Isham Research's Devil's IT Dictionary:
"an obsolete device still used by thousands of obsolete companies serving billions of obsolete customers and making huge obsolete profits for their obsolete shareholders. And this year's run twice as fast as last year's."
So let me get this straight... This thing keeps our customers happy and brings in huge profits... And you wanted to throw it away!
I though he did very well in Enemy of the State. He really showed that he can do more than just comedy flicks, not that any of his comedy flicks were bad either. He also get good reviews for Ali, although I did not see that one.
I have never read the I Robot stories but they sound like they would make an interesting movie. I think Smith will do a good job. I do understand your reservations though. Sometimes Hollywood writers take too many liberties with classic stories. I will reserve judgement until I see the previews/reviews.
I bought a Palm IIIe about three years ago and I still use it every day. In my office we do almost all scheduling of meetings and time using Outlook/Exchange. I don't think it is much of a hassle to sync once or twice a day. I also keep all my phone numbers in it. I cannot count how many times I have been on the road and in need of a number from the office. One top of all this I have recently begun using the task list to remind me when about dealines and other things I need to do. I guess I could use paper, but it is much easier to type/write it in, than to have to decrypt my handwriting. I did try to use it to take meeting notes one time. That is one area where I still prefer to use the old fasion pencil and paper. I could not write the characters fast and accuratly enough to keep up with the meeting. I may get one of the new laptops that flip over and become writing tablets, but not until they become a lot cheaper.
You have a very good point. We buy gasoline by the gallon, lunch meat by the pound and natural gas by the cubic foot. Why not charge internet users by the GB? Why should the ISP have to raise rates for everyone if only a small population of users are causing them to buy a bigger connection?
You could structure the system the way most mobile phone plans are structured. You pay $25 for 2GB/Month, $50 for 5GB/M and $100 for 10GB/M. This way the house with 4 teenagers all downloading the latest hit songs every day would be required to pay a bit more than grandma next door just downloading her email once a week.
Re:What about all those satelites / ISS?
on
Meet The Leonids
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· Score: 1
It a very big risk, in fact NASA delayed the launch of a satellite until after peak just to play it safe. Keep in mind that there are billions of particles floating around the Earth all the time; a meteor shower just complicates things. I have seen pictures of the damage that something as small as a paint chip can do at high speed to the Space Shuttle. NASA has tracking stations that monitor debris that could cause harm to the ISS, Shuttle and other objects like Hubble. They are occasionally forced to make course corrections to keep from getting hit.
I woke up around 5:15am this morning and the sky was very clear. Unfortunatly I live about 5 miles from Dulles Airport and the street lamps were on so there was a lot of light masking some of the sky. Despite this I was able to see a really good show. I saw at least 3 every minute or so. I even saw one that appeared to skip accross the sky. The Space Station was supposed to appear around 5:10, but I got out too late to see it. I think I did see another satelite moving west to east, I appeared to be too high to be a plane.
I am very glad I woke up to see it, I just wish I had the time to go out further from DC to watch it.
You make a good argument but the method of labeling sites as kid-friendly is going to be much easier to police than having sites label themselves as not-kid-friendly. Do you really think that sites that are maliciously trying to draw children are going to label themselves properly. The people charged with keeping track of this system would never be able to keep up. Conversly it is going to be much easier for them to check the kids.us domain to make sure everyone is adhearing to the rules. This does not mean that we should let young children roam these sites freely. They still need to be supervised, just like in your park on the corner of the street. This will help prevent the child trying to read more about "Harry Potter" from ending up at "Harry Pots Porn Palace". I believe the goal here is to give parents another tool to help them keep questionable material away from young children, although I bet that some parents will try to use this as a substitue for good parental supervision.
I could go on to get a job right away, or continue my formal education and get a Masters in Computer Science. Thinking about it, I've decided that I would like to further my knowledge of Computer Science, and pursue a masters degree.
