What?!? "Lost in Translation" was very well received. I don't know where to look up sales data but that was a very popular movie and is a really bad choice to bemoan how great quality is often overlooked.
I used to make $60K/yr doing extremely high pressure, fast paced, outsourcing contracts. Very complex, stressful work, demanded a very high technical competency level, required Lots of high pressure unpaid overtime. In hindsight, I'm amazed at how much work I did for so little return; basically a nightmare job.
Now I make $40/hr. The worker skill level is very low and management's expectations are low. Workers come in late, leave early, take long breaks. Management is very lenient. Weekend work is always fully paid for and usually optional. Overall, a very cushy, nice place to work.
I see workers at my current job with a fraction of the skill set doing a fraction of the work getting paid more than workers at my older job who had a much higher skill level, work ethic, and productivity output.
This seems so intrinsically illogical. The best explanation I have is that pay often has very little to do with skill set or job performance or work output. It often has much more to do with basic negotiation issues.
Also, salary level is not the primary determinant of job satisfaction. That has more to do with the nature of the work and the prestige and satisfaction associated with it.
I have been desperately trying to hire smart C++ people with more than four years experience.
70% of the resumes I got had no professional C++ experience. Either college only experience or unrelated experience (network admin, web design)
20% lacked really basic knowledge. Had no idea what STL was or what a binary tree or hash table was.
The other 10% had a myriad of problems. I don't think I'm being too picky; these were real problems.
Hey, if you know some smart C++ people that want to work in Austin, TX, I'd love to be proven wrong!
I've read a millions sites and articles and forums like this that give you the impression that there are great people everywhere but that's really not what I see.
$100 for a bike helmet?!? A quick google search shows children's bicycle helmets for $12.99 and nice adult helmets for $40. I bought a nice helmet for myself for ~$45 at a local bike shop; I didn't shop around at all and I picked the one I liked which wasn't the cheapest. These prices are without insurance benefits or anything like that.
Aside from the price, that post is just way off the mark.
If well salaried IT workers were doing simple work that was easily replaceable and commoditized they would have been replaced a long time ago. The IT field has been pretty strong for the past few decades and is still strong even after a lot of pessimism and a large bust. Any free economy wouldn't support such a large group of workers at a high salary if they weren't needed or could be replaced via a cheaper alternative.
The achievements and feats accomplished by the IT industry have been amazing. Can you honestly look at the brilliant tech workers in this industry and say their work isn't hard? You think you can hire some dollar an hour button pusher to do the work of a Bill Joy or a John Carmack? I can tell you've never had a part in building any kind of great engineering.
It sounds like you would just love to personally administer a lesson and guilt trip to IT workers around the country by visiting them and handing out pink slips with a self-righteous attitude. But that's irrelevant to the value of the industry.
I'd peg you as unsuccessful and bitter and you take pleasure in seeing others suffer similar fate.
I have lots of older Mac software that simply will not run in OS X classic mode.
Some of my software can be replaced by an OS X equivalent but not even having the option of occasionally booting back into OS 9 is a real deal breaker.
There are thousands of games being released every year and the best example you come up with of a Java game is Vampire. That is based on Half-Life's Source engine which is completely C++ based and has not a drop of Java. I don't doubt that they implemented some piece of the game using Java or a Java-like scripting language but big deal.
This really proves a point: When something is done in Java; it's highly touted. "Look, this was actually built using Java". The other 99% of the time, when the dev tools aren't so highly advertised, there is no Java.
I specifically said in my original post that most games use a higher level scripting language of some kind. There's QuakeC, UnrealScript, and I'm sure lots of other proprietary languages. Myst was written in HyperCard, loads of games were written in Macromedia Director, heck parts of Abuse were written in Lisp.
Java and C# are great languages. They are much better than C++ for LOTS of software tasks out there. But there are jobs where Java doesn't have significant advantages or just is not the most effective tool. C++ has plenty of well known rough spots and historical baggage, but there are many tasks where if you know how to use C++ properly, it is a highly effective tool for the job.
