There is all sorts of bias. You name it, we've got it. Discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, gender, age, schooling, by minorities, against minorities, one minority against another, men against women, women against men, agism, etc...
The most common by far is if the boss promotes a buddy. Usually the buddy shares something in common with the boss, be it gender, ethnicity, schooling, etc...
Some comments I've heard:
It is good if you're a (wo)men in company X, because the CEO is a (wo)man.
In company Y, each groups seems to be of only one ethnic group. Group A is all ethnic group A, group B is all ethnic group B, etc.
Do not work for company C because they promote ethnic group X and you won't get a fair shake. I was told this by a member of ethnic group X and by the CTO of a rival company.
We only hire gender X in this company. Hahaha. Except you when I walked in the door.
I sincerely doubt if my experiences are unusual.
You are deluding yourself and putting you and the industry on a pedastal to even think it is better in IT than in other industries. If IT is better than other industries, woe to us.
You're assuming that neurons have to be simulated directly. But the mathematical research may have found a mechanism to simulate the behavior of neurons without simulating the (individual) neurons themselves. For example, like finding the eigenvectors to a matrix.
Examples:
1. I put in a page footer into a Word document and it disappears in StarOffice.
2. Fonts and font spacings are different between the two so a document that is only two pages long in Microsoft Office is more than that in Star Office.
3. Formatting that looks good in Microsoft Office doesn't look good in Star Office or even worst is lost.
You could try to work around this but imagine the cost in time.
In a recent class I took (~35 students), the program ran only on Linux (and UNIX variants) but every single student except one used Microsoft products to write up the report. The exception wrote his/her report in plain text. This is anecdotal evidence but I have yet to see any meaniningful switch to Star Office. I know some German city tried to switch but one example does not make a trend.
Its known as the cost of doing business. In some businesses I've worked for, your clients want to send you files in Microsoft formats AND require that information that you send to them is in Microsoft formats. Thus Microsoft products are de facto standards. So if you don't support Microsoft formats, then you often lose a BIG part of your business. If your competitors support those formats then you're competing at a disadvantage.
You could argue the same thing about electricity. You don't have to be on the grid if the grid is controlled by a monopoly but if you aren't then your cost of doing business becomes onerous. Maybe big companies can build its own power plants but virtually all small businesses can't.
You were to a great extent if you wanted to buy a personal computer a couple of years ago. Microsoft charged computer manufacturers (HP, Compaq, Dell, etc...) for the operating system by the number of machines that were shipped irrespective of whether the machine shipped with Windows. The antitrust ruling changed that.
Furthermore, because everyone uses Microsoft Office, you have to buy Microsoft Office if you want to exchange documents with other people. As of yet, OpenOffice doesn't do a good enough job possibly because Microsoft Office has all manner of proprietary information that makes it difficult to read/write in their formats. That's a pretty brutal lock-in.
It has tremendous potential to make Google a lot more money.
1) Far more people use e-mail than web search.
2) E-mail is far more personal (and interpersonal) than web searches.
a) It contains far more of your personality.
b) It contains far more information about your
friendship network and your friends'
personalities.
3) It is immediate compared to web searchs. An
email from your friend about restaurant will
immediately elicit thoughts about which
restaurant to go to. You searching the web for
restaurants is a poor second cousin.
Imagine the companies salivating to get close
access to you even if its anonymously and one
way advertesing.
Companies would pay far, far more than that to
get ahold of your e-mail.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes. Sounds like the standard outsourcing experience.
So what about setting a global development center? Do people have experience with that and does it work?
There is no evidence that the more interaction you have, the more likely democracy will flow into the non-democratic state.
The common IT complaint is that the same is true about upper management positions.
The most common by far is if the boss promotes a buddy. Usually the buddy shares something in common with the boss, be it gender, ethnicity, schooling, etc...
Some comments I've heard:
It is good if you're a (wo)men in company X, because the CEO is a (wo)man.
In company Y, each groups seems to be of only one ethnic group. Group A is all ethnic group A, group B is all ethnic group B, etc.
Do not work for company C because they promote ethnic group X and you won't get a fair shake. I was told this by a member of ethnic group X and by the CTO of a rival company.
We only hire gender X in this company. Hahaha. Except you when I walked in the door.
I sincerely doubt if my experiences are unusual.
You are deluding yourself and putting you and the industry on a pedastal to even think it is better in IT than in other industries. If IT is better than other industries, woe to us.
The problem isn't the latency. Its the reliability.
You're assuming that neurons have to be simulated directly. But the mathematical research may have found a mechanism to simulate the behavior of neurons without simulating the (individual) neurons themselves. For example, like finding the eigenvectors to a matrix.
Actually, they have been publishing. He founded an institute on brain research several years ago and several papers have been published.
Examples:
1. I put in a page footer into a Word document and it disappears in StarOffice.
2. Fonts and font spacings are different between the two so a document that is only two pages long in Microsoft Office is more than that in Star Office.
3. Formatting that looks good in Microsoft Office doesn't look good in Star Office or even worst is lost.
You could try to work around this but imagine the cost in time.
In a recent class I took (~35 students), the program ran only on Linux (and UNIX variants) but every single student except one used Microsoft products to write up the report. The exception wrote his/her report in plain text. This is anecdotal evidence but I have yet to see any meaniningful switch to Star Office. I know some German city tried to switch but one example does not make a trend.
You could argue the same thing about electricity. You don't have to be on the grid if the grid is controlled by a monopoly but if you aren't then your cost of doing business becomes onerous. Maybe big companies can build its own power plants but virtually all small businesses can't.
Furthermore, because everyone uses Microsoft Office, you have to buy Microsoft Office if you want to exchange documents with other people. As of yet, OpenOffice doesn't do a good enough job possibly because Microsoft Office has all manner of proprietary information that makes it difficult to read/write in their formats. That's a pretty brutal lock-in.
It has tremendous potential to make Google a lot more money. 1) Far more people use e-mail than web search. 2) E-mail is far more personal (and interpersonal) than web searches. a) It contains far more of your personality. b) It contains far more information about your friendship network and your friends' personalities. 3) It is immediate compared to web searchs. An email from your friend about restaurant will immediately elicit thoughts about which restaurant to go to. You searching the web for restaurants is a poor second cousin. Imagine the companies salivating to get close access to you even if its anonymously and one way advertesing. Companies would pay far, far more than that to get ahold of your e-mail.