Fair points.. I don't necessarily think that learning how to set up a business is that much of a trick though (done it twice myself).. The trick is getting it right, and I've seen so many that've tried and gone bust. It's a gamble.. You need the ideas and the knowledge behind the business to make it go.. Yep, you can get out and gain a bit of knowledge, but you just sacrifice a fallback.. Maybe it's just me, but I like having things to fall back on when I take risks..
Not entirely sure what you mean by advanced degrees (those postgrad, or doctoral?).. Both my undergrad ones had years in industry, but they were overseen by Uni staff, and there was still some study to be done..
I'd also disagree with your call on the choices working in practice and theory.. Your way worked in practice; the optimal way also worked for countless others in practice too.. So both seem to work in practice.. But you did mention optimal, so you way works in practice, but isn't optimal.. Again, no big issue on that as they both worked.. Did you find it harder than people who went straight through?
Can't comment too much on shopping around and completion times in the US.. I'm using my experiences in the UK as the guide for the difficulties that can be experienced.. Are there maximum completion times on US courses, or could you effectively stay on the same course indefinitely until you finally complete? I was led to believe that it was an international standard, but I could easily be wrong on that count, as I've never had to investigate it..
Definitely an interesting point about the not-so-high achievers bowing out to go for business.. Hadn't actually taken that into consideration, and can see that'd be a great strategy.. Consider me duly enlightened on that point well made!
Actually, on my second degree I had to drop out just before the final for a year (brother had a nasty car crash leaving him on life support in my last term).
Uni said come back next year, same time.. So I did.. Whereupon they said they'd changed the syllabus sufficiently that I needed to complete the coursework that had been done by everyone else across the year.
Hardest couple of months I've ever worked, I think.. Took me a lot of fighting to even get the chance to do that (and then only barely got them to agree, and this was pulling an awful lot of strings); they were trying to get me to retake the year, as they didn't think the workload was possible.
Thankfully, it was, it just wasn't easy by a long shot.
Yes, many of them are interested in you going back, and going in from scratch on their "new" syllabus.
So, retake the first couple of years, then do the new couple of years..
They're not there to make life easy on you; they're there to make money and follow a syllabus.
What about the plan of "4 years in uni, two of which were working on the idea in parallel".
Get the idea running, gauge interest, and set the groundwork. If it takes over to the point that you don't have time for Uni, then by all means.. Run with it..
Dropping out of Uni to take the whole gamble with no idea is a huge risk.
One of the reasons startups fail is lack of funds.. If you were serious, chances are you're broke at the end of it.. Good luck paying for your fees and living expenses at the end (this is after running a couple of companies; first was an expensive learning experience, the second worked well. First one I set up while still at Uni, so was in work before I even graduated).
There aren't that many mature students..
What tends to happen is that when you first get to uni, you're used to living on not a lot. You start at Uni, and live frugally, with a pretty good lifestyle..
Then when you graduate, you live "real life" and get all kinds of comforts, house, car, things to do and contractual obligations.. All of which come about by advancing in your roles and getting better jobs backed up by your qualification.
When you jump out of Uni (in the UK, we have gap years in many degrees to work in Industry and get acclimatised before the final year, which could count as a 'stop out' year of sorts, but it's built into the schedule) to start your own business, you put endless time into it, sink money into it and gamble..
It takes two years at least to really see if a business has legs or not.. 3 to 5 to see if it'll succeed and be properly stable.
If it works out, great.. You've got a job.. Just hope it's not wiped out by changing markets and you were a one trick pony, otherwise you'll be back in competition for jobs with people with as much experience AND the paperwork.
If you try and head back to Uni, you need the income to cope with your contractual obligations, plus the fees for the Uni course, and you'll probably have to start from scratch (most courses have a maximum completion time). That's another 3-4 years out of your life, while everyone else is running ahead, advancing.
When you graduate, your last active commercial skill is about 4 years old.. Which is a problem.
