Ask your company to hire a relocation company to manage the move for you. It will save you many headaches, and is possibly cheaper than your company reimbursing you directly for moving expenses (Relo cos. get special rates on tons of stuff).
If you aren't getting reimbursed, talk to your tax accountant, or get one if you don't already have one. If you're moving more than 60 miles, the expenses are tax deductible -- but not all of them.
Depending on your salary, you may even want to hire a relo company for yourself, if the company won't pay for it.
One of my closest childhood friends commented to me in 1999 that on a carrier (the ship, not the service provider) their web access was censored.
Furthermore, they were forbidden by their CO from watching any news other than Fox News in the mess. Apparently, due to personal preference of the CO, not because of military policy... but after checking with and other parts of his ship, they all had the same mess/recreation policy.
See, dissenting points of view could harm troop morale, and diminish their effectiveness. The military is allowed to get away with a lot of things in the name of protecting morale. You wouldn't want any doubters to risk the lives of brother soldiers/shipmen/airmen because of their conscience, would you?
The armed forces, including all the men and women in them, are responsible for the execution of war -- not the morality of war. The Congress is responsible for those decisions, so the armed forces have no reason to hear dissenting points of view. Right?
Since the Revolutionary War in the US, that has been how it has worked. Separation of Powers, Checks and Balances, and all that. As long as Congress is respnsible for the ethical decisions of war, then censoring information accessible to the troops is fine. Oh wait...
Apologies in advance for the tongue-in-cheekiness.
First, the rules are different for corporations and individuals.
Second, the rules are different for cash than for checks or wires. ANY 10k cash transaction must be reported -- anyone who gives out 10k in cash must report it to the IRS. Wires, checks, etc only need to be reported if they are unusual for the person involved.
That said, I know many people who been contacted by DHS about funds they've wired for their company to vendors in London, Paris, Madrid, and other cities overseas.
I also know people who had checks they've issued clear from their bank accounts, but not credited to the payee for up to 30 days later (this seems to happen a lot with UK payees). As far as they know, everythings fine... until a vendor is screaming that they didn't receive payment.
Anyway, if the transaction is typical, the bank doesn't need to report it unless it's cash over $10k.
"This country (the U.S.) was built around personal responsibility and freedom"
Re-read your history. You misunderstand what personal responsibility and freedom meant to the people who founded the US. I suggest you read "Washington Crossing the Delaware," Macculloch (sp?) does a great job of explaining the different interpretations of the major factions.
"The trains by me are funded by force -- the average rider pays a few dollars, and the taxpayer pays almost $10 more to cover the bureaucracy of the trains."
BS. The US subsidy of trains is far less than you think. It's a mere fraction of the per-user subsidy of the highway system. Not only that, but you have no idea of the cost of a train ride, apparently. Nor do you account for the savings in public damages such as air pollution, traffic congestion, etc.
"The government welfare programs are overbudget, so the government inflates the currency, pushing the costs onto future generations while robbing the current citizens of the value of their savings and investments.
Government welfare programs are tied to inflation. Furthermore, are you aware at all of what happened to the value of currency before the US government started managing it? Or the rampant cycle of bust and boom that destroyed far more peoples' savings than the current modest rate of inflation? You are still very misinformed on the ramifications of a non-controlled currency.
"Of cousre, we'll never know, but I see most human invention coming out of a profit motive."
This is addressed in several other comments in this thread and article, so I'll skip it.
You're right, we do tend to disagree, we have very different understandings of the roles of government and how economics works. I appreciate the books you recommend to me, although I must say that the two I've read don't hold water when compared to the body of knowledge out there.
"Asking me to pick up the tab for your toys, against my will, is really not acceptible anymore to me."
So move elsewhere. Or work to get someone else elected.
I never drive, I only use the trains. I therefore think that all funding for highways should be cut. I mean, private industry will pick up the slack, right? Anyone who drives can choose to send a few bucks to their favorite highway maintenance organization, right?
"A great majority of the citizens of the State are so far in debt that there is no likelihood of escaping it in their lifetimes, so the citizens push the debt off to the next two generations."
