You will be the most important factor in getting that 6 figure salary, not the language you use.
All decent programmers should be able to break down complex problems into smaller pieces and use whatever tools are at hand to solve the problem.
It doesn't matter the tools you choose to use so long as you can adapt to the situations, learn how to use new tools, and get the job done well.
I find the many people allow recruiters and HR departments to tell them what they are worth; based on prior budget meetings, market value, and what they feel the job is worth.
A job interview is a sales presentation; you are selling yourself to them and they are selling you on their company. Plain and simple. Once they are sold on you, and you are sold on them, then its about negotiating a price that benefits both parties.
Mind you that interviewing at these companies can be quite laborious task; some interviews can be hours in front of a white board writing code in response to questions, then answering a bunch of S.T.A.R. questions, multiple rounds of interviews, etc.
By the time it is done and over with, as soon as they toss that old "market value" bit, i toss that out the window. The market isn't in this room writing code for you on the white board, answering silly college questions about algorithm run times, and self-evicting maps.
Then start negotiating, if you have the experience, you showed them you have the knowledge, you can negotiate much higher salaries.
The language is just a tool. You are what they are paying for, you have to be worth the money.
For the record, I do make almost twice the salary you were asking about as a lead java developer, i know and have used many other languages, and the post someone made about quality of life should probably trump you want for a 6 figure salary.
What good is it to make the salary you want, only to have to work 60 hour weeks and then your spouse leaves you and you paying them half your check plus child support anyways?
Even if you are surprised why is this a story? They are a business that owns a search engine, so #$@#$ what if they bias search results, what else would you expect from any business. This is just simple MS hating at its worst. I understand MS isn't the best thing out there and many, so called, geeks love their unix or linux distros but come on. Would this even be news if it weren't MS? Just stupid.
Wow they caught one guy out of thousands that do it. I doubt this will scare others into changing their ways. But it should hopefully force him to change his ways, since he got caught.
"And the reason those boxes are of such crappy quality is because the cable companies have such a tight lock. The cable companies want to keep the box cost down to maximize their own profits. If Motorola and SA could sell directly to consumers, they would suddenly have an incentive to improve the quality."
Why the above post was labeled insightful is beyond me. Digital cable services and DVRs are very popular. If the decision to get a "crappy" box was based off of profit margin you would still be able to maintain the same profit margin getting a much more expensive box, if there were one, and charging an appropriate rental fee to keep the same profit margin. The cable industry isn't worried about the sales of digital products as for the most part they sell themselves. The profit margin would still be there. The real reason we are stuck with the kinds of boxes we have currently is because we can only purchase what Motorola and SA are willing to create. The FCC integration Ban was passed in order to promote more competition within the settop box arena, so if a company like phillips or panasonic wanted to started created cable boxes they only had to make the box to take cablecards, all other specs would be up to them and voila, better set top boxes. However, no one has stepped up yet. For those who don't know MOto and SA make generic boxes that would work on either a cable provider or a satelite dish, hence the smart card slot on the front of some of the boxes. If moto and SA sold directly to you guys they would simply keep on selling the same boxes they are selling to the cable providers, the only difference is the cable providers put a cable card in it before you get it so it is ready for you, you would have to rent a cable card for that box after you purchase it from moto or SA. Wouldn't change a thing.
Obviously you have no idea how most advertising works. Almost all of those commercials, ads, and radio spots all say the same thing. They tell you the price of the service and always include the something like "not including taxes fee and other charges" somewhere. MOST companies advertise that way. When you see the commerical for the ATT 88 dollar triple play you are telling me that you think that 88 dollars is only for the service, NO, you also have to pay to rent the equipment etc.
As for your retarded gas analogy, as it is now the grade of gas you put in your care is dependent on the who made your car. So if the gas companies created this special grade of gas and also built their own special kinds of car that take the gas, no you shouldn't bitch either. Cuz guess what, someone already tells you what kind of grade of gas you are supposed to put in your car to begin with. I don't see a problem in that at all.