Not to say it doesn't happen, but it's a hell of a lot harder.. The risks are greater, and you really do have to see your peers racing ahead of you, if you can even afford to go back.
You just seem to believe it's as easy as wanting to go back, thus it must be easy to do because you want it to be.. Alas, that really isn't the truth. As long as someone accepts that, calculates the risk and chooses it, no problem.. They may make it big.. But they may screw themselves over big time..
Me.. I started my ideas while at Uni, so when I graduated, I had a few interesting things on the go AND the paperwork.. That's a far more reliable solution, just requires a lot of work to do..
Common sense says, if you have 2 candidates for a job, both with experience, and both pretty much fitting the bill, you choose the one that chose to stick with the degree rather than the one that dropped out to get experience.
Yes, there are some individuals who don't need the degree, and will barge their way through life anyway.. But for each of those, there are an awful lot who just don't make it..
These days, when there is so much talent to choose from, it's not a case of 'either or', it's a case that you can require both the degree AND the experience.
Depends on the information.
If it's information that could lead to the damaging of international reputation, then sure. That can lead to conflicts that wouldn't otherwise happen, and that can lead to deaths of tens of thousands (or if it escalates, vastly more).
All acts of war and terror and conflict require information; diplomacy is playing brinksmanship with big stakes. Throwing information out there with complete abandon is a very, very dangerous and destabilising thing.
That aside, Wikileaks doesn't necessarily release with complete abandon; they have made some attempts at sensible censoring, but by and large, seeing what they choose to release, and about who, it certainly shows they have an agenda. And that's the part I really don't trust.
If it's being an anxious person that makes me good at my role in IT (disaster recovery/business continuity), or whether doing that job simply makes me more so, as I constantly have to anticipate the worst..
Either way, yes, I'm an anxious person (and prone to mild depressions), but hey, there are ways of dealing with it.
In winter times, a SAD light really helps give a boost.. Every few weeks, I hit a health spa, and get a good massage.
I work out at the gym, which gives a good energy rush and helps me feel better.. I dive.. Hanging around the 30m mark doesn't give your body any choice but to relax (the joys of nitrogen)..
I keep a fairly busy social life, which doesn't let me dwell (there's nothing like people to keep you distracted!).. And being able to cook pretty well helps with that (and is a great distraction itself)..
When you're at work, let the focus (and anxiety) creep up; it gives you an edge..
When you're away from work.. Keep yourself busy and distracted..
In general, that works for me.. And as a side effect, it keeps me pretty healthy and well fed too!
As a cyclist, pedestrian, runner, and car user, I can attest to the problems caused by pedestrians not bothering to look at traffic and blithely stepping into the road, and a host of cyclist who will happily cut up drivers, cycle from one pavement to the other causing cars to have to emergency stop, jump red lights and a host of other things. I've even had cyclists swerve between cars, not looking, and collide with me on my own bike! Oh, and a couple of the guys I dive with and regularly hang out with are wheelchair users (they think people who advocate CCTV on the grounds you've just stated are completely oblivious to the real world and don't really think about solving problems or present real solutions). CCTV doesn't really fix things. Having a presence on the street is a far more effective ploy.
Ok, so I'd assume not being a UK citizen, you've not read the news on the minimum 25% cuts across the Department of Defence, with areas being hit with up to 40% reductions. That's pretty old news here. I think that's been out there for the last two months at least. So, before ranting about hypocrisy and making people sick, read the news of the country you're spitting vitriol over (the NHS is ringfenced from spending cuts, though a reorganisation has slashed the bureaucratic segment, removing one layer entirely, the military and general public service sector is being slashed by 25%).
Imagine if the UK National Health System decided that doctors aren't being paid enough so they're going to start charging a fee to get priority service? As long as they're accepting government paychecks, they have to do what their supervisors tell them to.
