For you to discard the viewpoints these people by a caricature of "nutjob" demonstrates your intellectual carelessness. People who disagree with conventional wisdom may have some unique insight. People who disagree with you may have some good points to make? How much literature on the subject of Intelligent Design have you read? Have you read any of Ham's writings?
For you to call names indicates that you are ignorant. Thankfully, ignorance is fixable, an exercise left to the reader.
I fully support philosophical materialists' right to raise money and build museums teaching what is consistent with their world view. I don't support philosophical materialism being taught in the publich school science classroom.
It's not that He *needed* to rest, it's that He chose to rest.
Most of the way that culture works was established in Genesis. God rested on the 7th day to set a pattern for humans. He knew that we worked best with a day of rest per week, and by establishing a Sabbath (day of rest) He showed us what we should do.
FWIW - "fundies" as you may refer to someone who believes as I do - believe that creatures adapt, and that favorable traits are preserved. We *don't* believe that evolution is a viable means of speciation - that all extant species were modified versions of previously existing species.
In theory this concept is a good one. The problem is that the playing field is not level and never will be.
The first issue is that we are such consumers that we demand to buy more and more crap and at the lowest possible price. The consumer will win here because business exists solely for the purpose of maximization of profit. It's the only moral mandate for any corporation. You cannot blame the corporation for striving to compete to provide the cheapest, highest quality products possible. This is what the consumer demands, and businesses work to provide what is in demand.
Secondly, we don't live in a world where the rules are applied equally. US based corporations mandated to pay a "living wage" by US standards will be completely unable to compete. Do you realize that in Indonesia you can live on $80/month, and be far far better off than many people there? Companies trying to compete in an economy like that will be compelled to pay what? $50K/year as a living wage? Even at $25K/year, that's $2,000/month or 25 TIMES the amount of pay that would satisfy many people in that economy.
Businesses would move outside the use and pay local economy wages then sell completed products to US based companies.
Remember that the only moral imperative for a corporation is to make money. (And the fact that they make money means that they can hire employees and pay your salary.) Making a profit is necessary and good, not an evil thing. Businesses only stay in business if they can produce goods and services demanded at the market rate.
My point was that what most people consider a minimal acceptable standard of living affects their spending decisions, and for people with low incomes, other choices can be made which on the surface seem objectionable.
If you're willing to do "whatever it takes" financially to live within your means, you're not trapped by the man. The poster to whom I replied indicated that the system was trapping young people. That's a load of crap. Let's empower people, not teach them that they are victims.
I'm one of those "evangelical Christians" and yet I think that at a fundamental level we agree on the issue of religious instruction within the classroom. When it comes to the details, I think that our views diverge.
Leveraging the scientific method we can say with as much certainty as is possible that favorable traits are preserved by natural processes, and unfavorable ones are removed by attrition. (Where the definition of favorable merely means 'tending to preserve life and the ability to procreate.')
This process of gradual change through natural selection unequivocally produces variants, which after many cycles/generations can be easily seen to differ from their progenitors. If this process is what you mean about evolution, then I think that all the fundamentalist Christians I know (and I know a whole lot of them) either believe this to be true, or can easily find their way to that point of view with some reasoned discussion. In fact, I believe that all of them would wholeheartedly support teaching of that factual, measurable, information in the classroom.
Unless I'm mistaken, you and I are in agreement on this much of the issue, right?
Now on the point of religious fervor affecting material taught in the classroom.
As a Christian I hold to a world view that says that the origin of life was brought about from the actions of an all-powerful, supernatural God. This is a religious view, and is not a scientific one. It is not testable via the scientific method, it's merely a view to which I hold and to me it makes sense - it fits well with what I see in the universe around me. As far as I'm concerned, this should not be taught in science class. It's not science, it's a philosophical world view.
Here's the fundamental problem. All theories of the origin of the universe are based on a supposition which cannot be tested via the scientific method. The creation of the universe was not observed by anyone, and it has not been repeated. In fact, many many theories around cosmology have fallen by the wayside over recent years. We can study data that currently exists in the universe as we see it, but we can't say what caused it, only theorize about it.
Since universal origins were not observed and cannot be repeated, it's not testable via the scientific method, and these theories are developed by people who apply their world view as they think of ideas about the formation of the universe.
When one begins to speak of evolution as a means of the origin of life, it's problematic because the "change of something to create something" requires that "something" exist first. At best, evolution can provide an explanation of how life extant today emerged from whatever original life was created through some undetermined means.
For what it's worth, my opinion is that the idea of evolution as the means of speciation provides a poor explanation at best. The fact that it's current conventional wisdom in science today is relatively irrelevant. It's a commitment to a world view that requires only natural means which requires that a process like evolution be used.
From my view, this is a religiously motivated argument, and because of that it has no place in science class, and certainly should not be taught as if it was factual.
Evolutionists and creationists have the same physical evidence and different explanations. I don't believe that the naturalist view is superior to the supernatural creator view. You probably do, and if so we disagree. My opinion is that evolution related to origins is a religiously motivated view, and does not belong in the science classroom.
