I was in Vegas in March for a tech conference and as usual, being a female traveling alone, I had my do not disturb sign up the entire time. I, too, had people banging on my door my 3rd day there. They didn't come in. They just radioed back when I answered the door that I was ok, told me it was a security check to make sure I was fine, and left. Now, this could be because my room was reserved through my company (major hardware/software company), so I was less of a threat and they didn't come in. But, it did scare the crap out of me to hear banging and someone yelling Security at my door. How are we to verify who these people are? As a female traveling alone, it was unnerving.
Not all of us military related personnel are 20 somethings spending minuscule paychecks on largely undesirable things. I'm a military spouse who actually works for IBM and is working on my PhD in information science. While I realize I'm not necessarily the norm, I do live here on base so I have a bit more understanding than most who have never been here or in this situation would. The towns here that are in direct proximity to the bases are actually a lot better than many of the other towns around the U.S mostly because you can't put a base in the middle of no where on an island since the island as a whole is in the middle of no where and it isn't that big to begin with.
That said, they did an economic study here on what would happen if they did a drawdown of troops: "Under the Army’s 2020 Force Structure Realignment, potentially 20,000 soldiers and 30,000 family members could be forced to leave. On top of the nearly 20,000 soldiers, another 3,053 direct contract jobs and 3,936 indirect jobs are at stake. Together, they make up roughly 4 percent of Hawaii’s labor force. With a move like this, officials say Hawaii’s economy could lose out on $1.3 billion." http://khon2.com/2014/11/14/ar...
That is a much bigger impact than you would think being that the only real money makers here on the islands are tourism and food exports including Dole and Monsanto. There is no real economy beyond that.
I also know some of the people who are actually a part of the team working on the telescopes here. They in no way want to do any harm to the natives or native lands. That said, the natives go back and forth a lot in what they want or choose to promote from one issue to another. The telescope project simply provides a face to the "foreign" institution that they can fight against at the moment. Being an anthropologist, I did of course research as much as I could when I got here about the natives. There is no denying that the acts perpetrated against the then standing monarchy of the Hawaiian islands where underhanded, however, that particular ruling class was not the long standing establishment many would have you believe. The islands were a part of many hostile take overs between warring tribes long before Captain Cook ever landed there.
The real issue at hand is how poorly the island natives are doing in comparison to the prosperity that surrounds them in the form of 5 star resorts and million dollar estates of the rich and famous (http://www.ksbe.edu/_assets/spi/pdfs/reports/demography_well-being/05_06_5.pdf); the infrastructure on the outskirts of the island where there is no tourism to support it is crumbling into the ocean (http://khon2.com/2015/04/28/portion-of-crumbling-kamehameha-highway-in-kaaawa-to-be-repaired/); and the fact that there is really no such thing as affordable homes (http://www.hawaiibusiness.com/the-high-cost-of-affordable-housing/). The telescope project is simply a way to get their voice heard when everyone turns a deaf ear and blind eye to all of the other maladies occurring at a much more local level.
When I left the Fortune 500 company I worked for for 5 years in November of 06 (to to go a startup), the first thing I told them in my exit interview was that I loved my job (it was in IT and I really did), but their questionnaires and surveys were bullshit, their team building exercises just took time away from my real work, and I'd rather an extra day off or a pay raise than some special food in the cafeteria or the ability to wear jeans on Friday. I didn't appreciate being rated on "customer service" when I never saw a customer, and believed that having to grade my department on its multiculturalism was ironic being that we were all white bread - that is unless they counted the English guy as being of a different "culture" simply because he spoke with an accent.
Funny thing is, the HR lady agreed with me, and I'm still rehireable.
Summary: She did it for the boys. Hell - it was boys that got me into my profession. I worked for Apple at the age of 19 by recommendation of a boy and by 21 I was heading the Mac techsupport department at 3dfx after my boyfriend was hired there (later on I found out he was hired in hopes I'd follow him over). I was able to travel from cost to cost for a company I really enjoyed working for and hell I got to play video games for a living. I was of course laid off when they went out of business but I find my self 4 years later doing web development for a top 500 company I've now worked for, for the last 3 years.
I love the industry. I love what I do. I also enjoy the fact that there aren't many women in my industry, if for no other reason than I usually can't stand working with them.
Referring back to previous comments, I don't ever plan to have children and the only reason for me to be a stay at home anything is so that I can VPN in and program in a tank top and shorts rather than a skirt and heels.
I will also admit that I will not date a guy outside the industry. Nothing like trying to explain my day at work to a non-techy when I have a hard enough time doing so to my boyfriend who works for McAfee.
Plus - who would I play WoW with?