You mean the way that consultants in the NHS have their own private practice, where they take paying customers who don't want to wait on the NHS list? Or the fact that they take on patients from Private practice where private doesn't have the infrastructure or skill to do the work themselves, so they pay the NHS to do the hard part?
The Thatcher government was voted in after the Winter of Discontent, where there was no money left in the coffers; the country had effectively shut down. The plan was to cut the fat, streamline the economy, kick start industry to give a stable base to grow from. When you have a strong economy, you can afford blue sky science. When you can't pay to keep the streets clean, the dead buried and disease at bay, investing in something that may, or may not, give you extra comfort 30 years down the line is a bit of a waste of money. And when the economy became vibrant, and the long term investments were starting to be embarked on, there was a huge shift in government (mid right to quite strongly left), and social policy became more important than long term investment. Lots of the UK infrastructure got sold off at bargain basement prices simply to keep the populace smiling and thinking that everything was a bed of roses under the government of the day. So, now, once again, we have no money (thanks to the global financial crisis) and no reserves (thanks Gordon Brown), so someone has to make really hard decisions on what will put the country on a track to long term stability rather than making things feel easier on the average person and leave a ruin for the next people in government. So far, I'm finding the coalition quite interesting. Not as harsh as a full on Conservative government would be, yet not as soft as a Lib Dem Government would be. They each temper the more excessive directions the other would take with an unchallenged majority. Yes, we're probably missing a trick or two that would let us be that little more agile and effective, but also we're probably missing a mistake or two that could lead to catastrophe.. No, I'm not unaffected by all this, but I can make out a rational plan that's hailed as a beginning of recovery, not the end of it.. And that honesty, I'm finding refreshing..
Interesting, advocating cuts to health... This is an area that's been receiving quite a few cuts in recent years (though they've quietly slipped in unanounced; they're called "efficiency savings", where a department automatically gains 3% less than in a previous year, as they're supposed to increase in efficiency year on year). The alterations to the NHS (removing the entire Primary Care Trust layer) is a massive cut from the budget, and handing the reins of fiscal responsibility to GPs is going to be interesting. It'll save money, no doubt about it; a cut by restructuring. And cut more? Well, that'll probably mean that some hospitals are shut down to save money. Nice on paper, having things consolidated in a few hospitals. Not so nice when you have to travel 30 or 40 miles (or more) to get to a hospital. Can't get around? Oh, shame that. Lose someone because they couldn't get to an Emergency Department quickly enough due to cost cuts? Shame that. I'm sure you'll still find the cuts worth it if that happens. Keeping health going is a pretty smart move. When hard times strike, people tend to fall ill more (Stress factors, poorer diet, so on, so forth), so it's expected that greater demand will be placed on the service. Besides, it's an easy call to say "Just cut this", and think you're smart. Follow the lines of money and production; look at all the dependant industry that latches into this too, what relies on it. Is the revenue from associated industry sufficient to help subsidise the main industry? There are a huge amount of factors in play, and it's a delicate web. Even the people with as many facts in their possession as possible quietly admit that it's really a calculated gamble without simple and easy answers.
Given 50 years or so, maybe. The USA was built in this fashion; it lifted designs, works and all kinds of "Intellectual Property" from Europe, and used it as it wished. Unsurprisingly, unencumbered by restrictive laws, it grew fast in the intellectual works arena, at which point people (the ones who'd made a profit this way) wanted to keep things as they were, and so lobbied for ever more restrictive legislation to ensure nobody could get a slice of their pie. And now, another country starts doing exactly this, and unsurprisingly, starts racing onwards, catching up fast. The difference in this is that with China, the State rules all. There aren't these pesky wildcard businessmen who can lobby all the time. Yes, there's corruption, but if it's uncovered and exposed to sight, the reprisals are nothing other than draconian. The State can, and will, modify its IP laws to best support the growth of the country, rather than the growth of an individual company; that's where it could very easily steal a march on the west.