Personal debt has more to do with people not spending within their means, and being ecouraged to enter into bondage with the credit companies. It doesn't tie in so well with government debt, you are conflating the NASA budget with Social Security, etc.
"I don't see any public interest achievements in NASA, and I definitely don't see why NASA or the U.S. government needs to be handling any scientific research"
Then open your eyes. Or read more history of science. One of NASA's roles is to create new markets -- for example, without NASA, there wouldn't be a market for commerical satellites.
"It is time to just end the program entirely and leave it up to a competitive marketplace. There are enough billionaires with money to spend, let them finance these toys strictly for ego"
What competitive marketplace? There is no market yet. Government has always acted to open new markets, which is what NASA is all about.
"Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) is asking NASA to help fund the demonstration of a reusable space capsule the El Segundo, Calif.-based company has been developing in secret with its own funding for the past 18 months."
Their own funding? Some guy from a Tribe Called Quest told me he left his wallet in El Segundo, I think I know what happened to the cash that was in it.
Also, until we see figures on how much they've spent on development themselves, I bet it pales in comparison to what they ask for from NASA. Not that there's anything wrong with that, as long as any tech they develop enters public domain (I wish).
Seriously though, it's been 15 years or so since I studied German, so thanks for pointing it out, it looked wrong to me, but I couldn't be bothered to look up the gender.
"What $8 bln CDN/yr wireless market? I live in Canada and there aren't any public wireless providers that I've heard of, though Bell/Rogers are planning to develop one. "
Lack of product != lack of market.
For example, right now there is a market for ice cream in my office, two of us would like to buy some -- but there is no company selling ice cream in my office building.[1]
They pretty much conflate the entire Internet provider market in T.O. with the wireless market -- but it's still a guesstimate.
[1] Except, of course, the leftover ice cream cake from last week's monthly birthday get-together, but that can't be touched until after 5 PM.
"And "false" information is not necessarily defamatory. Maybe if the bill said "False and defamatory" it'd stand a chance, because truth is an affirmative defense against charges of libel/slander."
It can be false and defamatory without causing harm. Currently, the burden is on the person seeking the information to demonstrate that they suffered damages as a result of the information. This bill aims to circumvent that, so that no judge or panel of judges would have to be consulted.
You can bet that the bill was intentionally worded poorly and vaguely -- it allows for:
(1) Enforcement to be wide open to interpretation, so that it can be used by those in power or running for office effectively;
(2) The court to establish the boundaries of the law after it has been passed, if it passes in current form (which, as you say, is highly unlikely).
It's a common tactic in NJ -- write a bill that overreaches in scope, hope it gets through, and then allow the courts to restrict the law. You know, see what you can get away with. Also, by overreaching they establish a 'middle ground' which is what they wanted in the first place, and get credit for compromising to reach that middle ground.
Biondi's a bit of a [insert slanderous term here], anyway --.
Of note, he sponsored a bill to extend implied consent to blood testing for illegal substances -- and allow reasonable force to get that test if the suspect was involved in an accident causing serious bodily harm.
"If Apple did try to steal their lunch, all it would succeed in doing would be to drive those companies straight into the arms of the iPod's competitors, most of whom are desperate to see any kind of an accessory market form around their players. "
I think the summary has it backwards. The accessory market won't develop unless the product has good marketshare already. If Apple drives the iPod accessory companies to make accessories for the iPod's competitors, it will in effect drive them out of business.
Look at it this way: if there was good profit to be made making accessories for other music players, there would be companies meeting that demand already.
Hmm, you should check out the East Coast (outside of NYC), the Midwest, the South... anywhere but the West coast, and you'll have a completely different set of observations.
"One of the things that amazed me when I came to the US was the zest for life of older people. Jogging along the roads, working out at the gym, hiking the trails, doing tai chi, travelling round the world, having fun eating out at restaurants, at the movies, whatever."
Apparently you didn't see the all the older people in the US languishing at home watching television making no effort to get out in public. In the US, you only see the active seniors out and about.
I'd be willing to bet that if you observed seniors in the US the same way you observed them in the UK, you have opinions of them just as bad, if not worse. Especially if you got out of the major metros in the US.
It's a game, with established rules. It's not Real Life, hell, most of them aren't even Second Life:).