I think a MS degree is an excelent step but I would suggest getting out and working a bit first. There are many good schools, as well as many diferent types of programs to choose from. I just started going back to school for my MS, but it took me 3 years to decide what I wanted to specialize in. By working it gives you more of an opportunity to see all the different parts of the business world. This will allow you to steer your degree program to help you fulfill your career goals.
On the flip side, if you have already decided that going straight back to school is the right thing to do then may I suggest George Mason University. It is a state school located right in the heart of Northern VA. There are a lot of technical companies located in the area that will give you great internship opportunities and work opportunities after you graduate. Also since it is a Virginia state school the tuition is only about $210 per credit (in state rate). The instructors I have encountered are great too.
But do we really?!? Have you ever been to this so called "space station"? I though not. That object you see in your telescope is really just a big piece of aluminum foil. It's a giant conspiracy to hide the fact that Russia squandered all of its funds for the ISS on super computers that search the Net for p0rn.:-)
I too would be interested in seeing the coments made, but it seems to me that Nam Tai was within its rights. We have a freedom of speech, but we have a duty to make sure what we say/wright is accurate. I think anyone here would be angry if some person, annonymous or otherwise, posted untrue comments about them. If I posted a comment on/. or in a local newspaper that Company X is defrauding stock holders I need to have evidence to back that statement up or else they may sue me for liable as is the case here.
I don't blame AOL for fighting the case though. I am not an AOL customer, but it does make me feel better that they are not handing out the names of annonymous posters to every company who asks, just because the comments are unfriendly to them.
I always think in decades. When I am forty and fifty I don't plan on competing for the same jobs as people in their twenties and thirties. Noone is going to hire a 25 year old program manager, because people with those skills, at that age don't exists. There are skills you can only obtain through life experience and education. I am currently going to school for a Masters degree. It won't do much to help me now, but it will set me apart from the rest in 10 years. Any time a good oportunity for advancement presents itself I jump on it. I recognize that older people can be left behind, but I don't think that paying union dues to the Teamsters is going to help me grow and prosper.
My office has about 800-1000 employees working in it on any one day. There are (potential) customers in my building every day. We are not required to wear a suite, but respectable dress is a must.
A line must be drawn somewhere, you would have to agree that showing up nude, unless your a hot babe:), is unacceptable. I don't think setting the bar a little higher hurts, especially in a bad economy when you are trying to hire the best people you can get. I know best dressed does not necessarly translate into the best skills, but you have to agree all other things being equal I would much rather hire/promote the person who goes the extra mile to dress better than the rest.
I was reponding mainly to the many people who whine about dressing up at all. I have working with people like that before and I wish that would all just grow up.
Why is a Union necessary? Gone are the days where people were huddled into rat infested sweat shops working for pennies an hour (in the US anyway). I feel that I am well compensated and well treated for what I do. If that were to ever change all I have to do is ask my employer to correct it or I find a new job.
There are so many reason I am glad I am not part of a union. Once you are part of a union everything is about seniority. It doesn't matter how well you do a job, you can't be promoted or fired if you have more time on the job than the next person. In addition, if I am garunteeded the same raise as the next guy what is my incentive to do better? The list goes on and on. I believe that if unions were to creap their way into the IT industry productivity would go way down.
I know this will not make me popular, based on some of the comments I have read so far, but I think dress codes are important. Customers base their willingness to buy not just on product quality but also how the team/company presents themselves. A group of people who are clean cut and well dressed are precieved as doing a better job. Companies are now facing a much tougher market and have to do everything to set themselves apart from the competition. I am not advocating going back to the days of blue suits and red power ties, but I think we need to be a step above jeans and a t-shirt.
Like it or not how we dress is still important. Do you really want to take your wife out to a nice restaurant (where you will probably be spending upward of $200 for the meal) where the waiters are wearing jeans and t-shirts. Do you really want guests showing up in shorts and sneakers to a formal wedding that you have spent a lot of time an money planning? I don't necessarly like getting dressed up in the morning, but I do it because I am expected to.