I think that it's wise to look for how you can: a) do the work that you're willing to tolerate (or enjoy) b) for the most pay possible
I think that your premise that employers are going to screw employees at every turn is false. Employers are not evil by nature. They are run by people, and people sometimes make bad choices. The fact that some companies show little loyalty or protection for their people does not mean that all companies will screw people.
I have worked for more than one company that I thought was a good place to work. If you expect that your employer will screw you, I suspect that prophecy will self-fulfill.
The grandparent was essentially saying that college grads are victims due to lack of opportunity.
My response is that college students and grads make CHOICES that influence their financial well being. My goal was to challenge some preconceptions about what standard of living college grads are entitled to have - which has a direct relationship on their financial well being.
If you've got the income to support your own home, please do so. If you don't, then don't blame society if you've made a choice to live above your means.
The challenge is that the current generation of college students and recent graduates has been led to believe that they are entitled to a life filled with stuff and with little self-sacrifice required.
If *everyone* would learn to adjust their expectations about what constitutes a minimal acceptable standard of living so that they can live without debt within or - gasp - below their means - our culture would be wealthier, stronger, and better equipped to face challenges.
My next door neighbors are first generation immigrants from El Salvador. They have a three bedroom house which the two parents, three kids, his dad, her mom, share the house with two renters who live in the basement. 9 people in a 1700 square foot house! This is in one of the wealthiest counties in the States. The mom and dad have two jobs. The grandmother has a job, and the dad has occasional work on a third job. These are people who have little education and very poor English skills. They are thrilled to have the opportunity to live in this country, and they are making it happen. It's tough going, but a better deal than in Central America, and they consider it a privilege to have American citizenship. Perhaps we should, too.
Most of these college kids could live at home, have a part time job, enroll in community college for core credits, before transferring to a 4 year college, drastically cutting their tuition. They could refuse to allow themselves to spend more on their credit card than they can pay in a given month. They could live off-campus with several roommates to minimize housing costs. They could forego cable, cell phones and cars to reduce their expenses until their income increases.
Instead, our culture of consumption tells people that they should "buy it now." People actually think that they cannot expect to pay off a car or a house within their lifetime. Ridiculous!
We're generally narcissistic and convinced that stuff, power, or sex will satisfy us. This leads to frustration, deeper debt, and hopelessness.
It's not that life is hard and these kids are victims! It's that mostly they think that they have to obtain a standard of living that is higher than their income, and they become indentured servants at 20%/year interest.
Poverty is one of America's most persistent and serious problems. The United States produces more per capita than any other industrialized country, and in recent years has devoted more than $500 billion per year, or about 12 percent of its gross national product, to public assistance and social insurance programs like Social Security, Medicare, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), food stamps, and Medicaid. http://www.econlib.org/library/ENC/PovertyintheUni tedStates.html
The poverty problem is not essentially a money problem. We already spend fortunes of money on poverty programs, have for 40 years, and it's getting worse, not better.
People are not poor solely because they don't have money. There are many factors, and it's a complex problem. I submit to you that there are several things that could be done to dramatically reduce poverty in the US, and few of them require throwing more government-managed dollars at the issue.
The core issues revolve around what people consider to be an acceptable living standard in our culture, and what is "normal."
People who are able to work should work. People should not borrow money for things that depreciate. People who don't understand the consequences of borrowing money should not borrow money at all. People who have no ability to earn an income should not start families. People who do start families that way should lean predominantly on their family members to help provide food and shelter rather than turning to the government. If you can't pay rent on an apartment, then you should get roommates to help pay the bills. This is common in other cultures. In my neighborhood there are several first-generation immigrant families. Most of them rely on family members and non-family members to help pay the mortgage. To those of us who are not immigrants, this seems unacceptable. Why? Because we're spoiled.
I do have compassion for people, and know that there are some people who just cannot make it on their own. (Mental handicap, physical infirmity, crushing medical bills, etc.)
As I see it, the largest root cause of the poverty problem is a) People are not willing to get the education that they need to provide the earning opportunities that are needed. b) If they do have an education, they are unwilling to work hard and consistently to earn money. c) If they do earn money, they do stupid things with it. e.g. play the lottery, borrow money to buy cars, run credit cards to the limits for crap they don't need, 100% mortgages with interest-only options, and d) then get overextended, borrowing to their credit limit where they are abused by financial institutions who are driven by shareholders who care about profitability more than whether these companies are abusing people to drive up profits. These mortgages and credit cards should never have been issued in the first place. Those people could not afford to borrow that money. e) refuse to learn how to develop relationship skills, and they buy into the lie that divorce solves your relational problems. As a result, children are thrown into poverty because the income that was insufficient to cover one household now is split to try to cover expenses for two households.
There are many things we can do to help reduce poverty. Most of them involve getting people to stop living above their means, learn to sacrifice a bit, hold people accountable for bad choices, and teach relational skills so that families are not broken into multiple households. It's not a money problem, it's predominately a character problem, and that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the money being spent in the war on terror.
Bruce, With all due respect, it seems to me that all software costs. Your distinction about initial costs would directly apply to F/OSS too.
