ING does it. It's quite easy. You need your friend's account number and routing number, and you can send money to their account anytime you want. I just set it up with my dad the other night so I could make payments to him once a month. It's quite simple.
Yeah, state farm as it too. I use it to pay my Au Pair. I do not consider the process to be simple, but for now, it's the best we've got.
In order to use it, you need to know the recipient's routing number and account number. Who knows this about their friends? Also, in the US, this information is not safe to divulge to untrustworthy parties. That same information can be used to initiate an ACH debit against your account.
The rest of the world is way more advanced than we are in this regard.
In every country I've lived in (Australia, the UK, Germany) bank transfers are completely free and easy to do over online banking. If I book holidays with my friends and we don't settle who owes what to who in cash during the trip we can simply transfer the difference over to them once back home.
I know it's hard to believe, but we don't really have that here in the US. Some banks offer a similar service, but it's difficult to use. It sucks, but it's how it is right now.
There are some services popping up that are going to get us pretty close to where we should be (popmoney, this visa thingy from the article, etc.) But these are really in their infancy. Paper checks (yes, paper checks) are still king over here. Drives me nuts, but it's true.
But why? Paper checks cost the banks money to process and the banks can't wait to get rid of them (and cut down on personal...). Well, couldn't wait to get rid of them of them, they are practically non-existing and only used when doing business with US partners.
Legacy. Inertia.
People here expect checks to be free, so they are. Even though they cost the bank much more money to deal with.
To give you an idea of how ridiculous it is, one of my banks, Bank of America, gives me free Cashier's Checks (i.e. certified funds). These cost the bank a ton of money because an actual teller has to issue them (and a manager has to approve it if the amount is large enough). On the other hand, they charge $3 for ACH transfers (electronic) and $25 for wire transfers, neither of which cost the bank much of anything.
This is finally starting to change, but change is slow. Checks are so ingrained here that we now have apps for our smartphones that can take pictures of checks for remote deposits. But really, I don't want to take photographs of checks and try to tell myself I'm all modern. I just want to be able to make a fucking electronic payment in the first place.
I was more surprised this wasn't available before in the US. Now I can better understand why anybody would ever use PayPal. I never understood what they offered that wasn't already available for free with any major bank.
Just how many things that the rest of the world takes for granted is unavailable in US?
This is one of the areas where the US is woefully behind. Stay tuned, though. There are some services popping up that will fill this need (popmoney, etc.)
My bank (State Farm Bank) actually offers a person-to-person payments service that is free, but it's pretty rare still.
Do Americans have a choice? I can't find a wireless carrier who has reception in my area who offers anything other than these plans.
Then you haven't been looking hard enough. Which "major" carrier gets good reception by you? Once you determine that, buy a prepaid plan from one of their MVNOs. Do a few minutes of research first to see which MVNOs will activate their MNO's phones.
For instance, if you have a Sprint phone, active on Boost. If you have a Verizon phone, activate on Page Plus.
The math doesn't work out so well for the flagship devices because you are limited as to who will activate them. I bought the Sprint version (Epic 4G) for $320, but it only works on Sprint.
On the other hand, if you're willing to go a few generations out of date, Boost offers a Moto Android phone for between $35-50/mo (depending on how long you've been a customer for). I think the phone is $200, but I forget. Virgin offers a samsung intercept for $200 or an LG Android somethingorother for $150 + $40/mo.
Sure, those aren't top of the line devices, but that's still a pretty good deal on a smartphone.
Say I have finished the contract. Or say I bring my own phone instead of taking a subsidized phone in the first place. Then why don't I get a discount of (ETF / length of contract) off Verizon, Sprint, or AT&T monthly service?
The big guys won't do it for you, but the MVNOs usually will.
If you have a Sprint device, activate it on Boost for $35/mo for unlimited talk/text/web. I believe cricket will activate Sprint devices too, but don't quote me on that. For Verizon, activate on Page Plus. I forget what they offer, but people seem to like them. If you're on GSM, you can choose whichever provider you want.
Indeed, how do Americans fall for this stuff while people in other nations seem to be able to get better deals? Are we really just that dumb?
No, only you are.