It is very true that the ability to copy and freely distribute music, movies, etc. has the ability to very seriously hurt the industry under their *current* business model. However I don't understand why the RIAA is so resistant to changing the model. I guess they feel it is easier to keep the old system than to learn or create a new one.
There has to be a way for them to make money off of all this. Sure, there will always be someone trying to rip off your work, but companies like M$ have seemed to adapt very well. Who would have though 10 years ago that local and national newspapers could give away free electronic copies of their content and still make money. There has to be a way to make this work for the entertainment industry.
This is just like saying that your market is ready to buy your products, but you are unwilling to sell.
I am assuming you are asking this question because you are currently in the situation of being owed money by a company that is unable or unwilling to pay you for work that you have completed. What you need is a good lawyer. There may be State or local laws that help protect you. If the company is in bankruptcy you will want to make it know early in the process that they owe you money. You may not get everything you are owed, but perhaps a good chunk of it.
If you are just getting into the business you will still want to seek advice from a lawyer. Ask about ways you can structure your contracts so that you get what you are owed. I would ask for a downpayment if you think the company may be short on cash. You can also bill them as you go, once or twice a month.
I would begin by breking down your house/apartment by room. Have an extra bathroom, dining room etc. pack those first. These are probably rooms you don't use much and you can bear to be without them for a few weeks. As moving day approaches you can pack the rooms you use more often, living room/rec room, kitchen and finally your bedroom.
As you pack each room you can group related things together into boxes. Sheets and towels in one set, computer cables and accessories in another set. As you go mark each box in big letters which room it belongs to. You can also mark the general contents of in smaller writing. Don't go overboard with labeling each and every item in the box, keep the description to 2-3 words, like "pots and utensils". Remember to mark this on the side of the box as the top and bottom are usually obscured by stacking them on top on one another. When packing each box remember that you will need to be able to lift and carry them a good distance (possibly up steps?). Even if all your books and CD's fit into one container they may be too heavy to manage in one container.
As you move into your new place stack your boxes into their respecitve rooms. Unpack each room as you see fit.
Suggestion: Pack at least a weeks worth of clothing and other essentials and move them yourself, don't put them on a truck. This goes if you are using a moving company or not. Moving companies routinely misplace things in transit, it has happened to me and several friends. In addition you may get to your new place and discover your apartment is not ready and you have to put your stuff into storage and live in a hotel until everything is sorted out. Be prepared for the worst!
... on school playgrounds everywhere: "My genome is better than your genome!"
Re:Blame college tuitions, not the dot-coms....
on
Generation Wrecked
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· Score: 1
What I want to know is at what point will people start realizing that it is not reasonable to pay $20-30k per year (and more) for an education that is only going to get you a job paying $30k per year. I went to York College of PA. I paid less than $45k for 4 years of college. It may not be an ivy league school or have an all-star basketball team (with appologies to a former roommate) but it gave me an excellent education. The reason that it does not have sky-high tuition is that it does everything debt free. A lot of schools throw up multimilion dollar buildings every year. They pay huge amounts of interest and often have very poor growth plans. They have to raise tuiton to pay for their own shortsightness. York is a great example of the way things could be.
Re:Lost bullshit education, work hard
on
Generation Wrecked
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· Score: 1
... Have at least 3 kids (the population aging, let's all do our part here to fix the situation, don't be selfish and hoard money with no offspring)...
This is the reason why Social Security is failing. In part because the boomers robed it to pay for unnecessary government trash, but mainly because they did not have enough children. How many only children do you know vs. how many of are parents have 3 or 4 siblings. Part of the Social Security "miracle" is that younger generations would support older ones. Guess what happens when you have a significantly small generation trying to support a larger one.