My problem with your point fo view is that holding on to access to VOD doesn't kill competition. It would be an incentive to rent Comcast's boxes over renting others or buying your own. So long as you have access to everything else, including the channels, guide, basic menu options, etc; you are still experiencing cable tv service. The incentive to use the Comcast equipment is to have access to on demand. Most people I talk to bitch and whine that their VOD services don't work to begin with; so on the assumption they are telling the truth they wouldn't care if they had a vendor box or a comcast box which also allows access to VOD. If your VOD works for you, then don't fuck it up by using a different vendor box. Simple!
You'd have to actually prove anti-trust suits. That is why no one has done it. Everyone saying it without actually knowing what they are saying is allowed. Take it to court, you better have all of your i's dotted and t's crossed. you wouldn't want to get counter sued.
I'd like to see one of these infamous "unlimited bandwidth" ads. Can anyone direct me to them? As for the topic; their network, live with it or don't use it. Here is a very good example. Most states use taxes and/or tolls to pay for highway building and maintenance. Let's say you have a three lane road. Then the state, using the money you paid to them, decides to limit one lane to a specific type of traffic. This works against you in two ways, one you now have one less lane to use and congestion can lead to long travel times. Two, it makes it illegal for you to get into that lane and if caught by the cops you get a ticket, a nice long wait for that ticket to be handed over to you, and then you get put back into your two legal lanes. Basically you received a RST packet with a nice price attached to it. Guess what, their highway, your money, they do what they want. Live with it or don't drive on the highway.
There are no such things are unlimited bandwidth accounts. There has not been any commercials that state unlimited bandwidth for accounts. This is made up by consumers such as yourself. The document has not recently been updated, that has been comcast policy for a long time. Before you write something, get your facts right.
I'm sorry, light pollution sounds like such a made up term. I fail to see how light pollution has any relevance to my life. Is it simply because you can't see stars at night? Tell me there is something more substantial than that. Even after reading the wikipedia article on it, I can't figure out why this phrase would interest people.
Obviously some people posting on this subject have yet to pick up a dictionary or Google the definition of monopoly. For those of you here I'll just cut and paste from Webster's:
Main Entry: monopoly Pronunciation: m&-'nä-p(&-)lE Function: noun Inflected Form(s): plural -lies Etymology: Latin monopolium, from Greek monopOlion, from mon- + pOlein to sell 1 : exclusive ownership through legal privilege, command of supply, or concerted action 2 : exclusive possession or control 3 : a commodity controlled by one party 4 : one that has a monopoly
Let us break this down some with the exception of option 4.
Option 1: Well cable companies aren't the "exclusive" owners of the right to rebroadcast signals like HBO or local stations. Most stations are rebroadcasted by both cable and satellite providers. Oops kills that notion as "exclusive" would not apply if more than one company can do it. Obviously cable companies do not have command of supply as dish network and the such would not be able to offer HBO etc etc. "Concerted Action", well this can be the tricky one. We can equate this to meaning actions taken to be in control of supply or to gain legal privilege. I can't see this one working for ya either since you'd be hard pressed to convince most of the major broadcasters not to get extra revenue from other entertainment providing companies. Not to mention that with franchising laws in place you just need to contact broadcasters, make an agreement for yourself, and get your franchise and boom you can provide service to people. How exclusive does that sound? NEXT! Option 2: aaaahhhh, there is that annoying word "exclusive" again. too bad Option 3: well here it states controlled by one party. One party, exclusive, not too far a leap here. Now that we have argued away the possibility of monopoly being used, let us go with the most often used version of this "government sanctioned" monopoly. Wow, ignorance at its best. People would not be saying this if they know how many times the government actually comes up with ways to interrupt business. For instance; the FCC, they have laws about how much certain packages can cost, where service should be provided, minimum speed to be called broadband, but did you know they have rules on hiring? Now I thought we had other government agencies that covered labor? Wonder why the FCC would have any word on labor? Think about it.
For those who lack brain power I'll work this out for you right now. A La Carte pricing is never cheaper than bundling. People are already complaining about current prices, "it is too much for just TV", "I barely watch those other channels" etc etc. Not including whatever it would cost to switch all systems over to where a la carte viewing is available, the price increase that would occur due to the broadcasters wanting to regain their loss revenue from lack of ad sales would cause most TV viewers to faint. That being said, it wouldn't take much of a lawyer to kill this suit.