Next time I sit down and play Risk, would it be OK for me to pay cash to one of the players to not attack me, or to give me some of his armies/cards? Is that cheating, or not?
Most MMORPGs are intended to have everyone on equal footing, and to let differences in how people play the game define the success of their character. Gold-buying circumvents this, to the detriment of everyone but the particular cheater... and in the long run, to the detriment of the cheater as well.
My point is that you can't expect to apply real-world economics to a game that is not intended to have them apply. When you play a game, you either play by the rules or you're a cheater.
"I think it's a far more telling stat to poll websites and see what users are connecting with and I don't mean just tech savvy sites like Slashdot."
But why would wou want your publicity numbers to show that you're still just a significant minority player? Defeats the whole purpose of marketing.
I agree, your stat is more useful to those that are already in the know about Firefox. But to the people the ads and publicity are targeted to, 150 million downloads is much more effective that 22% (if that) traffic.
Is buying gold banned in the EULA? Did you agree not to buy gold when you installed/logged on/set up a user account? If so, it's cheating.
Personally, I think people who buy gold are short-changing themselves of the full game experience. And if the game is too arduous, or too boring for them without buying gold, then they should be playing a different game, which might lead to more MMORPGs without the grind.
Gold-buying kills game economics for those who don't buy gold. It takes away any sense of achievement from the grind, making it more likely for others to buy gold.
Net net, gold-buying means that the gold-buyers are playing the wrong game, and the non-buyers are not getting what they paid for.
What metric would you prefer? Installed base? Good luck getting those numbers for Firefox, never mind the fact that Microsoft has the upper hand with IE by default.
Or perhaps the point of TFA is that Firefox shouldn't do marketing and publicity, and just let it spread by word-of-mouth. I'd be fine with that, if Firefox was pre-installed and set as default browser on every PC sold, like its major competitor.
The fact is, 150 million downloads IS a meaningful figure. It shows that Firefox is not some bit player with a likely inferior product. It shows that many, many people believe it to be a good browser -- which means that both corporate execs and Joe Sixpack are more likely to not dismiss it out of hand.
At any rate, I've seen enough product reviews written by the author to believe that he's a shill and a shameless self-promoter anyway. Because, of course, Firefox shouldn't promote itself with one of the only hard metrics available, but submitting your own 'articles' to other websites is fine.
I'm not saying that Gundeep Hora submitted this one... but if you google his name, all his 'articles' linked to in other aggregator sites like Slashdot seem to be submitted anonymously. More so than most authors.
It took me quite some time to realize it, but basically -- you're a worker. You get paid to produce something, and the manager gets paid to control what you do, and very often, how you do it.
As IT has become more of an integral part of operations for more companies, they've shifted how they handle it. No longer is it a "results-only" department with a wide margin for error, since IT has such an impact on the bottom line. The net effect is that many companies no longer accept the risk of maverick actions by their IT staff.
The owner of my company got some complaints from sales staff about their sales database being offline, because they could not effectively sell (a tech had changed the memory allocations on the server to try to speed up other software on the same server). The immediate consequence? The owner ripped into the CFO, who ripped into the IT manager, who ripped into the consaulting firm who provided the techs, who fired the tech. The long-term effect? IT is now ruled by an iron hand.
EVERY task is now reviewed by the IT manager before the ticket gets handled. The ticket is forwarded to the appropriate tech, who proposes a solution. The IT manager then reviews, signs off, and returns for execution. Anything more complicated than setting up an email address also has to be approved by the CFO.
Is it elegant and cost-effective? No.
Does it minimize the risk of catastrophic or very expensive failures? Yes.
In short, my answer to you is that you need to change roles if you want autonomy. Work for yourself, or consult for small firms through an agency or consulting firm.
If you stay in the same role, then welcome to corporate America... best of luck.
"Don't forget the insane fees paid (not salary or pay either, so they pay no income taxes)."
Not so. They aren't issued a W2, and no taxes are deducted from their payment -- but they still pay taxes on it. They are issued a 1099-MISC, and the payments is reported to the IRS as non-employee compensation. Some actors file taxes as being self-employed; they still pay income tax on it, often more than regular wage-earners pay.