Re:What do these people have in common?
on
Generation Wrecked
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· Score: 1
This same though crossed my mind when I read the article. I cannot stand to hear a college senior whine when they discover that their degree in art therapy, business or (my favorite) rec and leisure gets tham nothing but a job as a file clerk. It's not often the degree itself that is the problem. Many times it's a faliure of the student to research what employers are looking for. Often people get a business degree, but didn't realize that employers expect to see some minors that help specialize them, or several internships to help get their feet wet. The moral of the story it, talk to your professors and talk with people in the industry as early in your educational process as possible.
You hit the nail on the head. This is my favorite part of the article:
Instead of creating catch phrases, the government should focus on creating retirement options that give Gen Xers --and baby-boomers too, for that matter--the flexibility to withdraw money from their accounts if they're temporarily unemployed, starting a business, or just taking time out, say financial planners. Most important, the retirement accounts need to be portable to match the winding job paths of Gen Xers.
While I aggree with the last sentence, its the first part of the paragraph that is going to make matters worse. You should not be able to withdraw money from a retirement account unless you ABSOLUTLY need to. If you want to start a company or take time off of work, Great! But you are still going to need something to retire on. There are better saving options to do the things the author is talking about. Lets face it... Social Security as we know it probably will not exist. There may be something like it, but the benefits will be a lot smaller and we will not be able to collect it until much later in life. I for one don't plan to live off my children or the government. The author said we may need more than $7 million saved to properly retire, but I think this is a gross overstatement. $2m is a much better number to work with. Think of where you spend the bulk of your money now: Rent/mortgage, car, children, education for yourself and your children. These are major expenses that, if you plan properly, will not be there in 20-30-40 years. Your cost of living will be much lower. You will not need a $100k "salary" to live on. You could probably get by with $50-60k, perhaps less. You may not be able to retire completly on $2m, but you may be able to retire from your current career at 55-60 and go do something different part-time like teach or open/run a small community business.
It all starts with good planning. My suggestion to anyone who looks at this article and says "that's me" is to find a good financial planner. It's never to early to start.
Slashdot Mirror
What was that...
So let me get this straight... This thing keeps our customers happy and brings in huge profits... And you wanted to throw it away!
I have never read the I Robot stories but they sound like they would make an interesting movie. I think Smith will do a good job. I do understand your reservations though. Sometimes Hollywood writers take too many liberties with classic stories. I will reserve judgement until I see the previews/reviews.
I bought a Palm IIIe about three years ago and I still use it every day. In my office we do almost all scheduling of meetings and time using Outlook/Exchange. I don't think it is much of a hassle to sync once or twice a day. I also keep all my phone numbers in it. I cannot count how many times I have been on the road and in need of a number from the office. One top of all this I have recently begun using the task list to remind me when about dealines and other things I need to do. I guess I could use paper, but it is much easier to type/write it in, than to have to decrypt my handwriting. I did try to use it to take meeting notes one time. That is one area where I still prefer to use the old fasion pencil and paper. I could not write the characters fast and accuratly enough to keep up with the meeting. I may get one of the new laptops that flip over and become writing tablets, but not until they become a lot cheaper.
You could structure the system the way most mobile phone plans are structured. You pay $25 for 2GB/Month, $50 for 5GB/M and $100 for 10GB/M. This way the house with 4 teenagers all downloading the latest hit songs every day would be required to pay a bit more than grandma next door just downloading her email once a week.
It a very big risk, in fact NASA delayed the launch of a satellite until after peak just to play it safe. Keep in mind that there are billions of particles floating around the Earth all the time; a meteor shower just complicates things. I have seen pictures of the damage that something as small as a paint chip can do at high speed to the Space Shuttle. NASA has tracking stations that monitor debris that could cause harm to the ISS, Shuttle and other objects like Hubble. They are occasionally forced to make course corrections to keep from getting hit.
I am very glad I woke up to see it, I just wish I had the time to go out further from DC to watch it.
