Or a Yaris for $14K that seats 4 and gets 30/37 mpg?
I'm surprised the SMART fortwo is that cheap. When the diesel ones came out in Canada they were much more than that (current msrp for a smart fortwo gas is more than a yaris in Canada). The biggest benefit of a "smart" car over a yaris was parking (special half spots to fit them where I live). Now, if you have the money, an electric car is tempting due to the free charging stations.
Smart cars seemed to all be owned by businesses (with full wrap advertising) or rich people that have it as a city car (but generally drive their BMW or Mercedes if they plan on transporting anything or want comfort).
Last company I worked at (private) had plenty of over 40 employees in R&D. We had a physics PhD in his 70s who could sling some mean awk and run circles around me in C. While the guy was still excellent at coding his biggest value was his knowledge (both company related history and general tech.. want a quick synopsis of rfc XXXX? He's your man.). The guy would have had value sitting in a throne all day as an oracle, disseminating his knowledge and wisdom to those who brave enough to approach. His value was well known within R&D, however I'm not sure the latest CEO understood his value to the company. He's an asset you keep at all costs and should be willing to bend over backwards to keep him happy (not that he ever asked for much).
This. You can also tell by what state they are in and whether there is shedded skin. As they become adults they shed a layer. That's not going to happen in a matter of hours. Also any signs of eggs etc. I experienced this in a hotel in Florida. They didn't deny the infestation (didn't even feign surprise), but they insisted we pay for the first night despite not having stayed.
I got on their Facebook page and started Tweeting relentlessly. They locked their twitter account and made the Facebook page private. No BS libel suit though. Of course we had 3 rooms in different wings all in various stages of infection. They did manage to get my tripadvisor review pulled (claiming I didn't stay there). If I didn't stay there then why do I have a bill for the night? Can't have it both ways. Tripadvisor wasn't interested in my receipt, they just said to post it again and make sure there is nothing in the wording that sounds like I didn't stay there.
Personally I'd sick the local health authority on them. I've done that to local restaurants (after getting food poisoning) and in the case of the Florida hotel I even sought out their local inspectors. A bad review may or may not hurt them. A failed inspection can have them shut down and protects your ass against a libel suit.
The only job I quit without notice was because I couldn't stand showing up another day. I wrote up a nice letter to the owners that stated I was leaving and quite concisely why I was leaving and would not give the courtesy of notice. I then left the letter at the main desk as long before my next shift as possible. I never heard anything back negative about me leaving (and was paid my last cheque on time), but I did hear through the grapevine the manager mentioned in my letter was reprimanded (given a lower position and more closely monitored to make sure he was actually working).
Any other case I've been as flexible as possible between my new employer and old. The most recent job change I tapered off over a month then came back later as a (highly paid) contractor to help wrap up some projects and do some bug hunting (since I was best qualified for the hardware/software mix of the issues they were having). I would have loved to burn that bridge out of spite, but I'm in a small-ish city (300K) and I didn't want to hurt my coworkers who I loved working with (I hope to work them in the future). In hindsight I should have insisted on higher pay for anything past 2 weeks since I was holding off jumping to a new job that paid 30% more and was willing to have me start the next day. 2 weeks is the accepted norm and beyond that was not only a favour but also cutting into my earnings.
Yep. All the local providers here it is pretty clear even if it isn't explicit: commercial vs non-commercial use. If I want to run a web/app server I have to purchase a commercial account and fair enough since that's a different product (I generally expect to pay for hosting or a static ip etc).
They are ambiguous on purpose though. One of my friends worked at a one of the big ISPs. Most people could get away with running whatever (heck even a mail server back then) as long as their bandwidth usage did draw suspicion. As soon as they find a bandwidth hog they'd nail them on "running a server" or similar. One example he gave was a customer who's upwards bandwidth was pretty much pegged all the time (this was during the early era of high speed connections when there weren't monthly caps, just speed caps). They checked out where all the traffic was coming from and it ended up he was running the audio streaming service for a local radio station. Definitely not a legit use for a home line, but I could see why someone would try to pull that off (T-carrier lines were 10x the price of consumer high speed connections).
But even when only considering pasture-raised cattle, you could feed 20 times as many people form the same area of pasture if you would grow, say, soy on it.