My "cable TV" is netflix streaming + free OTA HD network channels + hulu. It is easy to get a smartphone for (eventually) $35/mo for unmetered talk/text/web (I don't use the term "unlimited". It defies the laws of physics). I don't do this, because I like newer phones. I'm on a 5-line smartphone plan from Sprint that works out to just over $40/mo/line.
Any more stupid mistakes you're making? I'm always happy to help people save money.
it seems to me that as time goes on the Americans are losing more and more credibility on the world stage. The start of the real decline seemed to happen with the latest invasion of Iraq and really accelerated through the term of G.W. Bush.
Your memory is short. The US has been declining in influence since the end of World War II. It spiked a bit with the fall of the Soviet Union, but then resumed its decline as China and Russia have gained in this regard.
Personally, I think we try to interfere too much in the world's affairs, anyhow. For instance, right now, the UN Security Council is debating whether or not the United States should create a No-Fly Zone over Libya. Can somebody please tell me why the US is even considering this? If the region would benefit from a No-Fly Zone, then the Arab League should create one. Which Islamic dictator rules over Libya is a local issue.
Further, this article did not say that he *tried* to get the plaintiff fired, so unless you're aware of something that wasn't stated in the article, I'm not sure how you can say that.
That's what the jury would have had to have found to get a verdict of tortious interference. According to his blog post, he first tried to submit the information to the U of M directly so they might fire him. And when that didn't work, he went public with the information, which both he and the U claim '"blew open" the issue of Moore's hiring and forced the hand of U of M decision-makers'. Apparently, the jury felt that this was more of an act of trying to get the guy fired, and less an act of informing the public (i.e. journalism).
Now, I do understand that laws can be screwed up, but the argument that I seem to be seeing here is that if I catch my coworker with child pornography on his computer and I tell someone about it, he can sue me if he loses his job over it.
Only if it can be shown that you were reporting the child pornography mainly to get your coworker fired, as opposed to reporting it because it's wrong and illegal.
"Solr"? Sounds Web 2.0, I don't think I'd be interested. Web 2.0 shouldn't require a book to explain it - in fact, the summary of the book is a bit too long for a proper Web 2.0 application.
Is your google broken, or do you merely enjoy acting like a douchebag?
In the US, we enjoy freedom of speech. We can basically publish whatever we want, without any prior restraint. That does not, however, absolve us of the damages our speech and actions might cause.
If you commit a tort against someone, you get to make that person whole. In this case, the blogger tried the get the plaintiff fired and succeeded. To use a car analogy, consider if I tried to run you over with my car and succeeded. That's a tort, and I'd be liable for damages.
So if someone loses wages or feels bad because you told the truth you can get sued and actually lose.
For some reason that makes me feel worse than I thought he lost a libel case...
We have freedom of speech in the US, but we don't always have freedom from the consequences of our speech, if that speech causes damage.
We also have freedom of expression in the US, but what if I like to express myself by punching people in the face? Well, that's not allowed, and I would be subject to civil and criminal liabilities for this "expression".
Yeah, they sued for interfering with the contract between employer and employee. I guess if I work phone support and go into a profanity-filled tirade at every customer who calls, the first who complains and I get fired, I get to sue them for informing my boss of my improper behavior.
That's not quite the same. There are a few reason why your example would not be tortious interference:
The complainer was not specifically trying to get you fired. He was merely describing his experience. For all the complainer knew, you'd get a reprimand, better training, or who knows? In the case of the blogger, he wrote that he was attempting to get the plaintiff fired, and then bragged that he got plaintiff fired after the fact. He also took specific action to get plaintiff fired by mailing the damaging information to the employer. Big mistakes.
Irrespective of the complainer, you were likely to get fired anyway. Because you would have been fired anyway, we can't say that the complainer interfered.
It was the speech, combined with the action, that made this rise to the level of tortious interference in the eyes of the jury. I'm still not convinced, but I don't know the rest of the facts of the case.
The referenced article refers to someone telling a friend that their problem is not something they can fix in 10 minutes for free. I feel this is totally reasonable.
That's because you think the friend in the article wanted her computer fixed, and fixed to a standard of being "guaranteed fixed". She did not want her computer guaranteed fixed, she wanted her problem solved.