If you want a la carte pricing, contact the broadcasters yourself, sign a contract to be able to receive the signal from them [shouldn't cost you too much since you aren't supplying the signal to others], purchase some kind of system that will get the signal to your home or include this cost in your contract with the broadcaster, and there you go. A la carte. Why try to use the government to force a company to give you something you want if you can go get it yourself. Hmmmmmmm, I'll leave out further comment on that question.
This is the american attitude. I don't give a fuck it doesn't make sense. Since I'm paying you for something, it should make sense to you regardless. NO! Just because you pay someone for something doesn't make it okay to think anything goes. My absolute favorite is, I pay you guys for a service, hell yeah I expect to speak to the owner of the company, I don't give a fuck that it is 3 AM in the fucking morning. People behave as if logic and customer service don't go together. Yes, that kid takes low money to do a job that isn't in agreement with his life goals. Yes, he is forced to ask you annoying questions you do not like. Yes, you can say no, buy your shit, and get the fuck out. Funny how you don't hear too many people complaining about the McDonalds "would you like to supersize" question. it is the same concept, if someone wanted supersize, they'd ask for it. However, it is good business practice to ask because you get more revenue. Rather than complain to someone who can't do shit about it, you can do as the parent entry says and complain to corporate, who will take your complaint and toss it in the trash as they make too much money of that policy, or you can shop else where.
There are many things that were thought to be common sense and were proved wrong through strictly following scientific protocols. Here is a common sense notion "Boys are more violent than girls". However you have to define what it is to be violent. A good definition of violence for young girls is social isolation not actual physical hitting. That being the case, social isolation voilence, aka violence as defined for the young girls, happens more often than boys interacting physically. Then once you get past frequency you have to account for harshness of the interaction. Was it just a soft hit or did he take a haymaker swing. Did the girl only get socially outcasted from the group of elites or from all groups. Then taking into account that "rough play" as it is called is a needed interaction for healthier young boys to properly progress. etc etc. You see how common sense really isn't something to base your research project on?
I'll believe this when I see more unbiased studies come out with the same conclusion under the same factors. For people whom don't know, just because one study's result points towards a corilation doesn't mean that to hold as truth. The study has to be replicated several times over and should be done by different scientist each time under the same conditions. If the results of each study are the same, then maybe they are on to something, otherwise as 1st post says move on nothing to see here.
As a consumer the only word you have in pricing is to pay it or not. You think all the people upset over the NFL network moving to Comcast's sports package had a say in that. HA! No wonder we are so ass backwards in this country, we have too many dipshits like yourself. You can't tell the difference between what you want and reality.
Actually the reason we would have to pay more is because the stations that had guaranteed viewers will no longer be able to project how many viewers will view their channel. Which in turn means they can't support charging as much as they do for advertising time, so they'll want to collect the revenue from the cable provider which in turn would then pass the higher charges on to the consumer. A la carte viewing is not what most people would want, they bitch and whine about today's prices, imagine easily paying 300% more for far fewer channels. People really don't think before requesting things. There is some proposal to have the customer's credited the value for the missing channels against the current price of standard service, problem being that the price for standard would sky rocket because stations like BET, MTV, etc etc would charge the cable company more as mentioned above.
Yes, who you know is important. But, if I know someone that works a cool place and a job isn't avialable, where do I look? Your friend isn't going to create a job for you, he can tell you when a job will open up. I highly doubt he can talk his upper managment into thinking a 3rd sysadmin would be needed. A lot of people get jobs because of who they know, for the rest of use who don't rub elbows with the Donald Trumps of IT, we get our jobs the old fashioned way. You either get recruited out of college, like myself, or you go through newspaper, Monster.com, and Dice like millions of others.
"That there are studies showing that education majors are, on average, the least sharp knives in the drawer (lowest average SAT/GRE scores)?"