And when we are talking vats of meat that's something that can be done in an urban area in a multistory building (rather than cutting down forested areas for cattle). As the earth's population continues to grow we are going to have to get into higher density food production. Tilapia is a good example of the direction things are going in. An excellent feed conversion ratio, quick growing, can be grown in high density etc. Cattle has a poor FCR in comparison.
I'd have to agree for the current generation of MBA, but MBP are still not competitive if you don't need the OS. When buying a new laptop for work I priced a MBP 15" (pre-retina) and compared it to an equally spec'd Samsung 7 series. Even if I purchased a current model refurb it was twice the price for the same processor, less ram, smaller HD etc. The Samsung series 7 aren't as nice as a MBP aesthetically (less aluminum, keyboard isn't as nice) but nearly $1000 kept in pocket gives me a lot of flexibility to get other gear. When the MBP Retina came out I was keen on getting one (I love me some pixels, more vertical resolution the better for programming) but the video performance is abysmal on the 13" and for the price of the 15" I'd rather make due with less pixels in my laptop and get a nice high resolution external monitor.
I'm going to have to break down and buy a newer Mac at some point. Mine is now useless for supporting OS X/iOS software since it arbitrarily can't use the latest release of OS X (though my wife's newer gen with a nearly identical proc and identical video is supported.. performance issue my ass, it's just forced upgrades). MBA is getting more and more tempting since the performance has improved and the price point is so temping. A few of my dev friends are using them as their main dev machines. Of course they mainly do server side dev which is a little different from my usage (Unity 3D, photoshop, Blender, Monodevelop).. though I'm sure the current machines would handle those well enough, it's the running Windows 7/8 VMs along side I'd be wary of (both processor and space-wise). Only option is use bootcamp so I'm running the Windows stuff I need to run natively, but that means I'm paying the OS X tax for no good reason (though it is a lot less painful than the past).
This. New director says you spend too much. He most likely has nothing to back it up and doesn't care if anyone has facts or figures to back it up. It's a top down decision that you won't have any ability to change in any way shape or form. I'd suggest polishing up your resume.
My best guess is this is just the beginning. He'll gut R&D (to cut costs) ramp up sales on existing products/services to show some gains and make out with a nice bonus for him/herself. After a few years of no innovation and no new products the company will start falling behind the competition and either the company will collapse, or they'll suddenly try to "innovate" (i.e. play catch up after basically leveraging the company for some quick gains). That may or may not work, but either way the company will hemorrhage talent. Any talent left behind will be so stressed, bitter and tired that they won't be half as productive as they used to (they will have figuratively quit while they wait to find something better).
I suspect that the most successful and enjoyable VR games will be sandboxes and MMOs. I'd rather visit alien worlds for the sake of exploration than blowing stuff up.
The most successful early adopter of technology has historically been the porn industry.
I suspect the female body is like an alien world to many slashdotters. A world they'd like to explore but most likely won't get a chance to in their lifetime.
Agreed. Where I live you need two people making that wage if you want to afford a modest house and a newer yet modest vehicle. Software developer wages start well below 70K here (high 40s to low 50s), and 6 figure wages are rare (IBM pays that, but most private and public technical software jobs peak around 90K). That's why I left to start on my own. I work less than my friends and make more money. If I'm happy with 70K I have a lot of flexibility and time off (which for some is worth a lot more than money).
The theory is those people are weeded out through a driving test prior to receiving their license. Problem is often the tests are difficult enough, or the person jumps through the hoops of the test despite having poor driving skills and practices in the real world. Where I am re-testing is rare and generally reserved to the elderly. I'd personally like to see it as a more frequently used tool in policing. Driving recklessly? In addition to a fine you need to pass a re-examination within x weeks or your license is suspended. caught texting and driving? You have to take a re-examination at your own cost. Basically drive it into peoples' skulls that driving is a privilege not a right.
Anything distracting is going to make someone a worse driver than they already are. Removing those distractions reduces the risks. It may not make them "safe", but they'll be further on the spectrum towards safe than if they were texting and driving (mediocre is better than horrid, and horrid is better than guaranteed manslaughter). Anecdotal, but in my experience it's those idiots that think they are the best drivers and can text and call with no problems (completely oblivious to how they are drifting in their own lane). I've confronted people about drifting due to distractions.. all claim they weren't drifting in their lane! "No, I was driving fine!"
Because some of them are good enough that you will want to employ them later but you can't really tell which ones from a conventional interview.