These tests are very trivial. Basic string tests are one thing but they are very different from the complex performance implications of larger scale software.
A good indicator is the game industry. Game developers are notorious early adopters and tend to care little and even hold contempt for backward compatibility. But they also require performance. There are plenty of Java puzzle games but any major game with fancy graphics that you find on a store shelf is C or C++ (with various graphic specific languages and custom game scripting type languages).
If you start seeing competitive cutting edge 3D engines written in Java, then you will know the performance difference has become moot.
There are plenty of non-game examples but that is the easiest to see.
Java and C# are great languages. Eclipse is awesome. But the performance, of Java at least, still isn't there; even with native code compilers.
Consumers purchase goods based on what the value is to them. Very few consumers do market calculations in their head, decide what is a "fair" value, and make purchase decisions based on that. I would spend $100 for some CDs and only $2 for others. The difference is what I perceive the value as; it's quite irrelevant to a consumer what it actually cost to produce the music.
Businesses sell goods based on how much they can get. They charge as much as the market will bear. They aren't obligated to keep their profit margins as narrow as possible.
You and plenty of others have developed a personal dislike for the RIAA and associated companies in this issue but statistically such considerations rarely factor into mass scale consumer buying patterns.
This article is the standard line of tripe you read everwhere. Very short on relevant facts or any insight; while being big on moral superiority, blame, and uninformed armchair market analysis.
If the music industry's problems were due to a traditional business issue such as quality or consumer convenience, another more agile and creative company could take the market. There are LOTs of smaller labels competing in the current market place and there is no artificial or unfair force holding them back.
The instant consumers get cheap, convenient, easily available access to goods for free, the money-driven economy around such goods will crumble. And it really doesn't matter how great the quality of the goods is, or how "nice" the industry is, or how much the public likes them, or what's fair and not fair.
Technology has allowed copyright-infringing techniques to become mainstream. This is clearly unfair by classical economics but as the saying goes: "all is fair in love and war". The writing on the wall is clear; this technology will ultimately make the existing music promotion and distribution business unviable.
Private enterprise (RIAA) knows this. They aren't blind. The enterprise is simply making every rational move it can to prolong its profit source and business model as long as it can. This is exactly what is expected in the capitalistic society that we live in.
I can guarantee you that most spammers are NOT using Outlook/Express. They use software especially designed to spam.
What confuses me is how posts like this get rated so highly even though they are based on obvious gross factual inaccuracies. There are several posts beneath it with 1-2 ratings that are much more intelligent.
Jaguar is OS X 10.2. 10.3 isn't out yet (only developer previews).
My sister has a 2.5 year old clamshell iBook. I don't think it's that unreasonable to expect to run the new version of the OS on it. Historically, that's an unusually short timeframe to stop supporting hardware.
Apple is simply ending support for hardware and software very quickly compared to Windows. The yearly OS X upgrades are much more necessary than new Windows releases. Most recent Mac software REQUIRES 10.2 (which is less than a year old) and no bug fixes are issued for prior OS releases.
I use Windows 2000 on a daily basis; although there are several major newer versions of Windows (XP and 2003), NO software requires them to run and there are still free service packs for 2000.
I've worked at a small company where the founders were nice likeable people at first but in hindsight after three years of working there I realized they really were very selfish and didn't want anyone to get any credit for good work or any stake in the company.
Before I left I worked three months of brutal slave-driven seven day weeks. At the time I thought I was doing some good people a favor and they had promised me advancement. After I got *huge* amounts of work done, they pulled back the advancement promises and made steady hints that I could be replaced by a cheaper candidate from the current job market. I literally would leap out of bed screaming in the middle of the night after some bad days at work. Life was really miserable.