Summary for female moderators: Hey baby, how you doin'? *smirk*
Slashdot Mirror
I was in Vegas in March for a tech conference and as usual, being a female traveling alone, I had my do not disturb sign up the entire time. I, too, had people banging on my door my 3rd day there. They didn't come in. They just radioed back when I answered the door that I was ok, told me it was a security check to make sure I was fine, and left. Now, this could be because my room was reserved through my company (major hardware/software company), so I was less of a threat and they didn't come in. But, it did scare the crap out of me to hear banging and someone yelling Security at my door. How are we to verify who these people are? As a female traveling alone, it was unnerving.
Not all of us military related personnel are 20 somethings spending minuscule paychecks on largely undesirable things. I'm a military spouse who actually works for IBM and is working on my PhD in information science. While I realize I'm not necessarily the norm, I do live here on base so I have a bit more understanding than most who have never been here or in this situation would. The towns here that are in direct proximity to the bases are actually a lot better than many of the other towns around the U.S mostly because you can't put a base in the middle of no where on an island since the island as a whole is in the middle of no where and it isn't that big to begin with.
That said, they did an economic study here on what would happen if they did a drawdown of troops:
"Under the Army’s 2020 Force Structure Realignment, potentially 20,000 soldiers and 30,000 family members could be forced to leave.
On top of the nearly 20,000 soldiers, another 3,053 direct contract jobs and 3,936 indirect jobs are at stake. Together, they make up roughly 4 percent of Hawaii’s labor force. With a move like this, officials say Hawaii’s economy could lose out on $1.3 billion."
http://khon2.com/2014/11/14/ar...
That is a much bigger impact than you would think being that the only real money makers here on the islands are tourism and food exports including Dole and Monsanto. There is no real economy beyond that.
I also know some of the people who are actually a part of the team working on the telescopes here. They in no way want to do any harm to the natives or native lands. That said, the natives go back and forth a lot in what they want or choose to promote from one issue to another. The telescope project simply provides a face to the "foreign" institution that they can fight against at the moment. Being an anthropologist, I did of course research as much as I could when I got here about the natives. There is no denying that the acts perpetrated against the then standing monarchy of the Hawaiian islands where underhanded, however, that particular ruling class was not the long standing establishment many would have you believe. The islands were a part of many hostile take overs between warring tribes long before Captain Cook ever landed there.
The real issue at hand is how poorly the island natives are doing in comparison to the prosperity that surrounds them in the form of 5 star resorts and million dollar estates of the rich and famous (http://www.ksbe.edu/_assets/spi/pdfs/reports/demography_well-being/05_06_5.pdf); the infrastructure on the outskirts of the island where there is no tourism to support it is crumbling into the ocean (http://khon2.com/2015/04/28/portion-of-crumbling-kamehameha-highway-in-kaaawa-to-be-repaired/); and the fact that there is really no such thing as affordable homes (http://www.hawaiibusiness.com/the-high-cost-of-affordable-housing/). The telescope project is simply a way to get their voice heard when everyone turns a deaf ear and blind eye to all of the other maladies occurring at a much more local level.
...why the headhunters are calling.
When I left the Fortune 500 company I worked for for 5 years in November of 06 (to to go a startup), the first thing I told them in my exit interview was that I loved my job (it was in IT and I really did), but their questionnaires and surveys were bullshit, their team building exercises just took time away from my real work, and I'd rather an extra day off or a pay raise than some special food in the cafeteria or the ability to wear jeans on Friday. I didn't appreciate being rated on "customer service" when I never saw a customer, and believed that having to grade my department on its multiculturalism was ironic being that we were all white bread - that is unless they counted the English guy as being of a different "culture" simply because he spoke with an accent.
Funny thing is, the HR lady agreed with me, and I'm still rehireable.
Summary: She did it for the boys.
Hell - it was boys that got me into my profession. I worked for Apple at the age of 19 by recommendation of a boy and by 21 I was heading the Mac techsupport department at 3dfx after my boyfriend was hired there (later on I found out he was hired in hopes I'd follow him over). I was able to travel from cost to cost for a company I really enjoyed working for and hell I got to play video games for a living. I was of course laid off when they went out of business but I find my self 4 years later doing web development for a top 500 company I've now worked for, for the last 3 years.
I love the industry. I love what I do. I also enjoy the fact that there aren't many women in my industry, if for no other reason than I usually can't stand working with them.
Referring back to previous comments, I don't ever plan to have children and the only reason for me to be a stay at home anything is so that I can VPN in and program in a tank top and shorts rather than a skirt and heels.
I will also admit that I will not date a guy outside the industry. Nothing like trying to explain my day at work to a non-techy when I have a hard enough time doing so to my boyfriend who works for McAfee.
Plus - who would I play WoW with?
Summary for female moderators: Hey baby, how you doin'?
*smirk*
lol - ok now that is funny!