Because I used to have my email address in the public domain in the pre-spam days of the Internet. Once spam came about, that address got completely swamped to the point of being unusable. I don't mind random people having my email address, if they just want to send me questions, or have a decent chat.. I do object to having it harvested by spammers and used to deluge me with random irritations. If I found that appearing on a CCTV camera caused me to have a deluge of spam mails through my letterbox, you can bet that I'd be up in arms about their misuse, and start to disguise/obfuscate my appearance in public.. When it's analogous to simply having a pair of eyes watching the crowd, as you could have anyone just sitting, watching the crowd go by and reporting to the Police if they saw anything worth reporting, I've no problem. If they abuse it, expect me to raise a complaint.
Which proves my point exactly. How many veteran snipers are there that can't conceal their location effectively? Hunting/Sniping are exactly the same skill.. Just a slightly different target. Now if you'd managed to come up with an example that said "actually, they were sewing geeks in their childhood, and never spent a day outside a candle lit basement", then we may have a debate to engage in.
In a war, the best person to stick in position as a sniper is the guy who's spend the last ten years or more practicing to handle a sniper rifle, and getting experience. The best guy to lead the troops into battle as a general is one who's come through times as an officer, and knows what the troops can, and will likely do in a given situation. There are military who never see the front line because they spend their time working on tuning the efficiency of logistics to ensure the front line troops get their supplies in the most efficient manner. What this reeks of is taking a front line trooper, who is excellent at combat most likely, and saying that they're best placed to direct the logistics teams, without understanding the math, or having the years of experience in that field, just because they've been in a fight. If you want to really trust your cyber warfare team, then have them led by the best hackers you know of. They understand the insidiousness of the attacks, and to them, fending off an attack (or leading one) is instinct, far more than it ever will be to a front liner. There are commanders of air, sea and land for very good reasons.. The style of combat is different.. New rules apply to digital warfare.. European fighters found to their cost a few hundred years ago that not adopting new methods of war was costly.. The British Empire insisted on keeping its rules as they always were, and putting their veteran commanders into the new situations, expecting them to 'just make it happen'.. However, they were ill suited to the new methods and ways, and consistently outmanoeuvered..
Working in the NHS, and keeping my eyes on the agreement quite strongly, I can assure you that MS aren't working that way. Besides, that'd only open the floodgates for everyone to do that, and then they'd end up providing a product for free to their largest purchasers.
This seems to come hot on the heels of the end of the Microsoft licensing deal with the NHS.
One of the side effects of the "Age of Austerity" is that the Government really doesn't have the money to throw around anymore. Real savings are having to be made in the Public Sector.
A simple choice is: Do we really get sufficient added value from having all the pretty functionality from the Microsoft Office suite, or do we really just need the basics (i.e. from Open Office, which is being used in Bristol City Council to a large extent) to create documents which can be stored. They may not look quite as slick, but they do the job nicely at a fraction of the cost (including support).
As Open alternatives start to be used, companies are increasingly finding that the myth of "there are no readily available skillsets in them, unlike Microsoft applications" really is a myth, and that there are a good many highly skilled people available at prices largely in line with the Microsoft setup, but often with a broader skillset behind that. It just seems to be that this is filtering into the view of Government now..
I'll be watching this one with interest; when used correctly, Open Source can be a huge cost saver. It's not the panacea for all ills, but when used as the right tool for the right job, everything works far better.
It's not turning the $300 console into a $20 relic. It's turning the $300 console into the $300 console plus the $20 relic (net gain of $20 of value, plus the value of the legacy games, and the enjoyment of being able to play good old gameplay games if you so choose as well as all the new flashy games).
That, in a nutshell, is the crux of the matter. However, this is always pitted against glossy advertising and people who don't actually understand what they're hiring for (and don't have the mental leanings to find out). It's far easier for HR departments to disengage the brain and pluck words from a glossy brochure than it is to actually discover what'll be best for long term growth.