I used to work for a company where vendors were excited to say "used by company XYZ" or they wanted us to assess whether the product was worthwhile for enterprise deployment. Even assessing the compatibility of those tools costs something - our time ain't free, even if the vendor asks for no money!
You also mention "the limited set of stuff that it's compatible with" My experience with F/OSS as a whole is that it tends to be compatible only with the one use case that represents the itch the author needed to scratch. Of course, it is possible to take the source and scratch my own itch - if I want to invest the labor to customize a hack to solve my problem, but many times it's less time and hassle to pay for the packaged work.
There was a time when I thought "who would pay for a TV show on iTunes?" I found myself in the middle of a "part one of two" episode, and didn't see part two on the program guide in the near future. I started to think about illegitimate P2P downloads, and then realized that for a mere $2 I could save myself the time and hassle of downloading for "free" (copyright violations aside.) My time and my integrity were well worth $2, and that's been my experience with software, too. Many times the "fit and finish" of commercial code is worth much more than the actual dollar cost to me.
All software costs. Sometimes F/OSS costs more, sometimes less. Sometimes commercial software is a better deal than F/OSS. There's room in the ecosystem for lots of business models.
I live in suburban MD near DC. I just checked and I have at least five options for DSL, and two cable companies offering broadband. None are super cheap, but I have options....
So, in summary, if you sign a contract which has a clause which requires a penalty for early termination, service providers charge you that penalty. Duh!
The business is very competitive, and there are lots of incentives to switch carriers. If you're not renegotiating with your cellular and broadband carriers when the contract comes close to ending, you're unwise.
I don't excuse the size of the fees, but they will be disclosed if you ask the terms of the agreement. Don't want to pay a fee? Don't sign up, or don't break the agreement.
My 15GB model is not sufficient to hold all of the content that I have in my iTunes library.
Some is podcast based, and much of that I would not pay for if it was only available for purchase. Most of my content has been ripped from CD media. Just because I have a large library of MP3s doesn't mean that I've made copyright-violating copies of music.
Of course there are lots of folks who don't pay for music, but that doesn't mean that there are not lots of us who don't illegitimately download content from the web.
The pundits talk for 30 minutes before the speech about what he's likely to say - or in many cases - exactly what he's going to say if they get a copy of the speech ahead of time, and then for an hour after his speech pundit dissect and critique every expression and phrase.
After the speech, if any part is in error, the errors are trumpeted via media outlets loudly.
I want to hear the president's point of view - even if I disagree with what he has to say, or about the principles on which he stands, I think it's valuable to hear it "from the horse's mouth" and make up my own mind, thank you very much.
My measure of success requires calling your own shots Who gets to call their own shots? Do you really think that even Warren Buffett or Bill Gates gets to "call his own shots?" They both have great accountability to others. Even Larry Ellison, who is least concerned with what others think of him is ultimately accountable to the board and stockholders.
If you own your own business, then you are accountable to your customers and suppliers. No one gets free lunch.
We're all trading time for money. Based on your definition, I guess we're all slaves. The way I see it I'm making a calculated trade which is quite favorable compared to other options. If that makes me a slave, I'm one with lots of choice about the type of slavery I'm in, and with little labor compared to the income my "owner" allows me to have. Frankly, I think your definition cheapens the term.
Is "calling your own shots" the entirety of your definition of success?
Sure I knew people, sure I was "lucky." The harder I work, the luckier I get! Part of working hard is building relationships with others. These relationships increase the chance that I will "know someone" or be "lucky."
Yes there are smarter people, and people who "work harder" than me. If they are focused on working hard on things that are not valued by the economy, they will have less financial reward than I have. Digging holes is hard work, but no one is going to pay anyone $500K/yr to dig holes with a shovel.
In my world, there's plenty of opportunity to go around. It's not that there's one fixed-size pie which is sliced thinner and thinner when more people arrive. There's plenty of pie for everyone.
Say you are a VC looking for a new startup CEO VCs don't hire techies to CEO startups. You want to "make it big?" Be the tech brains behind a startup, and let the VCs pay you big bucks to make your great idea the Next Big Thing!
What isn't okay is that the avenue that leads to success requires a either a golden ticket and a little luck or nothing but luck. I'm from a middle class family. I worked hard and played by the rules. I paid my way through college with a part time job, loans and government grants.
Today I'm leading a team of Java developers for a Fortune 500 company. I'm making decent money, and I have time for my wife and kids because I don't travel for work, and I don't work crazy overtime, either. As far as I'm concerned, I'm successful, and while there is something to be said for knowing the right people, and for being in the right place at the right time, that's not all it takes to be a success.
"When Opportunity knocks, it's too late to prepare." (John Maxwell)
If you know someone and get in a job, but have not prepared through hard work, you will quickly fail.
"The harder I work, the luckier I get." Samuel Goldwyn
I don't know what you're talking about. I said "almost all of you who think that you are that smart are simply wrong." You may be one of the exceptions to that rule.
I have no idea what you mean when you suggest that the three statements from my original post constitute "twisted logic" They all seem consistent to me... Can you clarify?
I have no fancy pedigree. I'm from a lower-middle-class family, I went to a liberal arts college you've never heard of, and I worked my butt off to get where I am.