Exactly. This is definitely the case in software. I had a few co-op students working under me (essentially an internship, it's paid work experience while they are still in school and depending on a few points it can even be subsidized). Telling a good dev from a poor one is a difficult task even with someone experienced. Interviewing a nervous university student with little experience is even more difficult (though a few good technical problems for them to solve weeds out the idiots). A good candidate may end up being mediocre (poor work ethic, incompatible personality), and others may surprise. It puts some experience under their belts so it's easier to get hired out of school and makes them more than flipping burgers (my first co-op as a student made me $17/hr when minimum wage was around $8.. though most fast food joints were paying >$10 from what I heard).
The flipside is often companies will offer the good candidates another term or a job. I had a job right out of school from a co-op position. I ended up hiring someone who co-oped under me as a contractor once he was done school (and before the company I managed him at could offer him a position).
There is no better way to find good jr candidates for a software company in my opinion. You get extra bodies that are generally productive at below market rates (plus possible subsidies which make it even more affordable) and get to essentially try before you buy. A co-op term is only as long as a school term (3-4 months), so if it doesn't work out you don't have to worry about firing anyone and the costs associated with that. You are also free to offer extensions (though my experience with the local university is they don't want anyone doing more than two consecutive terms anywhere so the student can branch out). We had them working on real work as well. A super smart one was working on modifying a data storage engine for an embedded project. One that didn't have the same programming chops was working on the testing framework and automating some manual tests we had to do for a particular client. They did real, valid, valuable work.
Good point. I haven't done any serious work on anything smaller than a 15" in.. I don't know how long. I was just sending some email on my old macbook 13" and I couldn't imagine typing code on the thing anymore (though I did when I was younger). Different strokes for different folks though. I worked with a guy that would code on a 10" netbook in visual studio. I could see doing it for a short time in VIM or similar, but a full blown IDE? One of my buddies swears his MBA 13" is the best thing since sliced bread, but he spends most of his time in emacs. Another MBA lover uses Sublime 2 mainly. I'd like to see one of them try to be productive in xcode on those things.
Count me in. Minimum 900 lines vertical resolution (so 1600*900 assuming 16:9).. smaller is fine by me as long as the resolution is there. I often try to code outside on my deck. Even with a table umbrella I need to crank the brightness to high and it's still really difficult to see. Plus with the brightness cranked up I'd better have an extension cord nearby.
Can't game on it? Perfect. Less distractions possible while I work (plus I have tons of other devices for gaming).
Only way I can see it happening in general is if Apple starts with something like a MBA with a transflective display then other companies will take notice and want a piece of that market too. In the past I could have seen Lenovo/IBM making an expensive thinkpad that fits the bill, but I don't really see it as something Lenovo in its current state would venture off into.
Well yeah, but the test is a predictor of IQ not an IQ test (i.e. it's not supposed to directly measure IQ). They found a strong correlation between certain results (total reaction time, difference between large and small image reaction time etc) and IQ. It won't work in all cases but appears to be a good predictor. Hence the term predictor.
It depends a lot on culture and government as well
THIS. Gun laws in the US aren't going to solve anything. It's the culture around guns in the US that is the real issue. Guns are viewed as a solution to problems (defending your property, controlling physical violence etc), and while guns may be a solution they are rarely the correct solution.
When I lived in the US we had an elderly neighbour (single lady, probably 70s) who kept a loaded revolver in her home as "protection". She found it absurd we didn't have a gun "to protect ourselves". "But what would you do if someone broke in?" Ahh.. let them have whatever they want? Call the police?
I know plenty of people in Canada with guns. They use them for hunting. They don't have them in their homes to "protect themselves". And due to storing them properly they would be extremely difficult to access in a break in type situation. The cultural view on guns is entirely different. I strongly believe any difference in non-crime related gun violence (between countries) is based in gun culture. Access to guns is secondary. Good luck changing culture around guns once it's established though. That's something that takes many generations to change, and with the short term thinking of politics in general, no one is going to be brave enough to try and start that movement.
We hired a "superstar" candidate out of one of the top schools in our field with a few years of experience. He operates on a level of someone with less than two years of experience, but expects to be paid on a level of someone with five years of experience. His classmate whom we also hired is more of an "average" candidate, and it surprises me that he can tie his shoes without constant direct supervision sometimes.
And what does that speak to other than your company's ability to hire? Obviously your superstar wasn't a superstar (hence the quotes you added).