The typical way that actors pay taxes on their earnings is through a corporation. If it's an S-Corp, then the corporation pays no taxes, but the owner pays income taxes on the distributions they receive, and employees of the Corp pay taxes on their salaries (like the personal assistants, etc). If it's not an S-Corp, the corporation pays taxes on their profits, and the actor also pays on their salary from the Corp, as do the employees.
At any rate, saying they don't pay taxes on their fees is misinformed at best.
Besides, do you really think the IRS ignores actors, musicians, etc? It didn't work that way for Willie Nelson and many, many others.
"Actually, the whole statement is a mess. $9 billion divided by 20 million people is $450 per person - or, 2.25% of a $20,000 annual income. Last I checked, federal taxes were a lot more than 2.25%. 20%-25% would be a more realistic figure. I think they meant to say 2 million Americans - of course, that wouldn't have made as big an impact."
Are you totally unaware of how the tax system works in the US? It's bracketed according to income levels. Also, those are net incomes, not gross incomes -- so subtract the standard deduction of $5000 for a single person, more for a head of household, plus deductions for dependents. Throw in deductions for lots of other things, and you'll find the average person with a gross income of $20,000 pays far less than 20% in tax.
I happen to think this is perfectly fine, but I just wanted to point out that a quick search online could've helped you figure out that the figure given is pretty accurate.
"...as long as the areas where cell phones are blocked are clearly marked as dead areas. It's something that you really need to know if you're on call.
Just set your cell phone to beep or vibrate when you lose coverage. Why should a theater etc be responsible for alerting you to potential problems with your personal electronics?
Slashdot Mirror
Ask your company to hire a relocation company to manage the move for you. It will save you many headaches, and is possibly cheaper than your company reimbursing you directly for moving expenses (Relo cos. get special rates on tons of stuff).
If you aren't getting reimbursed, talk to your tax accountant, or get one if you don't already have one. If you're moving more than 60 miles, the expenses are tax deductible -- but not all of them.
Depending on your salary, you may even want to hire a relo company for yourself, if the company won't pay for it.
Because it would cost additional to dev for PS2/3, it's going to lose money anyway (most likely), so why throw good money after bad?
If it's a hit, you can bet they'll do versions for the PS3 & Revolution.
Preposterous.
One of my closest childhood friends commented to me in 1999 that on a carrier (the ship, not the service provider) their web access was censored.
Furthermore, they were forbidden by their CO from watching any news other than Fox News in the mess. Apparently, due to personal preference of the CO, not because of military policy... but after checking with and other parts of his ship, they all had the same mess/recreation policy.
See, dissenting points of view could harm troop morale, and diminish their effectiveness. The military is allowed to get away with a lot of things in the name of protecting morale. You wouldn't want any doubters to risk the lives of brother soldiers/shipmen/airmen because of their conscience, would you?
The armed forces, including all the men and women in them, are responsible for the execution of war -- not the morality of war. The Congress is responsible for those decisions, so the armed forces have no reason to hear dissenting points of view. Right?
Since the Revolutionary War in the US, that has been how it has worked. Separation of Powers, Checks and Balances, and all that. As long as Congress is respnsible for the ethical decisions of war, then censoring information accessible to the troops is fine. Oh wait...
Apologies in advance for the tongue-in-cheekiness.
First, the rules are different for corporations and individuals.
Second, the rules are different for cash than for checks or wires. ANY 10k cash transaction must be reported -- anyone who gives out 10k in cash must report it to the IRS. Wires, checks, etc only need to be reported if they are unusual for the person involved.
That said, I know many people who been contacted by DHS about funds they've wired for their company to vendors in London, Paris, Madrid, and other cities overseas.
I also know people who had checks they've issued clear from their bank accounts, but not credited to the payee for up to 30 days later (this seems to happen a lot with UK payees). As far as they know, everythings fine... until a vendor is screaming that they didn't receive payment.
Anyway, if the transaction is typical, the bank doesn't need to report it unless it's cash over $10k.
"This country (the U.S.) was built around personal responsibility and freedom"
Re-read your history. You misunderstand what personal responsibility and freedom meant to the people who founded the US. I suggest you read "Washington Crossing the Delaware," Macculloch (sp?) does a great job of explaining the different interpretations of the major factions.