Chip on *my* shoulder? Perhaps you're looking at the wrong person's shoulder....
Yes, we expect a degree, unless you're so incredibly smart that you can produce without one. (And almost all of you who think that you are that smart are simply wrong. Formal education tends to give you the foundation on which all technology is built, and it's rare to find someone who 'gets it' without going to college.)
No, we DO NOT CARE where you went to school, as long as it's accredited. What we care about is: a) Can you do the technical work we need done?
b) Can you communicate clearly? (Orally and in writing.)
c) Are you decently groomed? (So that others are not made uncomfortable by your appearance.)
d) Do you know when to SHUT UP? (Being right about a technical issue is nice, but just because you are right you don't have the freedom to tell people they are idiots.)
e) Can you see the big picture? (Sometimes there is considerable business value in building something other than the "perfect" solution, and we want to be able to pay you to build something technically "lame" because it's the best way for us to make more money.)
f) Are you a leader in your chosen field? Are you willing to learn leadership in a broader sense?
We can always hire someone who knows how to flip bits. We are looking for people who can flip bits and be tolerable to be around. There are plenty of technically competent jerks who think they know it all. We'll let others have them, and we'll hire the people who are smart in more than one area.
The key is turning brainpower into systems and applications that make the company cheaper to run or facilitate making more money. That's what we care about. We don't care where your parchment came from.
Neither am I, but I know that I can't understand what it's like to maintain constant vigilence - because women can and are abused by men. They are statistically smaller and weaker than men, and easily victimized.
Ever walk to your car in a dark parking lot? When you do, do you give thought to being attacked? I don't, but almost every woman I've asked says she does. I recently heard that 10% of high school senior girls report having been raped. These are girls under 18.
I have an acquaintance who was in her work parking lot and rolled down her window to chat with a coworker who smiled pleasantly as he reached in the window to fondle her breast. This was most certainly unwelcome and abusive! Has that ever happened to you? Do you think she will *ever* consider rolling down her car window on a warm day without thinking of that event? Do you ever think "Will my coworker sexually harass me?" I doubt it.
You mock the blogger's fear as overreaction. Try thinking like a more vulnerable person, and then perhaps you'll respond more charitably.
I think that there will *always* be a community whose needs are not well served by the enterprise tool, and the organization needs to decide whether to allow departmental implementations in specific situations or whether the enterprise will run that tool, too.
In our example, if the silly tool in place worked well enough (or even close to as well as what we're running) I'd make our group "take one for the team" and use a tool that is less than optimal for enterprise benefits. There are situations where enterprise solution "A" simply does not work with development system "B."
Specifically, I'm thinking of when a.NET developer is asked to use a repository on a unix box, rather than VSS, which is tightly integrated to their IDE. (Thankfully my team doesn't do.NET, but you get the idea.)
So, should the.NET group have a departmental implementation of VSS, or should the enterprise CM team offer VSS for that set of customers? I know I don't have the answers, but these are the questions that the organization must deal with.
As far as "there are jerks/idiots/selfish people in every enterprise" I think you're absolutely right. I'd have hit that user's department with an insane troubleshooting fee plus expenses for the plane ride, though! (And I would have had a REALLY nice dinner at his department's expense while I was there.)
I also would make sure that I addressed the benefits of enterprise SCC with the team management. When the departmental tool crashes, their management should know that it didn't have to happen that way.
Frankly I don't want my guys installing Linux patches, checking backup logs to make sure that they ran, and maintaining the SCC tool (which has thus far required 0 care and feeding, unlike VSS.) If I could "hire that out" to experts in systems admin, tool admin, and let my guys focus on developing solutions to business problems, I'd be happy to do it!
I appear to be "one of those people." The problem is worsened by the fact that my boss owns enterprise CM, and one of my peers is accountable for adoption. The REASON is not zealotry.
Frankly the way that tools are implemented (which my peer inherited) makes usability particularly poor. (Can't check in large files, takes several minutes to open projects, poor integration of tool with developer platform, pessimistic locking) Because of that, people on my team NEVER checked code in or out unless compelled to do so. "Malicious compliance"
We set up a department-grade solution (linux box under desk, multiple hard disks, scheduled backup to a different physical disk nightly) and began using an open source tool. Presto - large checkins no problem. FAST access to the repository. Explorer shell integration on the desktop. Problem solved. Now we have really good usage of SCC tools.
My boss is not happy with me about this, but until the tools can do the job, we'll keep trying to fly under the radar, and hope we're not compelled to use the "enterprise" tool.
FWIW, I'm having conversations with my peer about how well the tools work (and don't) so that either that tool gets improved, or we get them to officially support the tool we like.
I speak from experience here - father of five, happily married and a great sex life with my wife!
Just because you get married doesn't mean your sex life suffers. In fact, I'd argue that when you learn great relationship skills the frequency and quality of sex increases dramatically.
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For you to discard the viewpoints these people by a caricature of "nutjob" demonstrates your intellectual carelessness. People who disagree with conventional wisdom may have some unique insight. People who disagree with you may have some good points to make? How much literature on the subject of Intelligent Design have you read? Have you read any of Ham's writings?