Her problem wasn't the malware, it's that she didn't want to pay someone $75 to fix a computer that couldn't be worth more than $100. I think that's perfectly reasonable. So instead of ranting, all the blogger needed to do was say, "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that you got some malware. That's always tricky to fix. Here's what you need to do: download combofix from http://www.combofix.org/. It's a free malware removal too, and it's pretty effective. Go ahead and download and run it.
"If that doesn't work, I hate to say it, but your only recourse is to wipe your hard drive and reinstall everything. What's that you say? You don't have the original installation material because you pirated all of your software? Well, unfortunately, that is probably what caused the malware infection. You really should restrict yourself to using genuine, licensed software if you want to avoid this in the future."
See how I solved her problem in 90 seconds? This is how the friends helping friends thing works. It might have taken her several hours to identify a reputable, free malware removal tool. Look how much time I saved her, and it only cost me a minute or two.
Id be willing to bet that if steve had fired up GMER, or Combofix, or one of Kaspersky's dedicated removal tools
This was what I was wondering. I realize that the only way to be completely sure that you're safe after an incident is to wipe clean and re-install, but why not at least recommend a malware removal tool? I mean, that was what the lady wanted, right? Not a guarantee of safety.
If it were my machine, I'd wipe it for sure. But it's not my machine, so my rules don't apply. The friend would have been satisfied with a tool. So give her the tool and go have yourself a nice, cold brew.
Occasionally someone at my place of business somehow manages to send an email out to everyone in the department, or division, or even the whole company. Even on modern hardware the network will struggle if you send an email out to several hundreds or even thousands of recipients.
I'm going to take a guess here that your place of business has its spam filter configured to run on each mail delivery, and on internal -> internal emails.
The solution is making people pay attention where they click, not "hiding buttons because users can't read", that same though is making popular software crappier every day.
K-9 is an Android (i.e. cellphone) app.
There's only but so much room for buttons on the small screen, so some typical buttons need to be moved to a menu. Reply To All is as good a choice as any, but I think this might actually be configurable.
When I was in college, my father suggested I use that approach (walk up to them, ask them to sleep with me) on women. I told him that 1) No woman would say yes to a random stranger walking up and asking for sex and 2) If a woman did say yes, I wouldn't want to sleep with her because chances are she had every STD known to man!
You're probably right on the STD point (always use a condom!), but I have to agree with your father on the asking for sex point. Sure, the answer will usually be, "no". But I bet the answer will be yes a nontrivial percentage of the time.
Remember, there are all kinds of women out there. Women who are: drunk, depressed, angry at their boyfriend, horny, trying to impress someone, stressed, etc. There are all kinds of reasons the answer might be yes. Your job is just to ask the requisite number of women. If you can handle a bit of rejection (it's not like you're emotionally invested in these women; all you've done is ask them one question), you can get laid.
In fact, a friend of mine tried the "nice shoes, wanna fuck" approach in college. Well, it was "nice button, wanna fuck" (she was wearing a weird glow-in-the-dark button). Her answer: "Let's dance for a few songs first."
But a candidate who spent 4 years getting a BS in programming and never wrote one line of code for any practical application gets the +1 for review, while a "hire me, please" candidate gets sent away?
I don't know many such candidates. Most university students understand that the job market is unkind to those who actually have zero experience. As you note, there is a good reason for this job market unkindness!
The guy with an AS will have a better intrinsic understanding of what he's doing, having had knowledge and experience both combined; whereas the guy without the AS will "have a feel for it" but, unless he's done some self-study, will be lacking a lot.
Having a feel for it is valuable most of the time, but when the processing requirements get large, what you feel is insufficient.
Does the system exhibit linear scaling or polynomial scaling? Both will give the "feeling" that the processing task can be done in the time allowed, but we could be talking about a difference in hardware cost that's in the millions of dollars. So which is it? Management needs to know so they can plan and budget.
Don't get me wrong. I love systems that were designed using the "I just feel it" level of rigor. It's good for my business.:)
I'm not trying to take anything away from your chosen career path. Going to community college is a great way to get your start in a field, a university education, or career change. I'm a big fan of community colleges.
