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Google's Megan Smith Would Be First US CTO Worthy of the Title
theodp writes: Bloomberg is reporting that Google X's Megan Smith is the top candidate for U.S. Chief Technology Officer. With a BS/MS in Mechanical Engineering from MIT, and experience ranging from General Magic to Google, Smith would arguably be the first U.S. CTO worthy of the title (the outgoing U.S. CTO has a bachelor's in Econ; his predecessor has a master's in Public Policy). "Smith joined Google in 2003. As vice president of business development, she oversaw many of its most important acquisitions, like Keyhole, the service that underlies Google Earth. She has led the company’s philanthropic division, Google.org, and served as a co-host for Google’s Solve for X forum, where distinguished thinkers and scientists brainstorm radical technology ideas with Google executives."
I'm not even going to waste mod points on this. I'd rather this just sit here at +0 and contribute my points to other, more worthy discussions on other posts.
Viable Slashdot alternatives: https://pipedot.org/ and http://soylentnews.org/
Because while she is quite qualified for the position I can bet that some in Congress will not only have an issue with her gender but also her sexual orientation.
Note that I do not believe this should be an issue at all, but reality is often different from what we would hope.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
Her coming from Google matters more than her degree. Revolving door politics is bad news for the consumer and for smaller businesses.
This is going to be AWESOME!
From the link BY THE FUCKING CONTRIBUTOR HIMSELF:
Prior to his career in government, Park was the co-founder of two successful health information technology companies.
So a man who started two IT companies by the age of 35 doesn't have a background in Technology, because he got a graduate degree in business?
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
Is she the scientologist?!
Kewl!
You could have the smartest and most qualified person on the planet in that position and it wouldn't make any difference. Governments in general and the US Government especially are bunglers. They mess things up and make problems worse. If she's smart, it should only take her six months or less to figure out that she's being used for PR purposes because she's a smart women with a tech degree, not because anybody in the government bureaucracy is actually going to change anything. Think about the kind of person that's attracted to government employment. These are people who largely aren't competent enough to get jobs in the private sector and have very little ambition to take the risks necessary to run a business or be self employed. They like to play it safe, not think to hard or work to hard and take home a fat check every month. That's who she's up against in the government and that's why she will fail.
I'm not even going to waste mod points on this. I'd rather this just sit here at +0 and contribute my points to other, more worthy discussions on other posts.
Apparently not in this discussion, you won't. Well, barring sockpuppets, that is.
Also remember, mods, it's not even enough to check the "post anonymously" box... your mods will be undone unless you are literally logged out.
I hate to see things like this happen. Appointing her just because she is female cheapens what I've done. Just as the joke of a new CEO of Microsoft who was picked for his race pisses off my Indian friends, this is the same deal.
I've once "posted anonymously", and could mod after that.
Mechanical engineering? Really? No way. Strong cyber computer science credentials are needed.
This sounds mostly political, then a bit managerial, then a teeny weeny bit technical. And from what I've read before, that post is mostly a bully pulpit with 0 effective power.
I'm sure each and every budgeting unit have their own systems, their own standards, their own teams, and their own kickbacks -sorry, suppliers. Standardizing, rationalizing and unifying all that is a bit technical, but, mostly, political.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Who is going to protect privacy if the CTO is in bed with Google?
Are the other applicants less qualified? Do any of them have degrees in mechanical engineering? We don't know, because the only person mentioned is Megan Smith. We can't fairly judge whether or not she'd be a good fit because we have no idea what the alternatives are.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
If you think about it, fascism is the best at installing qualified bureaucrats.
Todd Park and Jonathan Bush were health care consultants who met working for Booz Allen. They hired Todd's brother Ed Park (a software engineer) to develop a software solution to automate insurance claim processing for their womens health clinic business. The software written by Todd's brother was such a money saver they turned it into a business, Athenacare. Doesn't sound to me like Todd Park is a computer guy. Sounds like Todd Park is a professional health care consultant with some experience managing businesses that dwell on the interface between health care and IT. In light of the Affordable Care Act's prominence in the current administration, it doesn't seem surprising that they chose him despite his obviously very narrow IT knowledge, though I can't even imagine why they'd elevate him to Chief CTO from CTO of HHS when his resume leans more towards being HHS specific more than CTO. It is a bit suspicious that Booz Allen (his former employer) was picked to build the massive cock-up that was the ACA web site, though. Sounds like we had a shity Chief CTO who let his old friends blow sunshine up his ass and promise him the moon with healthcare.gov, and then delivered him a stinking turd. Maybe we should have had a Chief CTO who knew more about technology than about health care.