For you to call names indicates that you are ignorant. Thankfully, ignorance is fixable, an exercise left to the reader.
I fully support philosophical materialists' right to raise money and build museums teaching what is consistent with their world view. I don't support philosophical materialism being taught in the publich school science classroom.
It's not that He *needed* to rest, it's that He chose to rest.
Most of the way that culture works was established in Genesis. God rested on the 7th day to set a pattern for humans. He knew that we worked best with a day of rest per week, and by establishing a Sabbath (day of rest) He showed us what we should do.
FWIW - "fundies" as you may refer to someone who believes as I do - believe that creatures adapt, and that favorable traits are preserved. We *don't* believe that evolution is a viable means of speciation - that all extant species were modified versions of previously existing species.
In theory this concept is a good one. The problem is that the playing field is not level and never will be.
The first issue is that we are such consumers that we demand to buy more and more crap and at the lowest possible price. The consumer will win here because business exists solely for the purpose of maximization of profit. It's the only moral mandate for any corporation. You cannot blame the corporation for striving to compete to provide the cheapest, highest quality products possible. This is what the consumer demands, and businesses work to provide what is in demand.
Secondly, we don't live in a world where the rules are applied equally. US based corporations mandated to pay a "living wage" by US standards will be completely unable to compete. Do you realize that in Indonesia you can live on $80/month, and be far far better off than many people there? Companies trying to compete in an economy like that will be compelled to pay what? $50K/year as a living wage? Even at $25K/year, that's $2,000/month or 25 TIMES the amount of pay that would satisfy many people in that economy.
Businesses would move outside the use and pay local economy wages then sell completed products to US based companies.
Remember that the only moral imperative for a corporation is to make money. (And the fact that they make money means that they can hire employees and pay your salary.) Making a profit is necessary and good, not an evil thing. Businesses only stay in business if they can produce goods and services demanded at the market rate.
I'm all for catchy slogans but this makes no sense:
"Save the world?" if there's no god, save the world from what? Save the world *to* what?
If there's no god, what possible objective standard of right/wrong could exist?
I see your point. not.
My point was that what most people consider a minimal acceptable standard of living affects their spending decisions, and for people with low incomes, other choices can be made which on the surface seem objectionable.
If you're willing to do "whatever it takes" financially to live within your means, you're not trapped by the man. The poster to whom I replied indicated that the system was trapping young people. That's a load of crap. Let's empower people, not teach them that they are victims.
We agree - spend less than you make.
I'm one of those "evangelical Christians" and yet I think that at a fundamental level we agree on the issue of religious instruction within the classroom. When it comes to the details, I think that our views diverge.
Leveraging the scientific method we can say with as much certainty as is possible that favorable traits are preserved by natural processes, and unfavorable ones are removed by attrition. (Where the definition of favorable merely means 'tending to preserve life and the ability to procreate.')
This process of gradual change through natural selection unequivocally produces variants, which after many cycles/generations can be easily seen to differ from their progenitors. If this process is what you mean about evolution, then I think that all the fundamentalist Christians I know (and I know a whole lot of them) either believe this to be true, or can easily find their way to that point of view with some reasoned discussion. In fact, I believe that all of them would wholeheartedly support teaching of that factual, measurable, information in the classroom.
Unless I'm mistaken, you and I are in agreement on this much of the issue, right?
Now on the point of religious fervor affecting material taught in the classroom.
As a Christian I hold to a world view that says that the origin of life was brought about from the actions of an all-powerful, supernatural God. This is a religious view, and is not a scientific one. It is not testable via the scientific method, it's merely a view to which I hold and to me it makes sense - it fits well with what I see in the universe around me. As far as I'm concerned, this should not be taught in science class. It's not science, it's a philosophical world view.
Here's the fundamental problem. All theories of the origin of the universe are based on a supposition which cannot be tested via the scientific method. The creation of the universe was not observed by anyone, and it has not been repeated. In fact, many many theories around cosmology have fallen by the wayside over recent years. We can study data that currently exists in the universe as we see it, but we can't say what caused it, only theorize about it.
Since universal origins were not observed and cannot be repeated, it's not testable via the scientific method, and these theories are developed by people who apply their world view as they think of ideas about the formation of the universe.
When one begins to speak of evolution as a means of the origin of life, it's problematic because the "change of something to create something" requires that "something" exist first. At best, evolution can provide an explanation of how life extant today emerged from whatever original life was created through some undetermined means.
For what it's worth, my opinion is that the idea of evolution as the means of speciation provides a poor explanation at best. The fact that it's current conventional wisdom in science today is relatively irrelevant. It's a commitment to a world view that requires only natural means which requires that a process like evolution be used.
From my view, this is a religiously motivated argument, and because of that it has no place in science class, and certainly should not be taught as if it was factual.
Evolutionists and creationists have the same physical evidence and different explanations. I don't believe that the naturalist view is superior to the supernatural creator view. You probably do, and if so we disagree. My opinion is that evolution related to origins is a religiously motivated view, and does not belong in the science classroom.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
I think that it's wise to look for how you can:
a) do the work that you're willing to tolerate (or enjoy)
b) for the most pay possible
I think that your premise that employers are going to screw employees at every turn is false. Employers are not evil by nature. They are run by people, and people sometimes make bad choices. The fact that some companies show little loyalty or protection for their people does not mean that all companies will screw people.