I guess what I'm trying to say is let's say I'm evaluating two resumes that are identical in every way (how often does this actually happen?), with the exception that one candidate has an AS in Comp Sci. Bottom line is I'm going to interview both candidates or neither. There will never be a situation where I interview only the candidate with the AS. That's not to say that the AS was a waste. All I'm trying to say is that it's not going to make or break a resume, in my mind.
I certainly agree with you that experience is much more valuable than education. Learning is very different from doing. Your impression of B.S. candidates with no meaningful experience is correct, but only to a point. A BS in Comp Sci is going to be highly trainable. My company is tiny, so I would never hire such a candidate, but when I worked for a mammoth consulting firm, I would definitely consider a BS with no experience if he or she could demonstrate a solid foundation and understanding of the theory.
In reality though, I haven't seen many BS resumes with zero experience. Most university students recognize that they need to do some type of internship, or they're going to get clobbered by the job market when they graduate. I graduated with a BA in Computer Science, but I had a small data warehouse company, a regional insurance company, and IBM on my resume. I landed plenty of interviews.:)
My company does a lot of performance reengineering (system is feature-complete, but performance targets are not being met) projects. There is just no way I can hire someone who doesn't have the theoretical background to recognize and understand the basics of complexity theory and growth rates. There is a huge difference between O(n^c) and O(c^n). One might scale well, the other cannot scale using any known method (most cryptography is based on solving problems that are in O(c^n)). Obviously, we prefer designs that are in O(n) or at least O(n log n).
That, of course, is the difference between an AS and a BS. AS gets as far as data structures, which is great for most programming tasks. An AS with solid experience is a strong resume for a programming position. Of course, so is a resume with solid experience and no post-secondary education.
An Associate's Degree is 2 years, a Bachelor's is another 2 years. So I can get the first 2 years for about 1/3 the cost of the next 2 years. In other words, it's like I spend 2 years on an AA and 6 years on a BA... which, if I'm paying out-of-pocket instead of sending myself into debt hell, might actually happen in terms of actual time.
OK, fair enough. For whatever reason, I read in your last comment that the associate's was of value, in and of itself. I was just observing that I didn't think it held much value in the corporate world, anyhow.
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ING does it. It's quite easy. You need your friend's account number and routing number, and you can send money to their account anytime you want. I just set it up with my dad the other night so I could make payments to him once a month. It's quite simple.
Yeah, state farm as it too. I use it to pay my Au Pair. I do not consider the process to be simple, but for now, it's the best we've got.
In order to use it, you need to know the recipient's routing number and account number. Who knows this about their friends? Also, in the US, this information is not safe to divulge to untrustworthy parties. That same information can be used to initiate an ACH debit against your account.
The rest of the world is way more advanced than we are in this regard.
In every country I've lived in (Australia, the UK, Germany) bank transfers are completely free and easy to do over online banking. If I book holidays with my friends and we don't settle who owes what to who in cash during the trip we can simply transfer the difference over to them once back home.
I know it's hard to believe, but we don't really have that here in the US. Some banks offer a similar service, but it's difficult to use. It sucks, but it's how it is right now.
There are some services popping up that are going to get us pretty close to where we should be (popmoney, this visa thingy from the article, etc.) But these are really in their infancy. Paper checks (yes, paper checks) are still king over here. Drives me nuts, but it's true.
But why? Paper checks cost the banks money to process and the banks can't wait to get rid of them (and cut down on personal...). Well, couldn't wait to get rid of them of them, they are practically non-existing and only used when doing business with US partners.
Legacy. Inertia.
People here expect checks to be free, so they are. Even though they cost the bank much more money to deal with.
To give you an idea of how ridiculous it is, one of my banks, Bank of America, gives me free Cashier's Checks (i.e. certified funds). These cost the bank a ton of money because an actual teller has to issue them (and a manager has to approve it if the amount is large enough). On the other hand, they charge $3 for ACH transfers (electronic) and $25 for wire transfers, neither of which cost the bank much of anything.
This is finally starting to change, but change is slow. Checks are so ingrained here that we now have apps for our smartphones that can take pictures of checks for remote deposits. But really, I don't want to take photographs of checks and try to tell myself I'm all modern. I just want to be able to make a fucking electronic payment in the first place.
