Employment Security and Job Searching (was: Keeping private data private)
(Just to be fair: Crypto is useful, and has lots of applications. It's just not a cure-all, and can't help with most of the big security weaknesses one sees in the real world.) humor Does employment security improve if you get a job in crypto? /humor For the tenth time in 10 years (the third time in the last 12 months), I'm looking for a new job. Harvard is closing the Initiative in Innovative Computing at the end of June. I'll probably end up with a great new position building on my talents and network of connections -- but not unless I get the word out. So, that's the first reason for this message. Sorry if it was done so badly? But what's the best way to broadcast to all your friends and colleagues that you are officially in job search mode? Change your status on Facebook and LinkedIn? To make lemonade out of lemons, I have thought about writing about my employment saga. Sadly, I think it's an example of an all-too-common experience for Technology workers over the past decade. Then I stop and ask What's the point? Sounds like a boring book that nobody will care about. What do you think? Maybe it would be a good idea just to create a forum where tech workers could don an avatar and complain about work in Dilbert-esque ways for the cathartic value. I'm a cheerful, positive attitude kind of person, but when I think about the negative impact that job insecurity has had on my family, I think I'm ready for some venting. Another perhaps more interesting idea I had was to do an Open Source job search -- doing the search in an open website with daily entries about the job search process and actual details, thoughts, emotions, of the search. I would invite all parties (recruiters, employers, friends) to participate. How would it work if I were entertaining multiple offers? Would an open process help with important decision points like accept this offer, or, continue for the chance to potentially win a better position. What were the results of siteA vs. siteB? What was it like dealing with a recruiter? How did I prepare for an interview? What is the company like? The concept would probably garner some interest, and I can imagine that it could actually help the search process for all involved. I can also see a bunch of ways that it wouldn't work. I'm sure it is an idea that is way too risky for some people to touch. Still, every time I think that it's a stupid idea, I ask myself if I'm satisfied with the way things work now. I'm not. The job search process is tedious, grossly opaque, lop-sided and inefficient. I think of Doc Searles and others who embrace the (open) Free Culture movement. What do you think of this conept? -- Greg Rundlett Web Developer - Initiative in Innovative Computing http://iic.harvard.edu camb 617-384-5872 nbpt 978-225-8302 m. 978-764-4424 -skype/aim/irc/twitter freephile http://profiles.aim.com/freephile ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Patriot's Day?
So, anyone in the (historic?) MerriLUG area (i.e.: anyone in range of Nashua or Manchester) have Patriot's Day off? I'm working down in Lexington, these days, so it looks like they're making me take next Monday off. Anyone else in the same boat? The weather-forecast is bleak, so I guess it's not picnic- or cookout-weather, but it's a perfect day for huddling indoors with portable pentium-powered space-heaters (i.e.: laptop computers; not that anyone still sporting a cool-running PPC or such wouldn't be welcome). And what could be more patriotic than Linux and FOSS? -- Don't be afraid to ask (Lf.((Lx.xx) (Lr.f(rr. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: Employment Security and Job Searching
Greg Rundlett (freephile) g...@freephile.com writes: (Just to be fair: Crypto is useful, and has lots of applications. It's just not a cure-all, and can't help with most of the big security weaknesses one sees in the real world.) humor Does employment security improve if you get a job in crypto? /humor Only if you encrypt your résumé? Funny. A friend of mine in information-security did tell me, at one point, that all of the relevant companies had headquarters in the same town--even on the same block; and that, in that way, he had `job security' because he could (literally) walk away from one company and into another. For the tenth time in 10 years (the third time in the last 12 months), I'm looking for a new job. Harvard is closing the Initiative in Innovative Computing at the end of June. I'll probably end up with a great new position building on my talents and network of connections -- but not unless I get the word out. So, that's the first reason for this message. Sorry if it was done so badly? But what's the best way to broadcast to all your friends and colleagues that you are officially in job search mode? Change your status on Facebook and LinkedIn? And e-mail. I guess telephone-calls don't count as broadcasting. To make lemonade out of lemons, I have thought about writing about my employment saga. Sadly, I think it's an example of an all-too-common experience for Technology workers over the past decade. Then I stop and ask What's the point? Sounds like a boring book that nobody will care about. What do you think? I think that, if you're interested in doing something like that, you should do it--but, from what I've heard, you shouldn't expect to be getting rich off it it (or anything close); not because the subject-matter is lacking, but just because that's how it generally goes. Similar to `if you start a business, you'll probably fail. Just because, statistically, something like 90% of businesses fail in their first year.'