I haven't been involved in hiring EEs (last company we only needed a few, and the ones we had were doing fine and had a few decades left in them before retirement), but have been involved in hiring engineering (computer, mech) and compsci grads. My anecdotal experience shows a "top school" doesn't mean much. A student has to be motivated and take what they want from school. A top school may have more to offer, but an unmotivated student at a top school (who gets good grades by jumping through the hoops of tests and papers) is not half the employee someone from a less prestige school who actually took real interest in the subject. I had a co-op student (compsci/math double major) who could code circles around developers with 20+ years experience. He understood software and had a drive to improve himself and his knowledge of the subject. Exceedingly smart as well, but smart on its own is nearly useless. As a company you want smart people that get stuff done. Grunts (get stuff done) are ok for particular roles (with plenty of supervision) but smart people who can't get stuff done are truly useless. This all comes down to motivation, which can't be taught.
I'd argue that there are a lack of self motivated people in the upcoming generation. My grandfather's generation was people that worked hard for what little they had, my father's generation worked hard and were often loyal to their place of employment (but had quite a lot for how hard they worked). My generation jumps jobs more frequently (searching their "right" fit) and has high expectations as far as "work life balance". The upcoming generation has even higher monetary expectations (want everything now) and is even more fickle with their loyalty. To me the issue isn't education but rather attitude towards work. This is seen across the board, from educated to retail clerks. Walk into a store and see how many employees are browsing social media on their phones. We have trained each generation to be better and better consumers of entertainment with little to no attention span.
What's the solution? I don't think there is one other than time. Basically Darwinism in an intellectual age. The smart self motivated people will start their own companies with their cohorts and be successful, the lazy leaches will eventually end up being the technology era equivalents of janitors and garbage men. In the mean time we have some people that should be picking up garbage in a higher role than they deserve (due to labor market conditions). It'll all even out in time. In the meantime, expect to hire some useless people into roles they can barely fulfill.
How much more revenue could they secure if they made it easier to purchase? (Relevant).
Exactly. If he's concerned about image quality, then why not offer downloads that are up to his standards at a price that's so good it's easier to pay it and get a guaranteed good DL.
Heck, run their own private (pay for) torrent site and they can avoid some bandwidth costs. Or free official torrents with an advert or two at the begining (which they should get some revenue off or).
There are ways to monetize free viewers. I stream a few shows from the comedy network (Workaholics mainly, since they have the latest episodes) an I don't mind the ad interruptions.
Not lazy. It's simple economics. If I need something that works and I need it now, then "free" and partially working is not a solution.
I paid money for a game engine when there are free solutions out there. Why? Not laziness, it was for efficiency. The pay-for solution gets me onto multiple platforms quickly and that's what pays the bills. The free solutions create unpaid work.
In my spare time I might hack away at a project I find interesting to see where it gets me, but when it comes to business I need solutions that work now. Sometimes they are open source, sometimes they are proprietary. Obviously this isn't aimed at the hobbyist. And that's ok.
Forgetting the fact that one of your two actual examples is not free (for commercial use). Yes, I would pay. Why? Time == money.
If the solution gets me a model in a usable form quickly (no futzing, converting etc), then it's worth money. $1000 buys maybe a half week of someone's time. So if I can save 3 days work it has paid for itself.
Maybe that doesn't apply to you, but you can't assume that's the same for others. Not all of us have time to mess around with open source solutions that only get us 90% of the way. Just like how some will buy a 3d printer and others will make one (for significantly less). If your time is worth nothing, or it's just a hobby, then sure spend the time and save a few bucks. If you actually need to use it in a business (e.g. rapid prototyping) then building one yourself is a false economy.
Why pay $120 for Kinect when you can pay $1800 on Kickstarter!
Because you are paying for a platform not a Kinect camera. It's software and hardware that are guaranteed to work together (which is a lot easier to support than software alone).
Sure they could sell the software alone, but I'm assuming that's the majority of the cost anyhow. I'd expect to pay over a grand for that software (and it would pay for itself quickly). With the amount of kickstarter backers it's obvious there are more than a few people that think they can get value out of it for the price.
Slashdot Mirror
And I'm sure it develops harmonics well below that. It's not like the spinning generates a pure sine at 10khz.
You can type in full words with very little overhead.
Or a Yaris for $14K that seats 4 and gets 30/37 mpg?