I took another job offer from another old client. Small company (15 people) but I'm happy as could be. We're growing, there's loads of new opportunity and I'm already getting 3% of revenue on top of salary.
Of course this is all subjective, but my old boss just didn't want anyone around that was as smart as him or might want a piece of his pie. They wanted their employees as replaceable as possible; even at the expense of long term growth of the company.
You really don't want to work for someone like that.
Still using assembly?
on
Assembly '03
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I remember doing 100% assembly like 10-15 years ago. Since then I've faced reality and admitted it's simply inefficient. Now I feel rapidly becoming obsolete sticking to C++ and STL or sticking to career programming as a whole.
I'm amazed that people still try to write real software apps using assembly.
I just ran across someone who sent me a networking app written in x86. It was actually very will organized and commented. But why?!??!
BET exists because there is a large market for black themed entertainment. It doesn't *need* to be there it just sells well and survives in this marketplace.
Indie movies frequently feature such issues as gender roles since lots of people find them interesting and worth exploring. Many (including the poster you replied to and myself) consider this a very tired topic; it is nauseatingly cliche to see yet another indie movie about being gay.
Like there is this whole crappy ass movie and at the end someone is gay and that is supposed to shock me and make the past two hours entertaining.
99% of the time that globalization of the IT industry is mentioned on Slashdot it is either:
A) A scapegoat for workers who are suddenly less valuable or out of a job
B) A rationalization for someone to play parent and verbally punish all these "whiny pampered tech geeks"
The actual phenomenon of globalization is only affecting a small fraction (I've heard 2%) of USA's IT industry.
Offshore outsourcing only accounts for a small fraction (I've heard 2%) of the IT industry. It is widely publicized and blamed but it's really only a small part of the issue. The main issue is that the IT industry in general was inflated and hit a massive downturn. Addtionally, IT as a whole is maturing, becoming better understood, and more commoditized.
Almost every time I hear about globalization, it's opinion and armchair speculation and is very short on relevant hard numbers. The argument makes perfect sense to any armchair economist: "sure some third world guy can type in computer programs for a fraction of the salary of a westerner". It's a growing phenomenon but it is still massively exagerated. Lots of people have been saying that software development was going to be completely outsourced since the 1960's and this really hasn't happened. I also hear a lot of resentment towards mid to upper class western tech workers with big egos which is really a separate issue.
I've worked in the software consulting industry for many years and have encountered little serious competition from offshore outsourcing. People talk about it all the time and almost every company I dealt with has tried it in one form or another. To a large extent, US IT wins business on competitive merit.
I hear a lot about Linux and Open Source software being built by an army of volunteers. I doubt this is true. I know salaried employees who work full time for RedHat on Linux and I hear about other big-name companies (such as IBM) devoting highly paid staff to working on Linux.
Typically, if a project doesn't offer money it needs to offer prestige, fame, or at least recognition. I see this with lots of smaller projects all over but don't see this with something as big as Linux for example.
I am a full-time software engineer myself and know many others. Most of us easily work 50+ hours per week and time is extremely valuable. I can't imagine a significant number of engieneers devoting many nights and weekends doing difficult work on such a large project and getting little recognition or benefit in return.
Quitting is a very small amount of leverage compared to what employers have. It's true that the most horrible employers typically won't get choice staff and won't do as well, but overall a capitalist system gives a significant edge to employers.
I'm no bleeding heart. I've seen many employees who get cushy jobs, don't work that hard, or just like to complain. But I've also seen more employees just get abused and not have the slightest recourse.
It is tempting to believe that a completely capitalistic non-union system is fair. If an employment relationship isn't in the best interest of either employer or employee, they leave and choose a better option. If some people are willing to work longer and harder for less money, prestige, and advancement, they have a natural advantage for immediate job positions.
However, this really is NOT a fair system. The employer has significant advantages:
- Employers have much better information available. They have far more salary data available, and know the precise worth of positions and people much better than employees do.