I do not know what university you went to or where you are getting you information. The university I went to requires education majors to double major in a field they want to teach. Most math or science majors in my school were eduction majors, with some of the science majors going pre-med track. As for you study that you mention, I highly doubt they took all factors into mind. I can run a study on anything, if I don't do it right, it doesn't mean anything. For instance, that study would fail at my school because it doesn't account for the amount of course work required to double major, as compared to a student focusing on one major. Kinda makes your point melt way, like candy in the hands of a baby.
Good thing I have only used DICE. I can understand this better since it happened to Monster.com, a generic website that has jobs for the general public. If this occurred with DICE, then I'd be pissed. Dice is a website that helps techy people find techy jobs, I would hope the site is secured by techy people as well.
The list should read, math, engineering, and education majors. We do not need more scientists, we need more educators. The educators can then help educate the children that will become scientists, engineers, etc etc.
The sad truth is those cases shouldn't have even appeared before the judge in the first place. There are exactly zero, none, studies/experiments/research papers that have been able to support the theory that violent video games have an adverse affect on children. For those that will point out a random study that says otherwise, you have to understand that for a study to be viable and trustworthy, someone who is either unbiased or against the theory should be able to perfrom the same study under the same conditions and get the same results. That has yet to happen. And the crazy place that america is allows this to go on because they are not interested in the truth, but only the appearance of truth.
What about a credit card made you think of this? I'm not afraid of the atheist, I more frightened of you. Obviously you lack proper decision making skills and have lost a since of reality. You are unpreditable and probably much more dangerous than any atheist.
As for the credit card idea, hey why not. It will help raise money for some organizations that need funding and are usefull to the masses, relatively speaking. I really do not use credit cards, but if I did this one wouldn't be a bad choice.
I personally do not give a fuck if some organization wants to spend its time in a wikiwar with people whom are anal about maintaining their beloved wiki. The action goes something like this: They erase something, someone puts it back, they erase something, someone puts it back, etc etc etc. Doesn't affect me in any way.
Slashdot Mirror
You will be the most important factor in getting that 6 figure salary, not the language you use. All decent programmers should be able to break down complex problems into smaller pieces and use whatever tools are at hand to solve the problem. It doesn't matter the tools you choose to use so long as you can adapt to the situations, learn how to use new tools, and get the job done well. I find the many people allow recruiters and HR departments to tell them what they are worth; based on prior budget meetings, market value, and what they feel the job is worth. A job interview is a sales presentation; you are selling yourself to them and they are selling you on their company. Plain and simple. Once they are sold on you, and you are sold on them, then its about negotiating a price that benefits both parties. Mind you that interviewing at these companies can be quite laborious task; some interviews can be hours in front of a white board writing code in response to questions, then answering a bunch of S.T.A.R. questions, multiple rounds of interviews, etc. By the time it is done and over with, as soon as they toss that old "market value" bit, i toss that out the window. The market isn't in this room writing code for you on the white board, answering silly college questions about algorithm run times, and self-evicting maps. Then start negotiating, if you have the experience, you showed them you have the knowledge, you can negotiate much higher salaries. The language is just a tool. You are what they are paying for, you have to be worth the money. For the record, I do make almost twice the salary you were asking about as a lead java developer, i know and have used many other languages, and the post someone made about quality of life should probably trump you want for a 6 figure salary. What good is it to make the salary you want, only to have to work 60 hour weeks and then your spouse leaves you and you paying them half your check plus child support anyways?
Even if you are surprised why is this a story? They are a business that owns a search engine, so #$@#$ what if they bias search results, what else would you expect from any business. This is just simple MS hating at its worst. I understand MS isn't the best thing out there and many, so called, geeks love their unix or linux distros but come on. Would this even be news if it weren't MS? Just stupid.
anyone else thinks this may have something to do with this: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/09/08/05/1555219/XML-Library-Flaw-mdash-Sun-Apache-GNOME-Affected
Wow they caught one guy out of thousands that do it. I doubt this will scare others into changing their ways. But it should hopefully force him to change his ways, since he got caught.
