fanboy-shill. capitalization is going the way of allcaps - the oracle has spoken, sweetcheeks
You have no idea what the hell they were thinking. You can make some educated guesses but that's it.
Am I wearing jeans today because
a) they are the only thing in my closet
b) because jeans are comfortable
c) because I don't see wasting some salesman's time, some casheir's time, some trucker's
time, some gas station pump attendant's time, some banker's time, some manager's time,
some oil manager's time and thirteen government official's time just so I can have a pair
of jeans that are faded, but faded by the manufacturer instead of by use?
d) because I actually get paid to wear these jeans, and I'm a corporate plant.
e) because I'm a dirty good for nothing GNU/Hippy
f) I'm a homeless bum
g) I can't afford it
h) I'm a stupid pothead
i) some other reason?
"Do you trust the one in the white lab coat, or the one in the bike-racing suit more?" I mean if we're in an operating room, I'd probably be somewhat suspicous of the lab coat but not for professionalistic reasons, but rather pragmatic reasons; reasons that actually have a reason other than mere speculation: if you have a white lab coat you can clean it and be aware of dirt easier. Certain types of uniforms are OK if they are the right tool for the job. But most people do not gain significant advantages from their clothing(I'd say a lot of people lose...I mean how many office shoes could you run from the police effectively in?)
If people want to make a guess about me and guess wrong, they are welcomed to it. It's their loss, mostly. Oh and yes when my job requires it I dress spiffy and professional. But only insofar as it's required(unless I have some reason to do so. I've been known to surprise my peers by occasionally showing up to school in black & whites complete with tie, for no other reason than I felt like it, or that I had nothing else to wear. If anything wearing a suit to me can mean I'm either too poor or too lazy to do anything else.
Summary:
If you see me in a suit: assume I'm a lazy bastard
If you don't see me in a suit: I'm not being lazy, somehow. Unless you notice I'm also posting on slashdot, of course...
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
Vested interests? Does that mean wearing three-piece suits?
"Who's supposed to lead but smart people?"
Leaders. If you were smarter, you'd know that.
"The government grants you rights, not the other way around."-- beav007. Yes, these people really exist...