I'm not even going to waste mod points on this. I'd rather this just sit here at +0 and contribute my points to other, more worthy discussions on other posts.
No, now it's going to benefit from you using your karma bonus. You should have just kept your metaphorical mouth shut, you fuckwit.
CxO is a whore.
Fuck systemd. Fuck Redhat. Fuck Soylent, too. Wait, scratch the last one.
Every time this position has been filled, the incoming 'US CTO' has been treated with effusive praise in the tech and general press, as being someone whose talents, qualifications, and multicultural background make them uniquely suited for the fast-moving times, etc.
Then they quit after about 18 months on the job.
This time around, why don't we wait until Ms. Smith actually *accomplishes something useful in her new position* before we go off saying how great she's going to be? She hasn't done anything yet.
Why do you accept as a given that fairness leads to surviving and thriving?
Government wasn't about your qualifications, but about which party is in control and how much the person put in that position could further their agenda.
Be seeing you...
Mod parent up!!!
If we were hiring a 23 year old, I can see what the major/degree is being important.
But isn't it really what they've been doing *at work* for the last 10-15 years more important than what they did *at school*?
Or were you thinking that if they didn't go to the right preschool, elementary school, etc. that there's no way that they could be competent?
Yup.. Licensed by the state of California as a PE. 30 years plus experience Engineering (with a capital E). But darn it all, back in the late 70s, colleges didn't have software engineering curricula, and we can all agree that CS (as in theory of algorithms, big O()- which I'm not sure existed, meta-compiler design, and LISP) wouldn't be particularly useful in a lot of production software development. So I bailed on the CS (Math/CS actually.. there was no pure CS degree) and did *real work* building *real production systems*. With gradually increasing responsibility, etc.
So I'd agree.. some theoretical knowledge is useful (even essential), but there's a lot of ways to pick that up along the way.
... the willingness to admit you don't know everything, and are willing to seek expert advice...
The problem with equality is that it assumes that one size fits all regardless of race, sex, or culture. It's not a cut and dry subject, there needs to be boundaries that all parties can not only establish but agree upon. But we must also accept the fact that we will be arguing about this until the end of time. In which case, we need to establish certain rules that will cater to future generations as time goes on so that we're not tied down by rules, in ages passed, that may no longer apply to said generation.
So... did she ever use her degree for anything after graduating?
"worthy" is better judged in restrospect.
Those companies aren't big enough to count. Because that's what's really going on here: Big large tech companies pushing their people into key government posts. In a sense, this CTO position is created exactly for that purpose.
And long term, it's a pretty bad development, because it means the clerisy is slowly taking over. That is people who basically use science and technology as the magic sauce to justify whatever it is they're doing, whether warranted or not. A bit like how the UK says they want "science driven policy" but what they really want is the reverse, see eg. Davit Nutt's firing from his scientific advisor position with the government.
...we start talking about how disadvantaged women are in tech, and how we need to throw money at the problem or something?
BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
Who the hell modded this shit up?
This story isn't about gender issues, it's about tech issues. Smith seems to be the first candidate for the CTO who actually has a damn clue about the Tech in the Chief TECHNOLOGY Office position.
Previous appointees have been from tech businesses but have had a business background. Smith has an engineering background and has been working actually doing tech.
I mean, when was the last time you heard there isn't enough men employees in female dominated industries?
How about every single fucking time this topic comes up on slashdot and people post scads of links about campaigns to do exactly this in order to counter this ridiculous and pernicious piece of misinformation?
SJW n. One who posts facts.
There is no doubt that she has the chops and anyone would be lucky to snare an executive with her background and talents. But the article's focus on what degree she has is just silly. The brightest developer I ever knew had a degree in chemistry. The best Director of development I ever hired was an Air Force tech. The best COO I ever worked for was a lawyer / polysci major with no business classes under his belt. The best Director of IT I ever had earned an associates degree and got her A+ certification to get her first job.
Meanwhile, the worst Director of Development I ever had was an MS of CompSci with an MBA. Guy was a tool and an idiot. The worst COO I ever had was an MBA with top grades from a top school. The worst CFO I ever worked with was a chemistry major. OK, that one kinda goes against my point. Forget about him.
Still, my point stands:
If you are still worrying about your degree 20 years out of college, you haven't done anything.
Reading her bio, she sounds really good. And the projects she's worked on make it clear that she likes technology. If the U.S. won't take her, I hope Germany or the EU will.
The idea that you must have a technical degree to be "worthy" of the CTO title is idiotic. Stupidest Slashdot submission ever.