I was more surprised this wasn't available before in the US. Now I can better understand why anybody would ever use PayPal. I never understood what they offered that wasn't already available for free with any major bank.
Just how many things that the rest of the world takes for granted is unavailable in US?
This is one of the areas where the US is woefully behind. Stay tuned, though. There are some services popping up that will fill this need (popmoney, etc.)
My bank (State Farm Bank) actually offers a person-to-person payments service that is free, but it's pretty rare still.
They have an "unlimited" contract for their data.
Your contract also says you agree not to tether.
Do Americans have a choice? I can't find a wireless carrier who has reception in my area who offers anything other than these plans.
Then you haven't been looking hard enough. Which "major" carrier gets good reception by you? Once you determine that, buy a prepaid plan from one of their MVNOs. Do a few minutes of research first to see which MVNOs will activate their MNO's phones.
For instance, if you have a Sprint phone, active on Boost. If you have a Verizon phone, activate on Page Plus.
You get the idea.
The math doesn't work out so well for the flagship devices because you are limited as to who will activate them. I bought the Sprint version (Epic 4G) for $320, but it only works on Sprint.
On the other hand, if you're willing to go a few generations out of date, Boost offers a Moto Android phone for between $35-50/mo (depending on how long you've been a customer for). I think the phone is $200, but I forget. Virgin offers a samsung intercept for $200 or an LG Android somethingorother for $150 + $40/mo.
Sure, those aren't top of the line devices, but that's still a pretty good deal on a smartphone.
Say I have finished the contract. Or say I bring my own phone instead of taking a subsidized phone in the first place. Then why don't I get a discount of (ETF / length of contract) off Verizon, Sprint, or AT&T monthly service?
The big guys won't do it for you, but the MVNOs usually will.
If you have a Sprint device, activate it on Boost for $35/mo for unlimited talk/text/web. I believe cricket will activate Sprint devices too, but don't quote me on that. For Verizon, activate on Page Plus. I forget what they offer, but people seem to like them. If you're on GSM, you can choose whichever provider you want.
Indeed, how do Americans fall for this stuff while people in other nations seem to be able to get better deals? Are we really just that dumb?
No, only you are.
My "cable TV" is netflix streaming + free OTA HD network channels + hulu. It is easy to get a smartphone for (eventually) $35/mo for unmetered talk/text/web (I don't use the term "unlimited". It defies the laws of physics). I don't do this, because I like newer phones. I'm on a 5-line smartphone plan from Sprint that works out to just over $40/mo/line.
Any more stupid mistakes you're making? I'm always happy to help people save money.
it seems to me that as time goes on the Americans are losing more and more credibility on the world stage. The start of the real decline seemed to happen with the latest invasion of Iraq and really accelerated through the term of G.W. Bush.
Your memory is short. The US has been declining in influence since the end of World War II. It spiked a bit with the fall of the Soviet Union, but then resumed its decline as China and Russia have gained in this regard.
Personally, I think we try to interfere too much in the world's affairs, anyhow. For instance, right now, the UN Security Council is debating whether or not the United States should create a No-Fly Zone over Libya. Can somebody please tell me why the US is even considering this? If the region would benefit from a No-Fly Zone, then the Arab League should create one. Which Islamic dictator rules over Libya is a local issue.
Further, this article did not say that he *tried* to get the plaintiff fired, so unless you're aware of something that wasn't stated in the article, I'm not sure how you can say that.
That's what the jury would have had to have found to get a verdict of tortious interference. According to his blog post, he first tried to submit the information to the U of M directly so they might fire him. And when that didn't work, he went public with the information, which both he and the U claim '"blew open" the issue of Moore's hiring and forced the hand of U of M decision-makers'. Apparently, the jury felt that this was more of an act of trying to get the guy fired, and less an act of informing the public (i.e. journalism).
Now, I do understand that laws can be screwed up, but the argument that I seem to be seeing here is that if I catch my coworker with child pornography on his computer and I tell someone about it, he can sue me if he loses his job over it.
Only if it can be shown that you were reporting the child pornography mainly to get your coworker fired, as opposed to reporting it because it's wrong and illegal.