- Employers frequently engage in regular recruitment activities and know exactly what there is to lose and gain and can make changes very quickly. Typically, employees don't job search until they are unemployed or absolutely miserable at their current position. And employees typically must do any job searches in secrecy while employed.
- In all but the most extreme employment markets, there are more applicants than jobs. It is easier for an employer to find a new applicant than the other way around.
- Employers set terms of employment. Employees can challenge specific terms but in general they have little leverage in doing so. The only thing limiting employers along these lines are legal regulations.
- It is much more difficult for an employee to quit and find another job than for an employer to replace an employee. Switching jobs for an employee typically requires months of searching and in IT, frequent cross-country relocation.
I dislike the thought of union beaurocracy and the decreased business productivity as much as anyone else but I would like to see the playing field evened out a bit.
Unforunately, although there are no shortage of horror stories, today's IT workers simply don't have it bad enough to really justiy a union. History has demonstrated some pretty horrible situations for workers that led to unionization; IT work just isn't that bad yet.
Computers today are MUCH more accessible to beginners. There's a lot more to learn and it may be more overwhelming but most tool are much better designed and documented and the Internet has an unlimited supply of tutorials, message boards, and chat rooms to help the beginner.
Kids learning today have a much greater advantage than those that learned in the 80's. I'm not just being an old grump about this; kids today are learning much more than people used to and its primarily due to the advancement of technology.
I remember spending months trying to get color working correctly on an EGA card with assembly language source code from an old book. Today, you don't have to do things like that.
Plenty of geek gadgetry to appeal to the PDA and MP3-player buyers mixed with black leather and latex fashion and a pop rock soundtrack to appeal to teenagers and an annoyingly shallow philosophical statement. These were the kind of deep thoughts I had the first few times I smoked grass.
God bless them for making so much money off of it but it really wasn't that good a movie.
Slashdot Mirror
What?!? "Lost in Translation" was very well received. I don't know where to look up sales data but that was a very popular movie and is a really bad choice to bemoan how great quality is often overlooked.
I used to make $60K/yr doing extremely high pressure, fast paced, outsourcing contracts. Very complex, stressful work, demanded a very high technical competency level, required Lots of high pressure unpaid overtime. In hindsight, I'm amazed at how much work I did for so little return; basically a nightmare job.
Now I make $40/hr. The worker skill level is very low and management's expectations are low. Workers come in late, leave early, take long breaks. Management is very lenient. Weekend work is always fully paid for and usually optional. Overall, a very cushy, nice place to work.
I see workers at my current job with a fraction of the skill set doing a fraction of the work getting paid more than workers at my older job who had a much higher skill level, work ethic, and productivity output.
This seems so intrinsically illogical. The best explanation I have is that pay often has very little to do with skill set or job performance or work output. It often has much more to do with basic negotiation issues.
Also, salary level is not the primary determinant of job satisfaction. That has more to do with the nature of the work and the prestige and satisfaction associated with it.
I have been desperately trying to hire smart C++ people with more than four years experience.
70% of the resumes I got had no professional C++ experience. Either college only experience or unrelated experience (network admin, web design)
20% lacked really basic knowledge. Had no idea what STL was or what a binary tree or hash table was.
The other 10% had a myriad of problems. I don't think I'm being too picky; these were real problems.
Hey, if you know some smart C++ people that want to work in Austin, TX, I'd love to be proven wrong!
I've read a millions sites and articles and forums like this that give you the impression that there are great people everywhere but that's really not what I see.
$100 for a bike helmet?!? A quick google search shows children's bicycle helmets for $12.99 and nice adult helmets for $40. I bought a nice helmet for myself for ~$45 at a local bike shop; I didn't shop around at all and I picked the one I liked which wasn't the cheapest. These prices are without insurance benefits or anything like that.
Aside from the price, that post is just way off the mark.