. But, I can see you finding an audience. I recently gave my wife a copy of Ellen Ullman's `Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents' to read--not because she's a `technophile' who'd identify with it, but because she's *not* a technophile but would identify with it for other reasons. I figured she'd appreciate the sort of `drama' that Ullman conjures, and the important parts played by human-to-human relationships and `what it /feels/ like to be a programmer' in the book. And I was right: a day later, I asked my wife if she'd started reading it yet, and she said: I'm about two-thirds through it. It's great--why didn't you give me that before!? I feel like I finally understand where you've been coming from all of these years! I don't understand a lot of the technobabble between the characters, but I feel like I better understand how you see the world, and *why* you are so into the things you are. And there is *tremendous* value in books like that, just for that reason--because they can help people appreciate not only things in new and better ways, but they can also help people appreciate *each other* in new and better ways. The inner workings of an unemployed geek are difficult for many non-geeks to comprehend, and it's not helped by the fact that many of us can have difficulty expressing these things. I wouldn't be surprised if there were a sizable audience of tech-spouses to devour a book that explains the quiet angst of laid-off engineers, in the same way that my wife responded to `Close to the Machine'. If you can write it, you might even save some marriages at some point. Maybe it would be a good idea just to create a forum where tech workers could don an avatar and complain about work in Dilbert-esque ways for the cathartic value. I'm a cheerful, positive attitude kind of person, but when I think about the negative impact that job insecurity has had on my family, I think I'm ready for some venting. Are you familiar with The Daily WTF http://thedailywtf.com/? -- Don't be afraid to ask (Lf.((Lx.xx) (Lr.f(rr. ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
OT: Employment Security Options
For the tenth time in 10 years (the third time in the last 12 months), I'm looking for a new job... snip Sadly, I think it's an example of an all-too-common experience for Technology workers over the past decade...snip I can also see a bunch of ways that it wouldn't work. I'm sure it is an idea that is way too risky for some people to touch. Still, every time I think that it's a stupid idea, I ask myself if I'm satisfied with the way things work now. I'm not. The job search process is tedious, grossly opaque, lop-sided and inefficient... It wouldn't hurt to try some of those initiatives - again. As an old veteran of the technical industry, I concur that the captains of industry place very little value on our skills or respect for the hard work it take to acquire them. But, we best not wait for that to change! I solved the problem for me by starting my own company. It worked out well, but if you are looking for job security, that is the wrong direction to head. If you value independence and control more than money, security - or even your family in many sad cases - go for it. Unions are suggested from time to time. They are the anthesis of being professional or your own boss. (Few engineers or programmers behave as true professionals - adding to the perception problem.) Not many engineers find unions an attractive answer. My wife made a suggestion that seldom gets discussed, guilds. The medieval guilds established several tough-to-reach competence grades for their members, spanning apprentice to journeyman to master. They strictly enforced their workmanship and knowledge standards. They often, in effect, insured the quality of the work done by their members by leaning hard on them to straighten out any problems that were reported. History tells us that their quality work was valued beyond its cost, making the guild members highly sought. The guild set the pricing guide lines for each grade. The number of guild member was kept slightly below demand. The guilds, in many cases, did not try to prevent others from plying the trade - although some guilds got powerful and nasty eventually. With the concept of a guild, there are no strikes against the employer, the journeyman sets his price for the job (within guide lines), the journeyman, not the guild, contracts with the employer, etc. Might this concept be modified, updated, and revised to meet the needs of today's technical experts? Jim Kuzdrall ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
[GNHLUG] GamingSIG - Friday 05/01 - Lua TeeWorlds
*Gaming Special Interest Group* Friday, May 1st Brady Sullivan Building, 5th floor (DynInc) 1230 Elm Street, Manchester NH * Introductions and gear setup : 6:00pm to 6:30pm* For gaming, bring your gear with cables to connect to power and an ethernet switch. *Lua Scripting : 6:30pm to 7:00pm* Walter Mundt will give an introduction to Lua, a scripting language designed for embedding in applications and is used in many games for custom maps. *TeeWorlds : 7:00pm until 11:00pm* LAN party for TeeWorlds (http://www.teeworlds.com/) - a cute 2d combat game released under a permissive free software license. ___ gnhlug-announce mailing list gnhlug-annou...@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-announce/ ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
Re: OT: Employment Security Options
From: Jim Kuzdrall gnh...@intrel.com Date: Fri, 17 Apr 2009 18:32:56 -0400 My wife made a suggestion that seldom gets discussed, guilds. The medieval guilds established several tough-to-reach competence grades for their members, spanning apprentice to journeyman to master. They strictly enforced their workmanship and knowledge standards. They often, in effect, insured the quality of the work done by their members by leaning hard on them to straighten out any problems that were reported. snip Might this concept be modified, updated, and revised to meet the needs of today's technical experts? That's what the Microsoft certifications are for, right? i=0; while [ $i -lt 64 ]; do echo -n ha...; i=$((i+1)); done ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
[GNHLUG] PySIG next week (Thursday 23 April 2008)
Cookies are likely, a dynamite program is rumored, no snow is forecast. Stories. Gotchas. Data types. [Or not.] More. Next Thursday, Amoskeag Business Incubator, Manchester. Agenda to follow. -Bill ___ gnhlug-announce mailing list gnhlug-annou...@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-announce/ ___ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