"And the reason those boxes are of such crappy quality is because the cable companies have such a tight lock. The cable companies want to keep the box cost down to maximize their own profits. If Motorola and SA could sell directly to consumers, they would suddenly have an incentive to improve the quality." Why the above post was labeled insightful is beyond me. Digital cable services and DVRs are very popular. If the decision to get a "crappy" box was based off of profit margin you would still be able to maintain the same profit margin getting a much more expensive box, if there were one, and charging an appropriate rental fee to keep the same profit margin. The cable industry isn't worried about the sales of digital products as for the most part they sell themselves. The profit margin would still be there. The real reason we are stuck with the kinds of boxes we have currently is because we can only purchase what Motorola and SA are willing to create. The FCC integration Ban was passed in order to promote more competition within the settop box arena, so if a company like phillips or panasonic wanted to started created cable boxes they only had to make the box to take cablecards, all other specs would be up to them and voila, better set top boxes. However, no one has stepped up yet. For those who don't know MOto and SA make generic boxes that would work on either a cable provider or a satelite dish, hence the smart card slot on the front of some of the boxes. If moto and SA sold directly to you guys they would simply keep on selling the same boxes they are selling to the cable providers, the only difference is the cable providers put a cable card in it before you get it so it is ready for you, you would have to rent a cable card for that box after you purchase it from moto or SA. Wouldn't change a thing.
Obviously you have no idea how most advertising works. Almost all of those commercials, ads, and radio spots all say the same thing. They tell you the price of the service and always include the something like "not including taxes fee and other charges" somewhere. MOST companies advertise that way. When you see the commerical for the ATT 88 dollar triple play you are telling me that you think that 88 dollars is only for the service, NO, you also have to pay to rent the equipment etc.
As for your retarded gas analogy, as it is now the grade of gas you put in your care is dependent on the who made your car. So if the gas companies created this special grade of gas and also built their own special kinds of car that take the gas, no you shouldn't bitch either. Cuz guess what, someone already tells you what kind of grade of gas you are supposed to put in your car to begin with. I don't see a problem in that at all.
My problem with your point fo view is that holding on to access to VOD doesn't kill competition. It would be an incentive to rent Comcast's boxes over renting others or buying your own. So long as you have access to everything else, including the channels, guide, basic menu options, etc; you are still experiencing cable tv service. The incentive to use the Comcast equipment is to have access to on demand. Most people I talk to bitch and whine that their VOD services don't work to begin with; so on the assumption they are telling the truth they wouldn't care if they had a vendor box or a comcast box which also allows access to VOD. If your VOD works for you, then don't fuck it up by using a different vendor box. Simple!
Correction, you have competition. You just don't like your choices.
You'd have to actually prove anti-trust suits. That is why no one has done it. Everyone saying it without actually knowing what they are saying is allowed. Take it to court, you better have all of your i's dotted and t's crossed. you wouldn't want to get counter sued.
I'd like to see one of these infamous "unlimited bandwidth" ads. Can anyone direct me to them? As for the topic; their network, live with it or don't use it. Here is a very good example. Most states use taxes and/or tolls to pay for highway building and maintenance. Let's say you have a three lane road. Then the state, using the money you paid to them, decides to limit one lane to a specific type of traffic. This works against you in two ways, one you now have one less lane to use and congestion can lead to long travel times. Two, it makes it illegal for you to get into that lane and if caught by the cops you get a ticket, a nice long wait for that ticket to be handed over to you, and then you get put back into your two legal lanes. Basically you received a RST packet with a nice price attached to it. Guess what, their highway, your money, they do what they want. Live with it or don't drive on the highway.
There are no such things are unlimited bandwidth accounts. There has not been any commercials that state unlimited bandwidth for accounts. This is made up by consumers such as yourself. The document has not recently been updated, that has been comcast policy for a long time. Before you write something, get your facts right.
I'm sorry, light pollution sounds like such a made up term. I fail to see how light pollution has any relevance to my life. Is it simply because you can't see stars at night? Tell me there is something more substantial than that. Even after reading the wikipedia article on it, I can't figure out why this phrase would interest people.