The articles say that the new cards will be released in both PCI Express AND AGP form
If well salaried IT workers were doing simple work that was easily replaceable and commoditized they would have been replaced a long time ago. The IT field has been pretty strong for the past few decades and is still strong even after a lot of pessimism and a large bust. Any free economy wouldn't support such a large group of workers at a high salary if they weren't needed or could be replaced via a cheaper alternative.
The achievements and feats accomplished by the IT industry have been amazing. Can you honestly look at the brilliant tech workers in this industry and say their work isn't hard? You think you can hire some dollar an hour button pusher to do the work of a Bill Joy or a John Carmack? I can tell you've never had a part in building any kind of great engineering.
It sounds like you would just love to personally administer a lesson and guilt trip to IT workers around the country by visiting them and handing out pink slips with a self-righteous attitude. But that's irrelevant to the value of the industry.
I'd peg you as unsuccessful and bitter and you take pleasure in seeing others suffer similar fate.
I have lots of older Mac software that simply will not run in OS X classic mode.
Some of my software can be replaced by an OS X equivalent but not even having the option of occasionally booting back into OS 9 is a real deal breaker.
There are thousands of games being released every year and the best example you come up with of a Java game is Vampire. That is based on Half-Life's Source engine which is completely C++ based and has not a drop of Java. I don't doubt that they implemented some piece of the game using Java or a Java-like scripting language but big deal.
This really proves a point: When something is done in Java; it's highly touted. "Look, this was actually built using Java". The other 99% of the time, when the dev tools aren't so highly advertised, there is no Java.
I specifically said in my original post that most games use a higher level scripting language of some kind. There's QuakeC, UnrealScript, and I'm sure lots of other proprietary languages. Myst was written in HyperCard, loads of games were written in Macromedia Director, heck parts of Abuse were written in Lisp.
Java and C# are great languages. They are much better than C++ for LOTS of software tasks out there. But there are jobs where Java doesn't have significant advantages or just is not the most effective tool. C++ has plenty of well known rough spots and historical baggage, but there are many tasks where if you know how to use C++ properly, it is a highly effective tool for the job.
These tests are very trivial. Basic string tests are one thing but they are very different from the complex performance implications of larger scale software.
A good indicator is the game industry. Game developers are notorious early adopters and tend to care little and even hold contempt for backward compatibility. But they also require performance. There are plenty of Java puzzle games but any major game with fancy graphics that you find on a store shelf is C or C++ (with various graphic specific languages and custom game scripting type languages).
If you start seeing competitive cutting edge 3D engines written in Java, then you will know the performance difference has become moot.
There are plenty of non-game examples but that is the easiest to see.
Java and C# are great languages. Eclipse is awesome. But the performance, of Java at least, still isn't there; even with native code compilers.
Consumers purchase goods based on what the value is to them. Very few consumers do market calculations in their head, decide what is a "fair" value, and make purchase decisions based on that. I would spend $100 for some CDs and only $2 for others. The difference is what I perceive the value as; it's quite irrelevant to a consumer what it actually cost to produce the music.
Businesses sell goods based on how much they can get. They charge as much as the market will bear. They aren't obligated to keep their profit margins as narrow as possible.
You and plenty of others have developed a personal dislike for the RIAA and associated companies in this issue but statistically such considerations rarely factor into mass scale consumer buying patterns.
This article is the standard line of tripe you read everwhere. Very short on relevant facts or any insight; while being big on moral superiority, blame, and uninformed armchair market analysis.
If the music industry's problems were due to a traditional business issue such as quality or consumer convenience, another more agile and creative company could take the market. There are LOTs of smaller labels competing in the current market place and there is no artificial or unfair force holding them back.
The instant consumers get cheap, convenient, easily available access to goods for free, the money-driven economy around such goods will crumble. And it really doesn't matter how great the quality of the goods is, or how "nice" the industry is, or how much the public likes them, or what's fair and not fair.