You make a good argument but the method of labeling sites as kid-friendly is going to be much easier to police than having sites label themselves as not-kid-friendly. Do you really think that sites that are maliciously trying to draw children are going to label themselves properly. The people charged with keeping track of this system would never be able to keep up. Conversly it is going to be much easier for them to check the kids.us domain to make sure everyone is adhearing to the rules. This does not mean that we should let young children roam these sites freely. They still need to be supervised, just like in your park on the corner of the street. This will help prevent the child trying to read more about "Harry Potter" from ending up at "Harry Pots Porn Palace". I believe the goal here is to give parents another tool to help them keep questionable material away from young children, although I bet that some parents will try to use this as a substitue for good parental supervision.
I think a MS degree is an excelent step but I would suggest getting out and working a bit first. There are many good schools, as well as many diferent types of programs to choose from. I just started going back to school for my MS, but it took me 3 years to decide what I wanted to specialize in. By working it gives you more of an opportunity to see all the different parts of the business world. This will allow you to steer your degree program to help you fulfill your career goals.
On the flip side, if you have already decided that going straight back to school is the right thing to do then may I suggest George Mason University. It is a state school located right in the heart of Northern VA. There are a lot of technical companies located in the area that will give you great internship opportunities and work opportunities after you graduate. Also since it is a Virginia state school the tuition is only about $210 per credit (in state rate). The instructors I have encountered are great too.
But do we really?!? Have you ever been to this so called "space station"? I though not. That object you see in your telescope is really just a big piece of aluminum foil. It's a giant conspiracy to hide the fact that Russia squandered all of its funds for the ISS on super computers that search the Net for p0rn. :-)
I don't blame AOL for fighting the case though. I am not an AOL customer, but it does make me feel better that they are not handing out the names of annonymous posters to every company who asks, just because the comments are unfriendly to them.
You obviously have not seen the beta for the next version of Windows. It will bring that 3GHz P4 to its knees and beg for mercy! :)
I always think in decades. When I am forty and fifty I don't plan on competing for the same jobs as people in their twenties and thirties. Noone is going to hire a 25 year old program manager, because people with those skills, at that age don't exists. There are skills you can only obtain through life experience and education. I am currently going to school for a Masters degree. It won't do much to help me now, but it will set me apart from the rest in 10 years. Any time a good oportunity for advancement presents itself I jump on it. I recognize that older people can be left behind, but I don't think that paying union dues to the Teamsters is going to help me grow and prosper.
A line must be drawn somewhere, you would have to agree that showing up nude, unless your a hot babe :), is unacceptable. I don't think setting the bar a little higher hurts, especially in a bad economy when you are trying to hire the best people you can get. I know best dressed does not necessarly translate into the best skills, but you have to agree all other things being equal I would much rather hire/promote the person who goes the extra mile to dress better than the rest.
I was reponding mainly to the many people who whine about dressing up at all. I have working with people like that before and I wish that would all just grow up.
Why is a Union necessary? Gone are the days where people were huddled into rat infested sweat shops working for pennies an hour (in the US anyway). I feel that I am well compensated and well treated for what I do. If that were to ever change all I have to do is ask my employer to correct it or I find a new job.
There are so many reason I am glad I am not part of a union. Once you are part of a union everything is about seniority. It doesn't matter how well you do a job, you can't be promoted or fired if you have more time on the job than the next person. In addition, if I am garunteeded the same raise as the next guy what is my incentive to do better? The list goes on and on. I believe that if unions were to creap their way into the IT industry productivity would go way down.
Like it or not how we dress is still important. Do you really want to take your wife out to a nice restaurant (where you will probably be spending upward of $200 for the meal) where the waiters are wearing jeans and t-shirts. Do you really want guests showing up in shorts and sneakers to a formal wedding that you have spent a lot of time an money planning? I don't necessarly like getting dressed up in the morning, but I do it because I am expected to.
There has to be a way for them to make money off of all this. Sure, there will always be someone trying to rip off your work, but companies like M$ have seemed to adapt very well. Who would have though 10 years ago that local and national newspapers could give away free electronic copies of their content and still make money. There has to be a way to make this work for the entertainment industry.