"Solr"? Sounds Web 2.0, I don't think I'd be interested. Web 2.0 shouldn't require a book to explain it - in fact, the summary of the book is a bit too long for a proper Web 2.0 application.
Is your google broken, or do you merely enjoy acting like a douchebag?
I'm not real happy with the legal precedence this might set
The Hennepin County District Court is basically the lowest possible court. They can't set any precedents.
It's one thing to publish a story. It's another to try to get someone fired.
If blogger would have just published the facts and not tried to get plaintiff fired, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
In the US, we enjoy freedom of speech. We can basically publish whatever we want, without any prior restraint. That does not, however, absolve us of the damages our speech and actions might cause.
If you commit a tort against someone, you get to make that person whole. In this case, the blogger tried the get the plaintiff fired and succeeded. To use a car analogy, consider if I tried to run you over with my car and succeeded. That's a tort, and I'd be liable for damages.
So if someone loses wages or feels bad because you told the truth you can get sued and actually lose.
For some reason that makes me feel worse than I thought he lost a libel case...
We have freedom of speech in the US, but we don't always have freedom from the consequences of our speech, if that speech causes damage.
We also have freedom of expression in the US, but what if I like to express myself by punching people in the face? Well, that's not allowed, and I would be subject to civil and criminal liabilities for this "expression".
Yeah, they sued for interfering with the contract between employer and employee. I guess if I work phone support and go into a profanity-filled tirade at every customer who calls, the first who complains and I get fired, I get to sue them for informing my boss of my improper behavior.
That's not quite the same. There are a few reason why your example would not be tortious interference:
It was the speech, combined with the action, that made this rise to the level of tortious interference in the eyes of the jury. I'm still not convinced, but I don't know the rest of the facts of the case.
The referenced article refers to someone telling a friend that their problem is not something they can fix in 10 minutes for free. I feel this is totally reasonable.
That's because you think the friend in the article wanted her computer fixed, and fixed to a standard of being "guaranteed fixed". She did not want her computer guaranteed fixed, she wanted her problem solved.
Her problem wasn't the malware, it's that she didn't want to pay someone $75 to fix a computer that couldn't be worth more than $100. I think that's perfectly reasonable. So instead of ranting, all the blogger needed to do was say, "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that you got some malware. That's always tricky to fix. Here's what you need to do: download combofix from http://www.combofix.org/. It's a free malware removal too, and it's pretty effective. Go ahead and download and run it.
"If that doesn't work, I hate to say it, but your only recourse is to wipe your hard drive and reinstall everything. What's that you say? You don't have the original installation material because you pirated all of your software? Well, unfortunately, that is probably what caused the malware infection. You really should restrict yourself to using genuine, licensed software if you want to avoid this in the future."
See how I solved her problem in 90 seconds? This is how the friends helping friends thing works. It might have taken her several hours to identify a reputable, free malware removal tool. Look how much time I saved her, and it only cost me a minute or two.
Id be willing to bet that if steve had fired up GMER, or Combofix, or one of Kaspersky's dedicated removal tools
This was what I was wondering. I realize that the only way to be completely sure that you're safe after an incident is to wipe clean and re-install, but why not at least recommend a malware removal tool? I mean, that was what the lady wanted, right? Not a guarantee of safety.
If it were my machine, I'd wipe it for sure. But it's not my machine, so my rules don't apply. The friend would have been satisfied with a tool. So give her the tool and go have yourself a nice, cold brew.
Occasionally someone at my place of business somehow manages to send an email out to everyone in the department, or division, or even the whole company. Even on modern hardware the network will struggle if you send an email out to several hundreds or even thousands of recipients.
I'm going to take a guess here that your place of business has its spam filter configured to run on each mail delivery, and on internal -> internal emails.
Oops.
The solution is making people pay attention where they click, not "hiding buttons because users can't read", that same though is making popular software crappier every day.
K-9 is an Android (i.e. cellphone) app.
There's only but so much room for buttons on the small screen, so some typical buttons need to be moved to a menu. Reply To All is as good a choice as any, but I think this might actually be configurable.