"The trains by me are funded by force -- the average rider pays a few dollars, and the taxpayer pays almost $10 more to cover the bureaucracy of the trains."
BS. The US subsidy of trains is far less than you think. It's a mere fraction of the per-user subsidy of the highway system. Not only that, but you have no idea of the cost of a train ride, apparently. Nor do you account for the savings in public damages such as air pollution, traffic congestion, etc.
"The government welfare programs are overbudget, so the government inflates the currency, pushing the costs onto future generations while robbing the current citizens of the value of their savings and investments.
Government welfare programs are tied to inflation. Furthermore, are you aware at all of what happened to the value of currency before the US government started managing it? Or the rampant cycle of bust and boom that destroyed far more peoples' savings than the current modest rate of inflation? You are still very misinformed on the ramifications of a non-controlled currency.
"Of cousre, we'll never know, but I see most human invention coming out of a profit motive."
This is addressed in several other comments in this thread and article, so I'll skip it.
You're right, we do tend to disagree, we have very different understandings of the roles of government and how economics works. I appreciate the books you recommend to me, although I must say that the two I've read don't hold water when compared to the body of knowledge out there.
"Asking me to pick up the tab for your toys, against my will, is really not acceptible anymore to me."
So move elsewhere. Or work to get someone else elected.
I never drive, I only use the trains. I therefore think that all funding for highways should be cut. I mean, private industry will pick up the slack, right? Anyone who drives can choose to send a few bucks to their favorite highway maintenance organization, right?
"A great majority of the citizens of the State are so far in debt that there is no likelihood of escaping it in their lifetimes, so the citizens push the debt off to the next two generations."
Personal debt has more to do with people not spending within their means, and being ecouraged to enter into bondage with the credit companies. It doesn't tie in so well with government debt, you are conflating the NASA budget with Social Security, etc.
"I don't see any public interest achievements in NASA, and I definitely don't see why NASA or the U.S. government needs to be handling any scientific research"
Then open your eyes. Or read more history of science. One of NASA's roles is to create new markets -- for example, without NASA, there wouldn't be a market for commerical satellites.
"It is time to just end the program entirely and leave it up to a competitive marketplace. There are enough billionaires with money to spend, let them finance these toys strictly for ego"
What competitive marketplace? There is no market yet. Government has always acted to open new markets, which is what NASA is all about.
"Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) is asking NASA to help fund the demonstration of a reusable space capsule the El Segundo, Calif.-based company has been developing in secret with its own funding for the past 18 months."
Their own funding? Some guy from a Tribe Called Quest told me he left his wallet in El Segundo, I think I know what happened to the cash that was in it.
Also, until we see figures on how much they've spent on development themselves, I bet it pales in comparison to what they ask for from NASA. Not that there's anything wrong with that, as long as any tech they develop enters public domain (I wish).
Sorry, I recall only a little German...
:)
He barely came up to my waist.
Seriously though, it's been 15 years or so since I studied German, so thanks for pointing it out, it looked wrong to me, but I couldn't be bothered to look up the gender.
"What $8 bln CDN /yr wireless market? I live in Canada and there aren't any public wireless providers that I've heard of, though Bell/Rogers are planning to develop one. "
Lack of product != lack of market.
For example, right now there is a market for ice cream in my office, two of us would like to buy some -- but there is no company selling ice cream in my office building.[1]
They pretty much conflate the entire Internet provider market in T.O. with the wireless market -- but it's still a guesstimate.
[1] Except, of course, the leftover ice cream cake from last week's monthly birthday get-together, but that can't be touched until after 5 PM.
"Those crazy Germans."
No, that would be "der Maus"
You crazy Americans -- Hier ist der Maus!
"And "false" information is not necessarily defamatory. Maybe if the bill said "False and defamatory" it'd stand a chance, because truth is an affirmative defense against charges of libel/slander."
.
It can be false and defamatory without causing harm. Currently, the burden is on the person seeking the information to demonstrate that they suffered damages as a result of the information. This bill aims to circumvent that, so that no judge or panel of judges would have to be consulted.