I'm surprised the SMART fortwo is that cheap. When the diesel ones came out in Canada they were much more than that (current msrp for a smart fortwo gas is more than a yaris in Canada). The biggest benefit of a "smart" car over a yaris was parking (special half spots to fit them where I live). Now, if you have the money, an electric car is tempting due to the free charging stations.
Smart cars seemed to all be owned by businesses (with full wrap advertising) or rich people that have it as a city car (but generally drive their BMW or Mercedes if they plan on transporting anything or want comfort).
Last company I worked at (private) had plenty of over 40 employees in R&D. We had a physics PhD in his 70s who could sling some mean awk and run circles around me in C. While the guy was still excellent at coding his biggest value was his knowledge (both company related history and general tech.. want a quick synopsis of rfc XXXX? He's your man.). The guy would have had value sitting in a throne all day as an oracle, disseminating his knowledge and wisdom to those who brave enough to approach. His value was well known within R&D, however I'm not sure the latest CEO understood his value to the company. He's an asset you keep at all costs and should be willing to bend over backwards to keep him happy (not that he ever asked for much).
This. You can also tell by what state they are in and whether there is shedded skin. As they become adults they shed a layer. That's not going to happen in a matter of hours. Also any signs of eggs etc. I experienced this in a hotel in Florida. They didn't deny the infestation (didn't even feign surprise), but they insisted we pay for the first night despite not having stayed.
I got on their Facebook page and started Tweeting relentlessly. They locked their twitter account and made the Facebook page private. No BS libel suit though. Of course we had 3 rooms in different wings all in various stages of infection. They did manage to get my tripadvisor review pulled (claiming I didn't stay there). If I didn't stay there then why do I have a bill for the night? Can't have it both ways. Tripadvisor wasn't interested in my receipt, they just said to post it again and make sure there is nothing in the wording that sounds like I didn't stay there.
Personally I'd sick the local health authority on them. I've done that to local restaurants (after getting food poisoning) and in the case of the Florida hotel I even sought out their local inspectors. A bad review may or may not hurt them. A failed inspection can have them shut down and protects your ass against a libel suit.
The only job I quit without notice was because I couldn't stand showing up another day. I wrote up a nice letter to the owners that stated I was leaving and quite concisely why I was leaving and would not give the courtesy of notice. I then left the letter at the main desk as long before my next shift as possible. I never heard anything back negative about me leaving (and was paid my last cheque on time), but I did hear through the grapevine the manager mentioned in my letter was reprimanded (given a lower position and more closely monitored to make sure he was actually working).
Any other case I've been as flexible as possible between my new employer and old. The most recent job change I tapered off over a month then came back later as a (highly paid) contractor to help wrap up some projects and do some bug hunting (since I was best qualified for the hardware/software mix of the issues they were having). I would have loved to burn that bridge out of spite, but I'm in a small-ish city (300K) and I didn't want to hurt my coworkers who I loved working with (I hope to work them in the future). In hindsight I should have insisted on higher pay for anything past 2 weeks since I was holding off jumping to a new job that paid 30% more and was willing to have me start the next day. 2 weeks is the accepted norm and beyond that was not only a favour but also cutting into my earnings.
Yep. All the local providers here it is pretty clear even if it isn't explicit: commercial vs non-commercial use. If I want to run a web/app server I have to purchase a commercial account and fair enough since that's a different product (I generally expect to pay for hosting or a static ip etc).
They are ambiguous on purpose though. One of my friends worked at a one of the big ISPs. Most people could get away with running whatever (heck even a mail server back then) as long as their bandwidth usage did draw suspicion. As soon as they find a bandwidth hog they'd nail them on "running a server" or similar. One example he gave was a customer who's upwards bandwidth was pretty much pegged all the time (this was during the early era of high speed connections when there weren't monthly caps, just speed caps). They checked out where all the traffic was coming from and it ended up he was running the audio streaming service for a local radio station. Definitely not a legit use for a home line, but I could see why someone would try to pull that off (T-carrier lines were 10x the price of consumer high speed connections).
But even when only considering pasture-raised cattle, you could feed 20 times as many people form the same area of pasture if you would grow, say, soy on it.
And when we are talking vats of meat that's something that can be done in an urban area in a multistory building (rather than cutting down forested areas for cattle). As the earth's population continues to grow we are going to have to get into higher density food production. Tilapia is a good example of the direction things are going in. An excellent feed conversion ratio, quick growing, can be grown in high density etc. Cattle has a poor FCR in comparison.