When I was in college, my father suggested I use that approach (walk up to them, ask them to sleep with me) on women. I told him that 1) No woman would say yes to a random stranger walking up and asking for sex and 2) If a woman did say yes, I wouldn't want to sleep with her because chances are she had every STD known to man!
You're probably right on the STD point (always use a condom!), but I have to agree with your father on the asking for sex point. Sure, the answer will usually be, "no". But I bet the answer will be yes a nontrivial percentage of the time.
Remember, there are all kinds of women out there. Women who are: drunk, depressed, angry at their boyfriend, horny, trying to impress someone, stressed, etc. There are all kinds of reasons the answer might be yes. Your job is just to ask the requisite number of women. If you can handle a bit of rejection (it's not like you're emotionally invested in these women; all you've done is ask them one question), you can get laid.
In fact, a friend of mine tried the "nice shoes, wanna fuck" approach in college. Well, it was "nice button, wanna fuck" (she was wearing a weird glow-in-the-dark button). Her answer: "Let's dance for a few songs first."
But a candidate who spent 4 years getting a BS in programming and never wrote one line of code for any practical application gets the +1 for review, while a "hire me, please" candidate gets sent away?
I don't know many such candidates. Most university students understand that the job market is unkind to those who actually have zero experience. As you note, there is a good reason for this job market unkindness!
The guy with an AS will have a better intrinsic understanding of what he's doing, having had knowledge and experience both combined; whereas the guy without the AS will "have a feel for it" but, unless he's done some self-study, will be lacking a lot.
Having a feel for it is valuable most of the time, but when the processing requirements get large, what you feel is insufficient.
Does the system exhibit linear scaling or polynomial scaling? Both will give the "feeling" that the processing task can be done in the time allowed, but we could be talking about a difference in hardware cost that's in the millions of dollars. So which is it? Management needs to know so they can plan and budget.
Don't get me wrong. I love systems that were designed using the "I just feel it" level of rigor. It's good for my business. :)
I'm not trying to take anything away from your chosen career path. Going to community college is a great way to get your start in a field, a university education, or career change. I'm a big fan of community colleges.
I guess what I'm trying to say is let's say I'm evaluating two resumes that are identical in every way (how often does this actually happen?), with the exception that one candidate has an AS in Comp Sci. Bottom line is I'm going to interview both candidates or neither. There will never be a situation where I interview only the candidate with the AS. That's not to say that the AS was a waste. All I'm trying to say is that it's not going to make or break a resume, in my mind.
I certainly agree with you that experience is much more valuable than education. Learning is very different from doing. Your impression of B.S. candidates with no meaningful experience is correct, but only to a point. A BS in Comp Sci is going to be highly trainable. My company is tiny, so I would never hire such a candidate, but when I worked for a mammoth consulting firm, I would definitely consider a BS with no experience if he or she could demonstrate a solid foundation and understanding of the theory.
In reality though, I haven't seen many BS resumes with zero experience. Most university students recognize that they need to do some type of internship, or they're going to get clobbered by the job market when they graduate. I graduated with a BA in Computer Science, but I had a small data warehouse company, a regional insurance company, and IBM on my resume. I landed plenty of interviews. :)
My company does a lot of performance reengineering (system is feature-complete, but performance targets are not being met) projects. There is just no way I can hire someone who doesn't have the theoretical background to recognize and understand the basics of complexity theory and growth rates. There is a huge difference between O(n^c) and O(c^n). One might scale well, the other cannot scale using any known method (most cryptography is based on solving problems that are in O(c^n)). Obviously, we prefer designs that are in O(n) or at least O(n log n).
That, of course, is the difference between an AS and a BS. AS gets as far as data structures, which is great for most programming tasks. An AS with solid experience is a strong resume for a programming position. Of course, so is a resume with solid experience and no post-secondary education.
An Associate's Degree is 2 years, a Bachelor's is another 2 years. So I can get the first 2 years for about 1/3 the cost of the next 2 years. In other words, it's like I spend 2 years on an AA and 6 years on a BA ... which, if I'm paying out-of-pocket instead of sending myself into debt hell, might actually happen in terms of actual time.
OK, fair enough. For whatever reason, I read in your last comment that the associate's was of value, in and of itself. I was just observing that I didn't think it held much value in the corporate world, anyhow.