This is just like saying that your market is ready to buy your products, but you are unwilling to sell.
If you are just getting into the business you will still want to seek advice from a lawyer. Ask about ways you can structure your contracts so that you get what you are owed. I would ask for a downpayment if you think the company may be short on cash. You can also bill them as you go, once or twice a month.
As you pack each room you can group related things together into boxes. Sheets and towels in one set, computer cables and accessories in another set. As you go mark each box in big letters which room it belongs to. You can also mark the general contents of in smaller writing. Don't go overboard with labeling each and every item in the box, keep the description to 2-3 words, like "pots and utensils". Remember to mark this on the side of the box as the top and bottom are usually obscured by stacking them on top on one another. When packing each box remember that you will need to be able to lift and carry them a good distance (possibly up steps?). Even if all your books and CD's fit into one container they may be too heavy to manage in one container.
As you move into your new place stack your boxes into their respecitve rooms. Unpack each room as you see fit.
Suggestion: Pack at least a weeks worth of clothing and other essentials and move them yourself, don't put them on a truck. This goes if you are using a moving company or not. Moving companies routinely misplace things in transit, it has happened to me and several friends. In addition you may get to your new place and discover your apartment is not ready and you have to put your stuff into storage and live in a hotel until everything is sorted out. Be prepared for the worst!
On the flip side... this could be used by parents to determine if an unborn child will look like a movie star.
... on school playgrounds everywhere:
"My genome is better than your genome!"
What I want to know is at what point will people start realizing that it is not reasonable to pay $20-30k per year (and more) for an education that is only going to get you a job paying $30k per year. I went to York College of PA. I paid less than $45k for 4 years of college. It may not be an ivy league school or have an all-star basketball team (with appologies to a former roommate) but it gave me an excellent education. The reason that it does not have sky-high tuition is that it does everything debt free. A lot of schools throw up multimilion dollar buildings every year. They pay huge amounts of interest and often have very poor growth plans. They have to raise tuiton to pay for their own shortsightness. York is a great example of the way things could be.
This is the reason why Social Security is failing. In part because the boomers robed it to pay for unnecessary government trash, but mainly because they did not have enough children. How many only children do you know vs. how many of are parents have 3 or 4 siblings. Part of the Social Security "miracle" is that younger generations would support older ones. Guess what happens when you have a significantly small generation trying to support a larger one.
This same though crossed my mind when I read the article. I cannot stand to hear a college senior whine when they discover that their degree in art therapy, business or (my favorite) rec and leisure gets tham nothing but a job as a file clerk. It's not often the degree itself that is the problem. Many times it's a faliure of the student to research what employers are looking for. Often people get a business degree, but didn't realize that employers expect to see some minors that help specialize them, or several internships to help get their feet wet. The moral of the story it, talk to your professors and talk with people in the industry as early in your educational process as possible.
While I aggree with the last sentence, its the first part of the paragraph that is going to make matters worse. You should not be able to withdraw money from a retirement account unless you ABSOLUTLY need to. If you want to start a company or take time off of work, Great! But you are still going to need something to retire on. There are better saving options to do the things the author is talking about. Lets face it... Social Security as we know it probably will not exist. There may be something like it, but the benefits will be a lot smaller and we will not be able to collect it until much later in life. I for one don't plan to live off my children or the government. The author said we may need more than $7 million saved to properly retire, but I think this is a gross overstatement. $2m is a much better number to work with. Think of where you spend the bulk of your money now: Rent/mortgage, car, children, education for yourself and your children. These are major expenses that, if you plan properly, will not be there in 20-30-40 years. Your cost of living will be much lower. You will not need a $100k "salary" to live on. You could probably get by with $50-60k, perhaps less. You may not be able to retire completly on $2m, but you may be able to retire from your current career at 55-60 and go do something different part-time like teach or open/run a small community business.
It all starts with good planning. My suggestion to anyone who looks at this article and says "that's me" is to find a good financial planner. It's never to early to start.