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Fair points.. I don't necessarily think that learning how to set up a business is that much of a trick though (done it twice myself).. The trick is getting it right, and I've seen so many that've tried and gone bust. It's a gamble.. You need the ideas and the knowledge behind the business to make it go.. Yep, you can get out and gain a bit of knowledge, but you just sacrifice a fallback.. Maybe it's just me, but I like having things to fall back on when I take risks.. Not entirely sure what you mean by advanced degrees (those postgrad, or doctoral?).. Both my undergrad ones had years in industry, but they were overseen by Uni staff, and there was still some study to be done.. I'd also disagree with your call on the choices working in practice and theory.. Your way worked in practice; the optimal way also worked for countless others in practice too.. So both seem to work in practice.. But you did mention optimal, so you way works in practice, but isn't optimal.. Again, no big issue on that as they both worked.. Did you find it harder than people who went straight through? Can't comment too much on shopping around and completion times in the US.. I'm using my experiences in the UK as the guide for the difficulties that can be experienced.. Are there maximum completion times on US courses, or could you effectively stay on the same course indefinitely until you finally complete? I was led to believe that it was an international standard, but I could easily be wrong on that count, as I've never had to investigate it.. Definitely an interesting point about the not-so-high achievers bowing out to go for business.. Hadn't actually taken that into consideration, and can see that'd be a great strategy.. Consider me duly enlightened on that point well made!
Actually, on my second degree I had to drop out just before the final for a year (brother had a nasty car crash leaving him on life support in my last term). Uni said come back next year, same time.. So I did.. Whereupon they said they'd changed the syllabus sufficiently that I needed to complete the coursework that had been done by everyone else across the year. Hardest couple of months I've ever worked, I think.. Took me a lot of fighting to even get the chance to do that (and then only barely got them to agree, and this was pulling an awful lot of strings); they were trying to get me to retake the year, as they didn't think the workload was possible. Thankfully, it was, it just wasn't easy by a long shot.
Yes, many of them are interested in you going back, and going in from scratch on their "new" syllabus. So, retake the first couple of years, then do the new couple of years.. They're not there to make life easy on you; they're there to make money and follow a syllabus.
What about the plan of "4 years in uni, two of which were working on the idea in parallel". Get the idea running, gauge interest, and set the groundwork. If it takes over to the point that you don't have time for Uni, then by all means.. Run with it.. Dropping out of Uni to take the whole gamble with no idea is a huge risk. One of the reasons startups fail is lack of funds.. If you were serious, chances are you're broke at the end of it.. Good luck paying for your fees and living expenses at the end (this is after running a couple of companies; first was an expensive learning experience, the second worked well. First one I set up while still at Uni, so was in work before I even graduated).
There aren't that many mature students.. What tends to happen is that when you first get to uni, you're used to living on not a lot. You start at Uni, and live frugally, with a pretty good lifestyle.. Then when you graduate, you live "real life" and get all kinds of comforts, house, car, things to do and contractual obligations.. All of which come about by advancing in your roles and getting better jobs backed up by your qualification. When you jump out of Uni (in the UK, we have gap years in many degrees to work in Industry and get acclimatised before the final year, which could count as a 'stop out' year of sorts, but it's built into the schedule) to start your own business, you put endless time into it, sink money into it and gamble.. It takes two years at least to really see if a business has legs or not.. 3 to 5 to see if it'll succeed and be properly stable. If it works out, great.. You've got a job.. Just hope it's not wiped out by changing markets and you were a one trick pony, otherwise you'll be back in competition for jobs with people with as much experience AND the paperwork. If you try and head back to Uni, you need the income to cope with your contractual obligations, plus the fees for the Uni course, and you'll probably have to start from scratch (most courses have a maximum completion time). That's another 3-4 years out of your life, while everyone else is running ahead, advancing. When you graduate, your last active commercial skill is about 4 years old.. Which is a problem. Not to say it doesn't happen, but it's a hell of a lot harder.. The risks are greater, and you really do have to see your peers racing ahead of you, if you can even afford to go back. You just seem to believe it's as easy as wanting to go back, thus it must be easy to do because you want it to be.. Alas, that really isn't the truth. As long as someone accepts that, calculates the risk and chooses it, no problem.. They may make it big.. But they may screw themselves over big time.. Me.. I started my ideas while at Uni, so when I graduated, I had a few interesting things on the go AND the paperwork.. That's a far more reliable solution, just requires a lot of work to do..