Obviously some people posting on this subject have yet to pick up a dictionary or Google the definition of monopoly. For those of you here I'll just cut and paste from Webster's:
Main Entry: monopoly
Pronunciation: m&-'nä-p(&-)lE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -lies
Etymology: Latin monopolium, from Greek monopOlion, from mon- + pOlein to sell
1 : exclusive ownership through legal privilege, command of supply, or concerted action
2 : exclusive possession or control
3 : a commodity controlled by one party
4 : one that has a monopoly
Let us break this down some with the exception of option 4.
Option 1: Well cable companies aren't the "exclusive" owners of the right to rebroadcast signals like HBO or local stations. Most stations are rebroadcasted by both cable and satellite providers. Oops kills that notion as "exclusive" would not apply if more than one company can do it. Obviously cable companies do not have command of supply as dish network and the such would not be able to offer HBO etc etc. "Concerted Action", well this can be the tricky one. We can equate this to meaning actions taken to be in control of supply or to gain legal privilege. I can't see this one working for ya either since you'd be hard pressed to convince most of the major broadcasters not to get extra revenue from other entertainment providing companies. Not to mention that with franchising laws in place you just need to contact broadcasters, make an agreement for yourself, and get your franchise and boom you can provide service to people. How exclusive does that sound? NEXT!
Option 2: aaaahhhh, there is that annoying word "exclusive" again. too bad
Option 3: well here it states controlled by one party. One party, exclusive, not too far a leap here.
Now that we have argued away the possibility of monopoly being used, let us go with the most often used version of this "government sanctioned" monopoly. Wow, ignorance at its best. People would not be saying this if they know how many times the government actually comes up with ways to interrupt business. For instance; the FCC, they have laws about how much certain packages can cost, where service should be provided, minimum speed to be called broadband, but did you know they have rules on hiring? Now I thought we had other government agencies that covered labor? Wonder why the FCC would have any word on labor? Think about it.
For those who lack brain power I'll work this out for you right now. A La Carte pricing is never cheaper than bundling. People are already complaining about current prices, "it is too much for just TV", "I barely watch those other channels" etc etc. Not including whatever it would cost to switch all systems over to where a la carte viewing is available, the price increase that would occur due to the broadcasters wanting to regain their loss revenue from lack of ad sales would cause most TV viewers to faint. That being said, it wouldn't take much of a lawyer to kill this suit.
If you want a la carte pricing, contact the broadcasters yourself, sign a contract to be able to receive the signal from them [shouldn't cost you too much since you aren't supplying the signal to others], purchase some kind of system that will get the signal to your home or include this cost in your contract with the broadcaster, and there you go. A la carte. Why try to use the government to force a company to give you something you want if you can go get it yourself. Hmmmmmmm, I'll leave out further comment on that question.
This is the american attitude. I don't give a fuck it doesn't make sense. Since I'm paying you for something, it should make sense to you regardless. NO! Just because you pay someone for something doesn't make it okay to think anything goes. My absolute favorite is, I pay you guys for a service, hell yeah I expect to speak to the owner of the company, I don't give a fuck that it is 3 AM in the fucking morning. People behave as if logic and customer service don't go together. Yes, that kid takes low money to do a job that isn't in agreement with his life goals. Yes, he is forced to ask you annoying questions you do not like. Yes, you can say no, buy your shit, and get the fuck out. Funny how you don't hear too many people complaining about the McDonalds "would you like to supersize" question. it is the same concept, if someone wanted supersize, they'd ask for it. However, it is good business practice to ask because you get more revenue. Rather than complain to someone who can't do shit about it, you can do as the parent entry says and complain to corporate, who will take your complaint and toss it in the trash as they make too much money of that policy, or you can shop else where.
There are many things that were thought to be common sense and were proved wrong through strictly following scientific protocols. Here is a common sense notion "Boys are more violent than girls". However you have to define what it is to be violent. A good definition of violence for young girls is social isolation not actual physical hitting. That being the case, social isolation voilence, aka violence as defined for the young girls, happens more often than boys interacting physically. Then once you get past frequency you have to account for harshness of the interaction. Was it just a soft hit or did he take a haymaker swing. Did the girl only get socially outcasted from the group of elites or from all groups. Then taking into account that "rough play" as it is called is a needed interaction for healthier young boys to properly progress. etc etc. You see how common sense really isn't something to base your research project on?