I have worked for more than one company that I thought was a good place to work. If you expect that your employer will screw you, I suspect that prophecy will self-fulfill.
The grandparent was essentially saying that college grads are victims due to lack of opportunity.
My response is that college students and grads make CHOICES that influence their financial well being. My goal was to challenge some preconceptions about what standard of living college grads are entitled to have - which has a direct relationship on their financial well being.
If you've got the income to support your own home, please do so. If you don't, then don't blame society if you've made a choice to live above your means.
The challenge is that the current generation of college students and recent graduates has been led to believe that they are entitled to a life filled with stuff and with little self-sacrifice required.
If *everyone* would learn to adjust their expectations about what constitutes a minimal acceptable standard of living so that they can live without debt within or - gasp - below their means - our culture would be wealthier, stronger, and better equipped to face challenges.
My next door neighbors are first generation immigrants from El Salvador. They have a three bedroom house which the two parents, three kids, his dad, her mom, share the house with two renters who live in the basement. 9 people in a 1700 square foot house! This is in one of the wealthiest counties in the States. The mom and dad have two jobs. The grandmother has a job, and the dad has occasional work on a third job. These are people who have little education and very poor English skills. They are thrilled to have the opportunity to live in this country, and they are making it happen. It's tough going, but a better deal than in Central America, and they consider it a privilege to have American citizenship. Perhaps we should, too.
Most of these college kids could live at home, have a part time job, enroll in community college for core credits, before transferring to a 4 year college, drastically cutting their tuition. They could refuse to allow themselves to spend more on their credit card than they can pay in a given month. They could live off-campus with several roommates to minimize housing costs. They could forego cable, cell phones and cars to reduce their expenses until their income increases.
Instead, our culture of consumption tells people that they should "buy it now." People actually think that they cannot expect to pay off a car or a house within their lifetime. Ridiculous!
We're generally narcissistic and convinced that stuff, power, or sex will satisfy us. This leads to frustration, deeper debt, and hopelessness.
It's not that life is hard and these kids are victims! It's that mostly they think that they have to obtain a standard of living that is higher than their income, and they become indentured servants at 20%/year interest.
Poverty is one of America's most persistent and serious problems. The United States produces more per capita than any other industrialized country, and in recent years has devoted more than $500 billion per year, or about 12 percent of its gross national product, to public assistance and social insurance programs like Social Security, Medicare, Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), food stamps, and Medicaid.i tedStates.html
http://www.econlib.org/library/ENC/PovertyintheUn
The poverty problem is not essentially a money problem. We already spend fortunes of money on poverty programs, have for 40 years, and it's getting worse, not better.
People are not poor solely because they don't have money. There are many factors, and it's a complex problem. I submit to you that there are several things that could be done to dramatically reduce poverty in the US, and few of them require throwing more government-managed dollars at the issue.
The core issues revolve around what people consider to be an acceptable living standard in our culture, and what is "normal."
People who are able to work should work.
People should not borrow money for things that depreciate.
People who don't understand the consequences of borrowing money should not borrow money at all.
People who have no ability to earn an income should not start families.
People who do start families that way should lean predominantly on their family members to help provide food and shelter rather than turning to the government. If you can't pay rent on an apartment, then you should get roommates to help pay the bills. This is common in other cultures. In my neighborhood there are several first-generation immigrant families. Most of them rely on family members and non-family members to help pay the mortgage. To those of us who are not immigrants, this seems unacceptable. Why? Because we're spoiled.
I do have compassion for people, and know that there are some people who just cannot make it on their own. (Mental handicap, physical infirmity, crushing medical bills, etc.)
As I see it, the largest root cause of the poverty problem is
a) People are not willing to get the education that they need to provide the earning opportunities that are needed.
b) If they do have an education, they are unwilling to work hard and consistently to earn money.
c) If they do earn money, they do stupid things with it. e.g. play the lottery, borrow money to buy cars, run credit cards to the limits for crap they don't need, 100% mortgages with interest-only options, and
d) then get overextended, borrowing to their credit limit where they are abused by financial institutions who are driven by shareholders who care about profitability more than whether these companies are abusing people to drive up profits. These mortgages and credit cards should never have been issued in the first place. Those people could not afford to borrow that money.
e) refuse to learn how to develop relationship skills, and they buy into the lie that divorce solves your relational problems. As a result, children are thrown into poverty because the income that was insufficient to cover one household now is split to try to cover expenses for two households.
There are many things we can do to help reduce poverty. Most of them involve getting people to stop living above their means, learn to sacrifice a bit, hold people accountable for bad choices, and teach relational skills so that families are not broken into multiple households. It's not a money problem, it's predominately a character problem, and that has ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with the money being spent in the war on terror.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
Bruce,
With all due respect, it seems to me that all software costs. Your distinction about initial costs would directly apply to F/OSS too.