Common sense says, if you have 2 candidates for a job, both with experience, and both pretty much fitting the bill, you choose the one that chose to stick with the degree rather than the one that dropped out to get experience. Yes, there are some individuals who don't need the degree, and will barge their way through life anyway.. But for each of those, there are an awful lot who just don't make it.. These days, when there is so much talent to choose from, it's not a case of 'either or', it's a case that you can require both the degree AND the experience.
Oh, I so wish I knew who you were, so I could buy you a beer! :) That made me chuckle.. :)
Depends on the information. If it's information that could lead to the damaging of international reputation, then sure. That can lead to conflicts that wouldn't otherwise happen, and that can lead to deaths of tens of thousands (or if it escalates, vastly more). All acts of war and terror and conflict require information; diplomacy is playing brinksmanship with big stakes. Throwing information out there with complete abandon is a very, very dangerous and destabilising thing. That aside, Wikileaks doesn't necessarily release with complete abandon; they have made some attempts at sensible censoring, but by and large, seeing what they choose to release, and about who, it certainly shows they have an agenda. And that's the part I really don't trust.
If it's being an anxious person that makes me good at my role in IT (disaster recovery/business continuity), or whether doing that job simply makes me more so, as I constantly have to anticipate the worst.. Either way, yes, I'm an anxious person (and prone to mild depressions), but hey, there are ways of dealing with it. In winter times, a SAD light really helps give a boost.. Every few weeks, I hit a health spa, and get a good massage. I work out at the gym, which gives a good energy rush and helps me feel better.. I dive.. Hanging around the 30m mark doesn't give your body any choice but to relax (the joys of nitrogen).. I keep a fairly busy social life, which doesn't let me dwell (there's nothing like people to keep you distracted!).. And being able to cook pretty well helps with that (and is a great distraction itself).. When you're at work, let the focus (and anxiety) creep up; it gives you an edge.. When you're away from work.. Keep yourself busy and distracted.. In general, that works for me.. And as a side effect, it keeps me pretty healthy and well fed too!
As a cyclist, pedestrian, runner, and car user, I can attest to the problems caused by pedestrians not bothering to look at traffic and blithely stepping into the road, and a host of cyclist who will happily cut up drivers, cycle from one pavement to the other causing cars to have to emergency stop, jump red lights and a host of other things. I've even had cyclists swerve between cars, not looking, and collide with me on my own bike! Oh, and a couple of the guys I dive with and regularly hang out with are wheelchair users (they think people who advocate CCTV on the grounds you've just stated are completely oblivious to the real world and don't really think about solving problems or present real solutions).
CCTV doesn't really fix things. Having a presence on the street is a far more effective ploy.
Ok, so I'd assume not being a UK citizen, you've not read the news on the minimum 25% cuts across the Department of Defence, with areas being hit with up to 40% reductions. That's pretty old news here. I think that's been out there for the last two months at least.
So, before ranting about hypocrisy and making people sick, read the news of the country you're spitting vitriol over (the NHS is ringfenced from spending cuts, though a reorganisation has slashed the bureaucratic segment, removing one layer entirely, the military and general public service sector is being slashed by 25%).
You mean the way that consultants in the NHS have their own private practice, where they take paying customers who don't want to wait on the NHS list? Or the fact that they take on patients from Private practice where private doesn't have the infrastructure or skill to do the work themselves, so they pay the NHS to do the hard part?