Technology has allowed copyright-infringing techniques to become mainstream. This is clearly unfair by classical economics but as the saying goes: "all is fair in love and war". The writing on the wall is clear; this technology will ultimately make the existing music promotion and distribution business unviable.
Private enterprise (RIAA) knows this. They aren't blind. The enterprise is simply making every rational move it can to prolong its profit source and business model as long as it can. This is exactly what is expected in the capitalistic society that we live in.
I can guarantee you that most spammers are NOT using Outlook/Express. They use software especially designed to spam.
What confuses me is how posts like this get rated so highly even though they are based on obvious gross factual inaccuracies. There are several posts beneath it with 1-2 ratings that are much more intelligent.
Jaguar is OS X 10.2. 10.3 isn't out yet (only developer previews).
My sister has a 2.5 year old clamshell iBook. I don't think it's that unreasonable to expect to run the new version of the OS on it. Historically, that's an unusually short timeframe to stop supporting hardware.
Apple is simply ending support for hardware and software very quickly compared to Windows. The yearly OS X upgrades are much more necessary than new Windows releases. Most recent Mac software REQUIRES 10.2 (which is less than a year old) and no bug fixes are issued for prior OS releases.
I use Windows 2000 on a daily basis; although there are several major newer versions of Windows (XP and 2003), NO software requires them to run and there are still free service packs for 2000.
This is *very* true!
I've worked at a small company where the founders were nice likeable people at first but in hindsight after three years of working there I realized they really were very selfish and didn't want anyone to get any credit for good work or any stake in the company.
Before I left I worked three months of brutal slave-driven seven day weeks. At the time I thought I was doing some good people a favor and they had promised me advancement. After I got *huge* amounts of work done, they pulled back the advancement promises and made steady hints that I could be replaced by a cheaper candidate from the current job market. I literally would leap out of bed screaming in the middle of the night after some bad days at work. Life was really miserable.
I took another job offer from another old client. Small company (15 people) but I'm happy as could be. We're growing, there's loads of new opportunity and I'm already getting 3% of revenue on top of salary.
Of course this is all subjective, but my old boss just didn't want anyone around that was as smart as him or might want a piece of his pie. They wanted their employees as replaceable as possible; even at the expense of long term growth of the company.
You really don't want to work for someone like that.
I remember doing 100% assembly like 10-15 years ago. Since then I've faced reality and admitted it's simply inefficient. Now I feel rapidly becoming obsolete sticking to C++ and STL or sticking to career programming as a whole.
I'm amazed that people still try to write real software apps using assembly.
I just ran across someone who sent me a networking app written in x86. It was actually very will organized and commented. But why?!??!
BET exists because there is a large market for black themed entertainment. It doesn't *need* to be there it just sells well and survives in this marketplace.
Indie movies frequently feature such issues as gender roles since lots of people find them interesting and worth exploring. Many (including the poster you replied to and myself) consider this a very tired topic; it is nauseatingly cliche to see yet another indie movie about being gay.
Like there is this whole crappy ass movie and at the end someone is gay and that is supposed to shock me and make the past two hours entertaining.
99% of the time that globalization of the IT industry is mentioned on Slashdot it is either: A) A scapegoat for workers who are suddenly less valuable or out of a job B) A rationalization for someone to play parent and verbally punish all these "whiny pampered tech geeks" The actual phenomenon of globalization is only affecting a small fraction (I've heard 2%) of USA's IT industry.
Offshore outsourcing only accounts for a small fraction (I've heard 2%) of the IT industry. It is widely publicized and blamed but it's really only a small part of the issue. The main issue is that the IT industry in general was inflated and hit a massive downturn. Addtionally, IT as a whole is maturing, becoming better understood, and more commoditized.
Almost every time I hear about globalization, it's opinion and armchair speculation and is very short on relevant hard numbers.