I'd have to agree for the current generation of MBA, but MBP are still not competitive if you don't need the OS. When buying a new laptop for work I priced a MBP 15" (pre-retina) and compared it to an equally spec'd Samsung 7 series. Even if I purchased a current model refurb it was twice the price for the same processor, less ram, smaller HD etc. The Samsung series 7 aren't as nice as a MBP aesthetically (less aluminum, keyboard isn't as nice) but nearly $1000 kept in pocket gives me a lot of flexibility to get other gear. When the MBP Retina came out I was keen on getting one (I love me some pixels, more vertical resolution the better for programming) but the video performance is abysmal on the 13" and for the price of the 15" I'd rather make due with less pixels in my laptop and get a nice high resolution external monitor.
I'm going to have to break down and buy a newer Mac at some point. Mine is now useless for supporting OS X/iOS software since it arbitrarily can't use the latest release of OS X (though my wife's newer gen with a nearly identical proc and identical video is supported.. performance issue my ass, it's just forced upgrades). MBA is getting more and more tempting since the performance has improved and the price point is so temping. A few of my dev friends are using them as their main dev machines. Of course they mainly do server side dev which is a little different from my usage (Unity 3D, photoshop, Blender, Monodevelop).. though I'm sure the current machines would handle those well enough, it's the running Windows 7/8 VMs along side I'd be wary of (both processor and space-wise). Only option is use bootcamp so I'm running the Windows stuff I need to run natively, but that means I'm paying the OS X tax for no good reason (though it is a lot less painful than the past).
This. New director says you spend too much. He most likely has nothing to back it up and doesn't care if anyone has facts or figures to back it up. It's a top down decision that you won't have any ability to change in any way shape or form. I'd suggest polishing up your resume.
My best guess is this is just the beginning. He'll gut R&D (to cut costs) ramp up sales on existing products/services to show some gains and make out with a nice bonus for him/herself. After a few years of no innovation and no new products the company will start falling behind the competition and either the company will collapse, or they'll suddenly try to "innovate" (i.e. play catch up after basically leveraging the company for some quick gains). That may or may not work, but either way the company will hemorrhage talent. Any talent left behind will be so stressed, bitter and tired that they won't be half as productive as they used to (they will have figuratively quit while they wait to find something better).
I suspect that the most successful and enjoyable VR games will be sandboxes and MMOs. I'd rather visit alien worlds for the sake of exploration than blowing stuff up.
The most successful early adopter of technology has historically been the porn industry.
I suspect the female body is like an alien world to many slashdotters. A world they'd like to explore but most likely won't get a chance to in their lifetime.
Agreed. Where I live you need two people making that wage if you want to afford a modest house and a newer yet modest vehicle. Software developer wages start well below 70K here (high 40s to low 50s), and 6 figure wages are rare (IBM pays that, but most private and public technical software jobs peak around 90K). That's why I left to start on my own. I work less than my friends and make more money. If I'm happy with 70K I have a lot of flexibility and time off (which for some is worth a lot more than money).
The theory is those people are weeded out through a driving test prior to receiving their license. Problem is often the tests are difficult enough, or the person jumps through the hoops of the test despite having poor driving skills and practices in the real world. Where I am re-testing is rare and generally reserved to the elderly. I'd personally like to see it as a more frequently used tool in policing. Driving recklessly? In addition to a fine you need to pass a re-examination within x weeks or your license is suspended. caught texting and driving? You have to take a re-examination at your own cost. Basically drive it into peoples' skulls that driving is a privilege not a right.
Anything distracting is going to make someone a worse driver than they already are. Removing those distractions reduces the risks. It may not make them "safe", but they'll be further on the spectrum towards safe than if they were texting and driving (mediocre is better than horrid, and horrid is better than guaranteed manslaughter). Anecdotal, but in my experience it's those idiots that think they are the best drivers and can text and call with no problems (completely oblivious to how they are drifting in their own lane). I've confronted people about drifting due to distractions.. all claim they weren't drifting in their lane! "No, I was driving fine!"
Because some of them are good enough that you will want to employ them later but you can't really tell which ones from a conventional interview.