The Thatcher government was voted in after the Winter of Discontent, where there was no money left in the coffers; the country had effectively shut down.
The plan was to cut the fat, streamline the economy, kick start industry to give a stable base to grow from. When you have a strong economy, you can afford blue sky science. When you can't pay to keep the streets clean, the dead buried and disease at bay, investing in something that may, or may not, give you extra comfort 30 years down the line is a bit of a waste of money. And when the economy became vibrant, and the long term investments were starting to be embarked on, there was a huge shift in government (mid right to quite strongly left), and social policy became more important than long term investment. Lots of the UK infrastructure got sold off at bargain basement prices simply to keep the populace smiling and thinking that everything was a bed of roses under the government of the day.
So, now, once again, we have no money (thanks to the global financial crisis) and no reserves (thanks Gordon Brown), so someone has to make really hard decisions on what will put the country on a track to long term stability rather than making things feel easier on the average person and leave a ruin for the next people in government. So far, I'm finding the coalition quite interesting. Not as harsh as a full on Conservative government would be, yet not as soft as a Lib Dem Government would be. They each temper the more excessive directions the other would take with an unchallenged majority.
Yes, we're probably missing a trick or two that would let us be that little more agile and effective, but also we're probably missing a mistake or two that could lead to catastrophe..
No, I'm not unaffected by all this, but I can make out a rational plan that's hailed as a beginning of recovery, not the end of it.. And that honesty, I'm finding refreshing..
Interesting, advocating cuts to health... This is an area that's been receiving quite a few cuts in recent years (though they've quietly slipped in unanounced; they're called "efficiency savings", where a department automatically gains 3% less than in a previous year, as they're supposed to increase in efficiency year on year).
The alterations to the NHS (removing the entire Primary Care Trust layer) is a massive cut from the budget, and handing the reins of fiscal responsibility to GPs is going to be interesting. It'll save money, no doubt about it; a cut by restructuring.
And cut more? Well, that'll probably mean that some hospitals are shut down to save money. Nice on paper, having things consolidated in a few hospitals. Not so nice when you have to travel 30 or 40 miles (or more) to get to a hospital. Can't get around? Oh, shame that. Lose someone because they couldn't get to an Emergency Department quickly enough due to cost cuts? Shame that. I'm sure you'll still find the cuts worth it if that happens.
Keeping health going is a pretty smart move. When hard times strike, people tend to fall ill more (Stress factors, poorer diet, so on, so forth), so it's expected that greater demand will be placed on the service.
Besides, it's an easy call to say "Just cut this", and think you're smart. Follow the lines of money and production; look at all the dependant industry that latches into this too, what relies on it. Is the revenue from associated industry sufficient to help subsidise the main industry?
There are a huge amount of factors in play, and it's a delicate web. Even the people with as many facts in their possession as possible quietly admit that it's really a calculated gamble without simple and easy answers.
Given 50 years or so, maybe.
The USA was built in this fashion; it lifted designs, works and all kinds of "Intellectual Property" from Europe, and used it as it wished. Unsurprisingly, unencumbered by restrictive laws, it grew fast in the intellectual works arena, at which point people (the ones who'd made a profit this way) wanted to keep things as they were, and so lobbied for ever more restrictive legislation to ensure nobody could get a slice of their pie.
And now, another country starts doing exactly this, and unsurprisingly, starts racing onwards, catching up fast.
The difference in this is that with China, the State rules all. There aren't these pesky wildcard businessmen who can lobby all the time. Yes, there's corruption, but if it's uncovered and exposed to sight, the reprisals are nothing other than draconian.
The State can, and will, modify its IP laws to best support the growth of the country, rather than the growth of an individual company; that's where it could very easily steal a march on the west.
Because I used to have my email address in the public domain in the pre-spam days of the Internet. Once spam came about, that address got completely swamped to the point of being unusable.
I don't mind random people having my email address, if they just want to send me questions, or have a decent chat.. I do object to having it harvested by spammers and used to deluge me with random irritations.