I'll believe this when I see more unbiased studies come out with the same conclusion under the same factors. For people whom don't know, just because one study's result points towards a corilation doesn't mean that to hold as truth. The study has to be replicated several times over and should be done by different scientist each time under the same conditions. If the results of each study are the same, then maybe they are on to something, otherwise as 1st post says move on nothing to see here.
As a consumer the only word you have in pricing is to pay it or not. You think all the people upset over the NFL network moving to Comcast's sports package had a say in that. HA! No wonder we are so ass backwards in this country, we have too many dipshits like yourself. You can't tell the difference between what you want and reality.
Actually the reason we would have to pay more is because the stations that had guaranteed viewers will no longer be able to project how many viewers will view their channel. Which in turn means they can't support charging as much as they do for advertising time, so they'll want to collect the revenue from the cable provider which in turn would then pass the higher charges on to the consumer. A la carte viewing is not what most people would want, they bitch and whine about today's prices, imagine easily paying 300% more for far fewer channels. People really don't think before requesting things. There is some proposal to have the customer's credited the value for the missing channels against the current price of standard service, problem being that the price for standard would sky rocket because stations like BET, MTV, etc etc would charge the cable company more as mentioned above.
Yes, who you know is important. But, if I know someone that works a cool place and a job isn't avialable, where do I look? Your friend isn't going to create a job for you, he can tell you when a job will open up. I highly doubt he can talk his upper managment into thinking a 3rd sysadmin would be needed. A lot of people get jobs because of who they know, for the rest of use who don't rub elbows with the Donald Trumps of IT, we get our jobs the old fashioned way. You either get recruited out of college, like myself, or you go through newspaper, Monster.com, and Dice like millions of others.
"That there are studies showing that education majors are, on average, the least sharp knives in the drawer (lowest average SAT/GRE scores)?" I do not know what university you went to or where you are getting you information. The university I went to requires education majors to double major in a field they want to teach. Most math or science majors in my school were eduction majors, with some of the science majors going pre-med track. As for you study that you mention, I highly doubt they took all factors into mind. I can run a study on anything, if I don't do it right, it doesn't mean anything. For instance, that study would fail at my school because it doesn't account for the amount of course work required to double major, as compared to a student focusing on one major. Kinda makes your point melt way, like candy in the hands of a baby.
Good thing I have only used DICE. I can understand this better since it happened to Monster.com, a generic website that has jobs for the general public. If this occurred with DICE, then I'd be pissed. Dice is a website that helps techy people find techy jobs, I would hope the site is secured by techy people as well.
The list should read, math, engineering, and education majors. We do not need more scientists, we need more educators. The educators can then help educate the children that will become scientists, engineers, etc etc.
The sad truth is those cases shouldn't have even appeared before the judge in the first place. There are exactly zero, none, studies/experiments/research papers that have been able to support the theory that violent video games have an adverse affect on children. For those that will point out a random study that says otherwise, you have to understand that for a study to be viable and trustworthy, someone who is either unbiased or against the theory should be able to perfrom the same study under the same conditions and get the same results. That has yet to happen. And the crazy place that america is allows this to go on because they are not interested in the truth, but only the appearance of truth.
What about a credit card made you think of this? I'm not afraid of the atheist, I more frightened of you. Obviously you lack proper decision making skills and have lost a since of reality. You are unpreditable and probably much more dangerous than any atheist. As for the credit card idea, hey why not. It will help raise money for some organizations that need funding and are usefull to the masses, relatively speaking. I really do not use credit cards, but if I did this one wouldn't be a bad choice.
I personally do not give a fuck if some organization wants to spend its time in a wikiwar with people whom are anal about maintaining their beloved wiki. The action goes something like this: They erase something, someone puts it back, they erase something, someone puts it back, etc etc etc. Doesn't affect me in any way.