Exactly. This is definitely the case in software. I had a few co-op students working under me (essentially an internship, it's paid work experience while they are still in school and depending on a few points it can even be subsidized). Telling a good dev from a poor one is a difficult task even with someone experienced. Interviewing a nervous university student with little experience is even more difficult (though a few good technical problems for them to solve weeds out the idiots). A good candidate may end up being mediocre (poor work ethic, incompatible personality), and others may surprise. It puts some experience under their belts so it's easier to get hired out of school and makes them more than flipping burgers (my first co-op as a student made me $17/hr when minimum wage was around $8.. though most fast food joints were paying >$10 from what I heard).
The flipside is often companies will offer the good candidates another term or a job. I had a job right out of school from a co-op position. I ended up hiring someone who co-oped under me as a contractor once he was done school (and before the company I managed him at could offer him a position).
There is no better way to find good jr candidates for a software company in my opinion. You get extra bodies that are generally productive at below market rates (plus possible subsidies which make it even more affordable) and get to essentially try before you buy. A co-op term is only as long as a school term (3-4 months), so if it doesn't work out you don't have to worry about firing anyone and the costs associated with that. You are also free to offer extensions (though my experience with the local university is they don't want anyone doing more than two consecutive terms anywhere so the student can branch out). We had them working on real work as well. A super smart one was working on modifying a data storage engine for an embedded project. One that didn't have the same programming chops was working on the testing framework and automating some manual tests we had to do for a particular client. They did real, valid, valuable work.
Good point. I haven't done any serious work on anything smaller than a 15" in.. I don't know how long. I was just sending some email on my old macbook 13" and I couldn't imagine typing code on the thing anymore (though I did when I was younger). Different strokes for different folks though. I worked with a guy that would code on a 10" netbook in visual studio. I could see doing it for a short time in VIM or similar, but a full blown IDE? One of my buddies swears his MBA 13" is the best thing since sliced bread, but he spends most of his time in emacs. Another MBA lover uses Sublime 2 mainly. I'd like to see one of them try to be productive in xcode on those things.
Count me in. Minimum 900 lines vertical resolution (so 1600*900 assuming 16:9).. smaller is fine by me as long as the resolution is there. I often try to code outside on my deck. Even with a table umbrella I need to crank the brightness to high and it's still really difficult to see. Plus with the brightness cranked up I'd better have an extension cord nearby.
Can't game on it? Perfect. Less distractions possible while I work (plus I have tons of other devices for gaming).
Only way I can see it happening in general is if Apple starts with something like a MBA with a transflective display then other companies will take notice and want a piece of that market too. In the past I could have seen Lenovo/IBM making an expensive thinkpad that fits the bill, but I don't really see it as something Lenovo in its current state would venture off into.
Well yeah, but the test is a predictor of IQ not an IQ test (i.e. it's not supposed to directly measure IQ). They found a strong correlation between certain results (total reaction time, difference between large and small image reaction time etc) and IQ. It won't work in all cases but appears to be a good predictor. Hence the term predictor.
It depends a lot on culture and government as well
THIS. Gun laws in the US aren't going to solve anything. It's the culture around guns in the US that is the real issue. Guns are viewed as a solution to problems (defending your property, controlling physical violence etc), and while guns may be a solution they are rarely the correct solution.
When I lived in the US we had an elderly neighbour (single lady, probably 70s) who kept a loaded revolver in her home as "protection". She found it absurd we didn't have a gun "to protect ourselves". "But what would you do if someone broke in?" Ahh.. let them have whatever they want? Call the police?
I know plenty of people in Canada with guns. They use them for hunting. They don't have them in their homes to "protect themselves". And due to storing them properly they would be extremely difficult to access in a break in type situation. The cultural view on guns is entirely different. I strongly believe any difference in non-crime related gun violence (between countries) is based in gun culture. Access to guns is secondary. Good luck changing culture around guns once it's established though. That's something that takes many generations to change, and with the short term thinking of politics in general, no one is going to be brave enough to try and start that movement.
We hired a "superstar" candidate out of one of the top schools in our field with a few years of experience. He operates on a level of someone with less than two years of experience, but expects to be paid on a level of someone with five years of experience. His classmate whom we also hired is more of an "average" candidate, and it surprises me that he can tie his shoes without constant direct supervision sometimes.
And what does that speak to other than your company's ability to hire? Obviously your superstar wasn't a superstar (hence the quotes you added).