If I found that appearing on a CCTV camera caused me to have a deluge of spam mails through my letterbox, you can bet that I'd be up in arms about their misuse, and start to disguise/obfuscate my appearance in public.. When it's analogous to simply having a pair of eyes watching the crowd, as you could have anyone just sitting, watching the crowd go by and reporting to the Police if they saw anything worth reporting, I've no problem. If they abuse it, expect me to raise a complaint.
The truly scummy ones win my vote for Crowbar..
Which proves my point exactly. How many veteran snipers are there that can't conceal their location effectively? Hunting/Sniping are exactly the same skill.. Just a slightly different target.
Now if you'd managed to come up with an example that said "actually, they were sewing geeks in their childhood, and never spent a day outside a candle lit basement", then we may have a debate to engage in.
That seems far more fair than the cloak and dagger technicalities employed by the UK (where I live) and the US..
In a war, the best person to stick in position as a sniper is the guy who's spend the last ten years or more practicing to handle a sniper rifle, and getting experience.
The best guy to lead the troops into battle as a general is one who's come through times as an officer, and knows what the troops can, and will likely do in a given situation.
There are military who never see the front line because they spend their time working on tuning the efficiency of logistics to ensure the front line troops get their supplies in the most efficient manner.
What this reeks of is taking a front line trooper, who is excellent at combat most likely, and saying that they're best placed to direct the logistics teams, without understanding the math, or having the years of experience in that field, just because they've been in a fight.
If you want to really trust your cyber warfare team, then have them led by the best hackers you know of. They understand the insidiousness of the attacks, and to them, fending off an attack (or leading one) is instinct, far more than it ever will be to a front liner.
There are commanders of air, sea and land for very good reasons.. The style of combat is different.. New rules apply to digital warfare..
European fighters found to their cost a few hundred years ago that not adopting new methods of war was costly.. The British Empire insisted on keeping its rules as they always were, and putting their veteran commanders into the new situations, expecting them to 'just make it happen'.. However, they were ill suited to the new methods and ways, and consistently outmanoeuvered..
Working in the NHS, and keeping my eyes on the agreement quite strongly, I can assure you that MS aren't working that way. Besides, that'd only open the floodgates for everyone to do that, and then they'd end up providing a product for free to their largest purchasers.
This seems to come hot on the heels of the end of the Microsoft licensing deal with the NHS.
One of the side effects of the "Age of Austerity" is that the Government really doesn't have the money to throw around anymore. Real savings are having to be made in the Public Sector.
A simple choice is: Do we really get sufficient added value from having all the pretty functionality from the Microsoft Office suite, or do we really just need the basics (i.e. from Open Office, which is being used in Bristol City Council to a large extent) to create documents which can be stored. They may not look quite as slick, but they do the job nicely at a fraction of the cost (including support).
As Open alternatives start to be used, companies are increasingly finding that the myth of "there are no readily available skillsets in them, unlike Microsoft applications" really is a myth, and that there are a good many highly skilled people available at prices largely in line with the Microsoft setup, but often with a broader skillset behind that. It just seems to be that this is filtering into the view of Government now..
I'll be watching this one with interest; when used correctly, Open Source can be a huge cost saver. It's not the panacea for all ills, but when used as the right tool for the right job, everything works far better.
It's not turning the $300 console into a $20 relic. It's turning the $300 console into the $300 console plus the $20 relic (net gain of $20 of value, plus the value of the legacy games, and the enjoyment of being able to play good old gameplay games if you so choose as well as all the new flashy games).
I only enjoy reading about bad things happening to people who immerse themselves in schadenfreude.
That, in a nutshell, is the crux of the matter. However, this is always pitted against glossy advertising and people who don't actually understand what they're hiring for (and don't have the mental leanings to find out).
It's far easier for HR departments to disengage the brain and pluck words from a glossy brochure than it is to actually discover what'll be best for long term growth.