The argument makes perfect sense to any armchair economist: "sure some third world guy can type in computer programs for a fraction of the salary of a westerner". It's a growing phenomenon but it is still massively exagerated. Lots of people have been saying that software development was going to be completely outsourced since the 1960's and this really hasn't happened. I also hear a lot of resentment towards mid to upper class western tech workers with big egos which is really a separate issue.
I've worked in the software consulting industry for many years and have encountered little serious competition from offshore outsourcing. People talk about it all the time and almost every company I dealt with has tried it in one form or another. To a large extent, US IT wins business on competitive merit.
I hear a lot about Linux and Open Source software being built by an army of volunteers. I doubt this is true. I know salaried employees who work full time for RedHat on Linux and I hear about other big-name companies (such as IBM) devoting highly paid staff to working on Linux.
Typically, if a project doesn't offer money it needs to offer prestige, fame, or at least recognition. I see this with lots of smaller projects all over but don't see this with something as big as Linux for example.
I am a full-time software engineer myself and know many others. Most of us easily work 50+ hours per week and time is extremely valuable. I can't imagine a significant number of engieneers devoting many nights and weekends doing difficult work on such a large project and getting little recognition or benefit in return.
I've worked in IT for MANY industries and have never heard this technology even mentioned; much less witnessed widespread paranoia.
Quitting is a very small amount of leverage compared to what employers have. It's true that the most horrible employers typically won't get choice staff and won't do as well, but overall a capitalist system gives a significant edge to employers.
I'm no bleeding heart. I've seen many employees who get cushy jobs, don't work that hard, or just like to complain. But I've also seen more employees just get abused and not have the slightest recourse.
It is tempting to believe that a completely capitalistic non-union system is fair. If an employment relationship isn't in the best interest of either employer or employee, they leave and choose a better option. If some people are willing to work longer and harder for less money, prestige, and advancement, they have a natural advantage for immediate job positions. However, this really is NOT a fair system. The employer has significant advantages: - Employers have much better information available. They have far more salary data available, and know the precise worth of positions and people much better than employees do. - Employers frequently engage in regular recruitment activities and know exactly what there is to lose and gain and can make changes very quickly. Typically, employees don't job search until they are unemployed or absolutely miserable at their current position. And employees typically must do any job searches in secrecy while employed. - In all but the most extreme employment markets, there are more applicants than jobs. It is easier for an employer to find a new applicant than the other way around. - Employers set terms of employment. Employees can challenge specific terms but in general they have little leverage in doing so. The only thing limiting employers along these lines are legal regulations. - It is much more difficult for an employee to quit and find another job than for an employer to replace an employee. Switching jobs for an employee typically requires months of searching and in IT, frequent cross-country relocation. I dislike the thought of union beaurocracy and the decreased business productivity as much as anyone else but I would like to see the playing field evened out a bit. Unforunately, although there are no shortage of horror stories, today's IT workers simply don't have it bad enough to really justiy a union. History has demonstrated some pretty horrible situations for workers that led to unionization; IT work just isn't that bad yet.
Computers today are MUCH more accessible to beginners. There's a lot more to learn and it may be more overwhelming but most tool are much better designed and documented and the Internet has an unlimited supply of tutorials, message boards, and chat rooms to help the beginner. Kids learning today have a much greater advantage than those that learned in the 80's. I'm not just being an old grump about this; kids today are learning much more than people used to and its primarily due to the advancement of technology. I remember spending months trying to get color working correctly on an EGA card with assembly language source code from an old book. Today, you don't have to do things like that.
C'mon... Just like we call a rub down joint a "massage parlor" or a hooker a "dancer". Drop the legal friendly euphemisms and call a spade a spade.
Plenty of geek gadgetry to appeal to the PDA and MP3-player buyers mixed with black leather and latex fashion and a pop rock soundtrack to appeal to teenagers and an annoyingly shallow philosophical statement. These were the kind of deep thoughts I had the first few times I smoked grass.
God bless them for making so much money off of it but it really wasn't that good a movie.