I haven't been involved in hiring EEs (last company we only needed a few, and the ones we had were doing fine and had a few decades left in them before retirement), but have been involved in hiring engineering (computer, mech) and compsci grads. My anecdotal experience shows a "top school" doesn't mean much. A student has to be motivated and take what they want from school. A top school may have more to offer, but an unmotivated student at a top school (who gets good grades by jumping through the hoops of tests and papers) is not half the employee someone from a less prestige school who actually took real interest in the subject. I had a co-op student (compsci/math double major) who could code circles around developers with 20+ years experience. He understood software and had a drive to improve himself and his knowledge of the subject. Exceedingly smart as well, but smart on its own is nearly useless. As a company you want smart people that get stuff done. Grunts (get stuff done) are ok for particular roles (with plenty of supervision) but smart people who can't get stuff done are truly useless. This all comes down to motivation, which can't be taught.
I'd argue that there are a lack of self motivated people in the upcoming generation. My grandfather's generation was people that worked hard for what little they had, my father's generation worked hard and were often loyal to their place of employment (but had quite a lot for how hard they worked). My generation jumps jobs more frequently (searching their "right" fit) and has high expectations as far as "work life balance". The upcoming generation has even higher monetary expectations (want everything now) and is even more fickle with their loyalty. To me the issue isn't education but rather attitude towards work. This is seen across the board, from educated to retail clerks. Walk into a store and see how many employees are browsing social media on their phones. We have trained each generation to be better and better consumers of entertainment with little to no attention span.
What's the solution? I don't think there is one other than time. Basically Darwinism in an intellectual age. The smart self motivated people will start their own companies with their cohorts and be successful, the lazy leaches will eventually end up being the technology era equivalents of janitors and garbage men. In the mean time we have some people that should be picking up garbage in a higher role than they deserve (due to labor market conditions). It'll all even out in time. In the meantime, expect to hire some useless people into roles they can barely fulfill.
you may be good, but if no one recommends you for a job you might have to move to a bigger town or city.
If you think you are good and no one recommends you it's time for some self reflection.
The bigger WOW here is that this is even a story.
Exactly. Thanks Dice for bringing slashdot down another notch. This is garbage.
How much more revenue could they secure if they made it easier to purchase? (Relevant).
Exactly. If he's concerned about image quality, then why not offer downloads that are up to his standards at a price that's so good it's easier to pay it and get a guaranteed good DL.
Heck, run their own private (pay for) torrent site and they can avoid some bandwidth costs. Or free official torrents with an advert or two at the begining (which they should get some revenue off or).
There are ways to monetize free viewers. I stream a few shows from the comedy network (Workaholics mainly, since they have the latest episodes) an I don't mind the ad interruptions.
Not lazy. It's simple economics. If I need something that works and I need it now, then "free" and partially working is not a solution.
I paid money for a game engine when there are free solutions out there. Why? Not laziness, it was for efficiency. The pay-for solution gets me onto multiple platforms quickly and that's what pays the bills. The free solutions create unpaid work.
In my spare time I might hack away at a project I find interesting to see where it gets me, but when it comes to business I need solutions that work now. Sometimes they are open source, sometimes they are proprietary. Obviously this isn't aimed at the hobbyist. And that's ok.
You want to pay over grand for FREE software?
Forgetting the fact that one of your two actual examples is not free (for commercial use). Yes, I would pay. Why? Time == money.
If the solution gets me a model in a usable form quickly (no futzing, converting etc), then it's worth money. $1000 buys maybe a half week of someone's time. So if I can save 3 days work it has paid for itself.
Maybe that doesn't apply to you, but you can't assume that's the same for others. Not all of us have time to mess around with open source solutions that only get us 90% of the way. Just like how some will buy a 3d printer and others will make one (for significantly less). If your time is worth nothing, or it's just a hobby, then sure spend the time and save a few bucks. If you actually need to use it in a business (e.g. rapid prototyping) then building one yourself is a false economy.
Why pay $120 for Kinect when you can pay $1800 on Kickstarter!
Because you are paying for a platform not a Kinect camera. It's software and hardware that are guaranteed to work together (which is a lot easier to support than software alone).
Sure they could sell the software alone, but I'm assuming that's the majority of the cost anyhow. I'd expect to pay over a grand for that software (and it would pay for itself quickly). With the amount of kickstarter backers it's obvious there are more than a few people that think they can get value out of it for the price.