You can bet that the bill was intentionally worded poorly and vaguely -- it allows for:
(1) Enforcement to be wide open to interpretation, so that it can be used by those in power or running for office effectively;
(2) The court to establish the boundaries of the law after it has been passed, if it passes in current form (which, as you say, is highly unlikely).
It's a common tactic in NJ -- write a bill that overreaches in scope, hope it gets through, and then allow the courts to restrict the law. You know, see what you can get away with. Also, by overreaching they establish a 'middle ground' which is what they wanted in the first place, and get credit for compromising to reach that middle ground.
Biondi's a bit of a [insert slanderous term here], anyway --
Of note, he sponsored a bill to extend implied consent to blood testing for illegal substances -- and allow reasonable force to get that test if the suspect was involved in an accident causing serious bodily harm.
"If Apple did try to steal their lunch, all it would succeed in doing would be to drive those companies straight into the arms of the iPod's competitors, most of whom are desperate to see any kind of an accessory market form around their players. "
I think the summary has it backwards. The accessory market won't develop unless the product has good marketshare already. If Apple drives the iPod accessory companies to make accessories for the iPod's competitors, it will in effect drive them out of business.
Look at it this way: if there was good profit to be made making accessories for other music players, there would be companies meeting that demand already.
Hmm, you should check out the East Coast (outside of NYC), the Midwest, the South... anywhere but the West coast, and you'll have a completely different set of observations.
"One of the things that amazed me when I came to the US was the zest for life of older people. Jogging along the roads, working out at the gym, hiking the trails, doing tai chi, travelling round the world, having fun eating out at restaurants, at the movies, whatever."
Apparently you didn't see the all the older people in the US languishing at home watching television making no effort to get out in public. In the US, you only see the active seniors out and about.
I'd be willing to bet that if you observed seniors in the US the same way you observed them in the UK, you have opinions of them just as bad, if not worse. Especially if you got out of the major metros in the US.
"It's neither. It's just simple economics."
:).
It's a game, with established rules. It's not Real Life, hell, most of them aren't even Second Life
Next time I sit down and play Risk, would it be OK for me to pay cash to one of the players to not attack me, or to give me some of his armies/cards? Is that cheating, or not?
Most MMORPGs are intended to have everyone on equal footing, and to let differences in how people play the game define the success of their character. Gold-buying circumvents this, to the detriment of everyone but the particular cheater... and in the long run, to the detriment of the cheater as well.
My point is that you can't expect to apply real-world economics to a game that is not intended to have them apply. When you play a game, you either play by the rules or you're a cheater.
"I think it's a far more telling stat to poll websites and see what users are connecting with and I don't mean just tech savvy sites like Slashdot."
But why would wou want your publicity numbers to show that you're still just a significant minority player? Defeats the whole purpose of marketing.
I agree, your stat is more useful to those that are already in the know about Firefox. But to the people the ads and publicity are targeted to, 150 million downloads is much more effective that 22% (if that) traffic.
By the established rules.
Is buying gold banned in the EULA? Did you agree not to buy gold when you installed/logged on/set up a user account? If so, it's cheating.
Personally, I think people who buy gold are short-changing themselves of the full game experience. And if the game is too arduous, or too boring for them without buying gold, then they should be playing a different game, which might lead to more MMORPGs without the grind.
Gold-buying kills game economics for those who don't buy gold. It takes away any sense of achievement from the grind, making it more likely for others to buy gold.
Net net, gold-buying means that the gold-buyers are playing the wrong game, and the non-buyers are not getting what they paid for.
So, total downloads is misleading, huh?
What metric would you prefer? Installed base? Good luck getting those numbers for Firefox, never mind the fact that Microsoft has the upper hand with IE by default.
Or perhaps the point of TFA is that Firefox shouldn't do marketing and publicity, and just let it spread by word-of-mouth. I'd be fine with that, if Firefox was pre-installed and set as default browser on every PC sold, like its major competitor.
The fact is, 150 million downloads IS a meaningful figure. It shows that Firefox is not some bit player with a likely inferior product. It shows that many, many people believe it to be a good browser -- which means that both corporate execs and Joe Sixpack are more likely to not dismiss it out of hand.