I used to work for a company where vendors were excited to say "used by company XYZ" or they wanted us to assess whether the product was worthwhile for enterprise deployment. Even assessing the compatibility of those tools costs something - our time ain't free, even if the vendor asks for no money!
You also mention "the limited set of stuff that it's compatible with" My experience with F/OSS as a whole is that it tends to be compatible only with the one use case that represents the itch the author needed to scratch. Of course, it is possible to take the source and scratch my own itch - if I want to invest the labor to customize a hack to solve my problem, but many times it's less time and hassle to pay for the packaged work.
There was a time when I thought "who would pay for a TV show on iTunes?" I found myself in the middle of a "part one of two" episode, and didn't see part two on the program guide in the near future. I started to think about illegitimate P2P downloads, and then realized that for a mere $2 I could save myself the time and hassle of downloading for "free" (copyright violations aside.) My time and my integrity were well worth $2, and that's been my experience with software, too. Many times the "fit and finish" of commercial code is worth much more than the actual dollar cost to me.
All software costs. Sometimes F/OSS costs more, sometimes less. Sometimes commercial software is a better deal than F/OSS. There's room in the ecosystem for lots of business models.
Respectfully,
Anomaly
I live in suburban MD near DC. I just checked and I have at least five options for DSL, and two cable companies offering broadband. None are super cheap, but I have options....
So, in summary, if you sign a contract which has a clause which requires a penalty for early termination, service providers charge you that penalty. Duh!
The business is very competitive, and there are lots of incentives to switch carriers. If you're not renegotiating with your cellular and broadband carriers when the contract comes close to ending, you're unwise.
I don't excuse the size of the fees, but they will be disclosed if you ask the terms of the agreement. Don't want to pay a fee? Don't sign up, or don't break the agreement.
My 15GB model is not sufficient to hold all of the content that I have in my iTunes library.
Some is podcast based, and much of that I would not pay for if it was only available for purchase. Most of my content has been ripped from CD media. Just because I have a large library of MP3s doesn't mean that I've made copyright-violating copies of music.
Of course there are lots of folks who don't pay for music, but that doesn't mean that there are not lots of us who don't illegitimately download content from the web.
The pundits talk for 30 minutes before the speech about what he's likely to say - or in many cases - exactly what he's going to say if they get a copy of the speech ahead of time, and then for an hour after his speech pundit dissect and critique every expression and phrase.
After the speech, if any part is in error, the errors are trumpeted via media outlets loudly.
I want to hear the president's point of view - even if I disagree with what he has to say, or about the principles on which he stands, I think it's valuable to hear it "from the horse's mouth" and make up my own mind, thank you very much.
The current model is a good one, IMNSHO.
Anomaly
My measure of success requires calling your own shots
Who gets to call their own shots? Do you really think that even Warren Buffett or Bill Gates gets to "call his own shots?" They both have great accountability to others. Even Larry Ellison, who is least concerned with what others think of him is ultimately accountable to the board and stockholders.
If you own your own business, then you are accountable to your customers and suppliers. No one gets free lunch.
We're all trading time for money. Based on your definition, I guess we're all slaves. The way I see it I'm making a calculated trade which is quite favorable compared to other options. If that makes me a slave, I'm one with lots of choice about the type of slavery I'm in, and with little labor compared to the income my "owner" allows me to have. Frankly, I think your definition cheapens the term.
Is "calling your own shots" the entirety of your definition of success?
Sure I knew people, sure I was "lucky." The harder I work, the luckier I get! Part of working hard is building relationships with others. These relationships increase the chance that I will "know someone" or be "lucky."
Yes there are smarter people, and people who "work harder" than me. If they are focused on working hard on things that are not valued by the economy, they will have less financial reward than I have. Digging holes is hard work, but no one is going to pay anyone $500K/yr to dig holes with a shovel.
In my world, there's plenty of opportunity to go around. It's not that there's one fixed-size pie which is sliced thinner and thinner when more people arrive. There's plenty of pie for everyone.
Say you are a VC looking for a new startup CEO
:)
VCs don't hire techies to CEO startups. You want to "make it big?" Be the tech brains behind a startup, and let the VCs pay you big bucks to make your great idea the Next Big Thing!
What isn't okay is that the avenue that leads to success requires a either a golden ticket and a little luck or nothing but luck.
I'm from a middle class family. I worked hard and played by the rules. I paid my way through college with a part time job, loans and government grants.
Today I'm leading a team of Java developers for a Fortune 500 company. I'm making decent money, and I have time for my wife and kids because I don't travel for work, and I don't work crazy overtime, either. As far as I'm concerned, I'm successful, and while there is something to be said for knowing the right people, and for being in the right place at the right time, that's not all it takes to be a success.
"When Opportunity knocks, it's too late to prepare." (John Maxwell)
If you know someone and get in a job, but have not prepared through hard work, you will quickly fail.
"The harder I work, the luckier I get." Samuel Goldwyn
So.... get lucky!
I don't know what you're talking about. I said "almost all of you who think that you are that smart are simply wrong." You may be one of the exceptions to that rule.
I have no idea what you mean when you suggest that the three statements from my original post constitute "twisted logic" They all seem consistent to me... Can you clarify?