At any rate, I've seen enough product reviews written by the author to believe that he's a shill and a shameless self-promoter anyway. Because, of course, Firefox shouldn't promote itself with one of the only hard metrics available, but submitting your own 'articles' to other websites is fine.
I'm not saying that Gundeep Hora submitted this one... but if you google his name, all his 'articles' linked to in other aggregator sites like Slashdot seem to be submitted anonymously. More so than most authors.
"The cynic in me doubts this is possible, but I really want to believe so."
No, the realist in you doubts that weaponless space is possible.
The cynic in you KNOWS that it is not possible.
F-in Mondays...
It took me quite some time to realize it, but basically -- you're a worker. You get paid to produce something, and the manager gets paid to control what you do, and very often, how you do it.
As IT has become more of an integral part of operations for more companies, they've shifted how they handle it. No longer is it a "results-only" department with a wide margin for error, since IT has such an impact on the bottom line. The net effect is that many companies no longer accept the risk of maverick actions by their IT staff.
The owner of my company got some complaints from sales staff about their sales database being offline, because they could not effectively sell (a tech had changed the memory allocations on the server to try to speed up other software on the same server). The immediate consequence? The owner ripped into the CFO, who ripped into the IT manager, who ripped into the consaulting firm who provided the techs, who fired the tech. The long-term effect? IT is now ruled by an iron hand.
EVERY task is now reviewed by the IT manager before the ticket gets handled. The ticket is forwarded to the appropriate tech, who proposes a solution. The IT manager then reviews, signs off, and returns for execution. Anything more complicated than setting up an email address also has to be approved by the CFO.
Is it elegant and cost-effective? No.
Does it minimize the risk of catastrophic or very expensive failures? Yes.
In short, my answer to you is that you need to change roles if you want autonomy. Work for yourself, or consult for small firms through an agency or consulting firm.
If you stay in the same role, then welcome to corporate America... best of luck.
"Don't forget the insane fees paid (not salary or pay either, so they pay no income taxes)."
Not so. They aren't issued a W2, and no taxes are deducted from their payment -- but they still pay taxes on it. They are issued a 1099-MISC, and the payments is reported to the IRS as non-employee compensation. Some actors file taxes as being self-employed; they still pay income tax on it, often more than regular wage-earners pay.
The typical way that actors pay taxes on their earnings is through a corporation. If it's an S-Corp, then the corporation pays no taxes, but the owner pays income taxes on the distributions they receive, and employees of the Corp pay taxes on their salaries (like the personal assistants, etc). If it's not an S-Corp, the corporation pays taxes on their profits, and the actor also pays on their salary from the Corp, as do the employees.
At any rate, saying they don't pay taxes on their fees is misinformed at best.
Besides, do you really think the IRS ignores actors, musicians, etc? It didn't work that way for Willie Nelson and many, many others.
"Actually, the whole statement is a mess. $9 billion divided by 20 million people is $450 per person - or, 2.25% of a $20,000 annual income. Last I checked, federal taxes were a lot more than 2.25%. 20%-25% would be a more realistic figure. I think they meant to say 2 million Americans - of course, that wouldn't have made as big an impact."
Are you totally unaware of how the tax system works in the US? It's bracketed according to income levels. Also, those are net incomes, not gross incomes -- so subtract the standard deduction of $5000 for a single person, more for a head of household, plus deductions for dependents. Throw in deductions for lots of other things, and you'll find the average person with a gross income of $20,000 pays far less than 20% in tax.
I happen to think this is perfectly fine, but I just wanted to point out that a quick search online could've helped you figure out that the figure given is pretty accurate.
Besides the fact that your comment shows that you have no understanding of what TES games are really about:
"mod me down if you want, but if i wanted to play a game like this i can go next door and play with their kids free of charge."
As opposed to paying to play with the neighbor's kids? I'd rather you didn't play with your neighbors' kids at all.
So? Where is your right to a signal written in law?
Furthermore, as I said the the GP, just set your phone to alert you when you lose signal, then you have no problems.
"...as long as the areas where cell phones are blocked are clearly marked as dead areas. It's something that you really need to know if you're on call.
Just set your cell phone to beep or vibrate when you lose coverage. Why should a theater etc be responsible for alerting you to potential problems with your personal electronics?