I have no fancy pedigree. I'm from a lower-middle-class family, I went to a liberal arts college you've never heard of, and I worked my butt off to get where I am.
Chip on *my* shoulder? Perhaps you're looking at the wrong person's shoulder....
I'm a hiring manager in a Fortune 500 company.
Yes, we expect a degree, unless you're so incredibly smart that you can produce without one. (And almost all of you who think that you are that smart are simply wrong. Formal education tends to give you the foundation on which all technology is built, and it's rare to find someone who 'gets it' without going to college.)
No, we DO NOT CARE where you went to school, as long as it's accredited. What we care about is:
a) Can you do the technical work we need done?
b) Can you communicate clearly? (Orally and in writing.)
c) Are you decently groomed? (So that others are not made uncomfortable by your appearance.)
d) Do you know when to SHUT UP? (Being right about a technical issue is nice, but just because you are right you don't have the freedom to tell people they are idiots.)
e) Can you see the big picture? (Sometimes there is considerable business value in building something other than the "perfect" solution, and we want to be able to pay you to build something technically "lame" because it's the best way for us to make more money.)
f) Are you a leader in your chosen field? Are you willing to learn leadership in a broader sense?
We can always hire someone who knows how to flip bits. We are looking for people who can flip bits and be tolerable to be around. There are plenty of technically competent jerks who think they know it all. We'll let others have them, and we'll hire the people who are smart in more than one area.
The key is turning brainpower into systems and applications that make the company cheaper to run or facilitate making more money. That's what we care about. We don't care where your parchment came from.
Neither am I, but I know that I can't understand what it's like to maintain constant vigilence - because women can and are abused by men. They are statistically smaller and weaker than men, and easily victimized.
Ever walk to your car in a dark parking lot? When you do, do you give thought to being attacked? I don't, but almost every woman I've asked says she does. I recently heard that 10% of high school senior girls report having been raped. These are girls under 18.
I have an acquaintance who was in her work parking lot and rolled down her window to chat with a coworker who smiled pleasantly as he reached in the window to fondle her breast. This was most certainly unwelcome and abusive! Has that ever happened to you? Do you think she will *ever* consider rolling down her car window on a warm day without thinking of that event? Do you ever think "Will my coworker sexually harass me?" I doubt it.
You mock the blogger's fear as overreaction. Try thinking like a more vulnerable person, and then perhaps you'll respond more charitably.
I think that there will *always* be a community whose needs are not well served by the enterprise tool, and the organization needs to decide whether to allow departmental implementations in specific situations or whether the enterprise will run that tool, too.
.NET developer is asked to use a repository on a unix box, rather than VSS, which is tightly integrated to their IDE. (Thankfully my team doesn't do .NET, but you get the idea.)
.NET group have a departmental implementation of VSS, or should the enterprise CM team offer VSS for that set of customers? I know I don't have the answers, but these are the questions that the organization must deal with.
In our example, if the silly tool in place worked well enough (or even close to as well as what we're running) I'd make our group "take one for the team" and use a tool that is less than optimal for enterprise benefits. There are situations where enterprise solution "A" simply does not work with development system "B."
Specifically, I'm thinking of when a
So, should the
As far as "there are jerks/idiots/selfish people in every enterprise" I think you're absolutely right. I'd have hit that user's department with an insane troubleshooting fee plus expenses for the plane ride, though! (And I would have had a REALLY nice dinner at his department's expense while I was there.)
I also would make sure that I addressed the benefits of enterprise SCC with the team management. When the departmental tool crashes, their management should know that it didn't have to happen that way.
Frankly I don't want my guys installing Linux patches, checking backup logs to make sure that they ran, and maintaining the SCC tool (which has thus far required 0 care and feeding, unlike VSS.) If I could "hire that out" to experts in systems admin, tool admin, and let my guys focus on developing solutions to business problems, I'd be happy to do it!
I appear to be "one of those people." The problem is worsened by the fact that my boss owns enterprise CM, and one of my peers is accountable for adoption. The REASON is not zealotry.
Frankly the way that tools are implemented (which my peer inherited) makes usability particularly poor. (Can't check in large files, takes several minutes to open projects, poor integration of tool with developer platform, pessimistic locking) Because of that, people on my team NEVER checked code in or out unless compelled to do so. "Malicious compliance"
We set up a department-grade solution (linux box under desk, multiple hard disks, scheduled backup to a different physical disk nightly) and began using an open source tool. Presto - large checkins no problem. FAST access to the repository. Explorer shell integration on the desktop. Problem solved. Now we have really good usage of SCC tools.
My boss is not happy with me about this, but until the tools can do the job, we'll keep trying to fly under the radar, and hope we're not compelled to use the "enterprise" tool.
FWIW, I'm having conversations with my peer about how well the tools work (and don't) so that either that tool gets improved, or we get them to officially support the tool we like.
Does your enterprise tool work reasonably well?
I speak from experience here - father of five, happily married and a great sex life with my wife!
Just because you get married doesn't mean your sex life suffers. In fact, I'd argue that when you learn great relationship skills the frequency and quality of sex increases dramatically.
YMMV.
Anomaly