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Tags > economy
Operating system expertise moves outward as programmers job-hop
By Andy OramNovember 3, 2009
I just held a reunion with people I worked with at a real-time and data acquisition computer vendor 20 years ago, and was interested to see how many ended up in another, related line of work.
Four short links: 22 October 2009 - Cognitive Surplus, Scaling, Chinese Blogs, CS Education for Growth
October 22, 2009
Isaac Mao, China, 40M Blogs and Counting -- "Today, there are 40 million bloggers in China and around 200 million blogs, according to Mao. Some blogs survive only a few days before being shut down by authorities. More than 80% of people in China don't know that the internet is censored in their country. When riots broke out in Xinjiang province this year, the authorities shut down internet access for the whole region. No one could get online." This and more in today's Four Short Links.
The Mobile Frontier - The Future of the Sustainable Network
September 30, 2009
The mobile network has created unprecedented opportunity for the world. It truly is pervasive - spanning out across geographies and socio-economic boundaries to enable sustainable participation, growth and potential prosperity on a previously unimaginable scale.
Environment Variables: On Surplus, Scarcity, Fear & Greed
August 19, 2009
I am big believer that markets gravitate between FEAR and GREED, and that industries are driven by core assumptions about the SCARCITY or SURPLUS of enabling resources. Think about the stock market in terms of the former (it's heavily outlook driven), and the evolution of computing, as afforded by the latter (i.e., the commoditization of processing, storage and bandwidth).
Ignite Show: Anthony Citrano on Money Remixed - Ignite Show Episode 26
By Brady ForrestAugust 13, 2009
This week's Ignite Show veers into the current financial situation of the US. The economy is going off a cliff and financial practices are being, ahem, re-evaluated. Anthony Citrano takes this thinking a step further and ponders what would happen if the US dollar disappeared. He suggests that corporations will end up issuing money (like Kong Bucks in Snow Crash).
The US Online Job Market Improved Slightly in July
August 5, 2009
Measured in terms of online job postings, the U.S. job market† improved slightly in July. This blog entry shows two views of the number of job postings per day: note the slight uptick in July 2009 in both graphs. The worst year-over-year decline occurred in April, the online job market subsequently shed less postings in May and June. Given that July was an improvement over May/June, one would hope that the stage is set for a sustained upward trend.
The US Online Job Market Was (still) Down Big In June 2009
July 1, 2009
Updating my post from early June, the U.S. online job market still hasn't shown signs of recovering from steady declines that began in September of last year. Compared to the same period last year, there were 50% less job postings in June 2009.
Corporations and Cloud Sourcing
By Kurt CagleMarch 9, 2009
The news out of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (the BLS) was grim this weak - the unemployment rate had reached 8.1%, climbing two whole percentage points in the last quarter. This rise is even more stunning given that unemployment had reportedly been stable for the past several years at around 5%, though this may also be simply a reflection that the numbers haven't been cooked quite so vigorously.
Fighting the Status Quo
By Kurt CagleMarch 1, 2009
Seth Godin recently published a rather insightful blog post on how trade groups often work to stifle innovation in order to maintain the status quo. The comments are especially timely now, as industry after industry goes to Washington hat in hand in order to beg a few billion here or there to keep their particular company or even industry afloat.
State of the Computer Book Market 2008, part 4 -- The Languages
February 26, 2009
In this fourth post on the State of the Computer Book Market, we will look at programming languages and drill in a little on each language area. Overall the market for programming languages was down 5.9% in 2008 when compared with 2007. There were 1,849,974 units sold in 2007 versus 1,740,808 units sold in 2008, which is a decrease of 109,166 units. So the unhealthy 8% loss in the Overall Computer Book Market was not completely fueled by programming-oriented books.
Kindle 2.0: Publishing's Killer? Publishing's Savior?
February 17, 2009
The new Kindle 2.0 is a cool enough-looking gadget - its hyper-svelt profile (just over a third of an inch) is thinner than most of the books it holds, at ten ounces it's also lighter, and the silvery/white casing (among others) manages to take scuffs and dirt better than its predecessor. The e-ink paper, sporting sixteen shades of gray, is also a compelling testament to what looks like the next major display technology - e-ink retains its state after it's configured, which means that you only have to refresh the page when you move beyond the buffered page content ... which in turn means that you can run the Kindle for days without recharging.
The Long Emergency: An Interview with James Howard Kunstler
January 12, 2009
We'll, let's just start by saying we've constructed an infrastructure for daily life with no future. That's pretty disturbing, isn't it? I customarily refer to this as the greatest misallocation off resources in the history of the world. Having poured all our post-WW2 wealth in it, we've made ourselves hostage to the psychology of previous investment -- meaning we will desperately try anything to keep it all going, to sustain the unsustainable, at all costs. Thus, we'll be squandering our dwindling resources in a gigantic act of futility. That's the Big Picture end of the story.
Analysis 2009: Energy Sector Faces Volatile Year
By Kurt CagleJanuary 8, 2009
Here in Victoria, my corner gas station has a liter of regular unleaded gas for CAN$0.80, about US$3.00 a gallon. Six months ago, a similar liter cost nearly $1.50, more than $6 a gallon when factoring in the dramatic...
Analysis 2009
By Kurt CagleJanuary 6, 2009
Understanding the art of prognostication is not that dissimilar to understanding weaving. Few things ever occur out of the blue - they just hadn't emerged out of the background noise just yet, and as such when they do appear, you...
Analysis 2009: The Financial Crisis Hits IT Hard
By Kurt CagleJanuary 6, 2009
The recession that started in January 2008 looks to be four phased. The first phase, The housing collapse, actually started in August 2007. The financial meltdown hit in September 2008, and likely will continue through to March 2009 or...
Analysis 2009: Government Gets Into the Software Business
By Kurt CagleJanuary 6, 2009
The incoming Obama administration has, even before taking office formally, pledged between $650 and $800 billion dollars worth of public works initiatives, a massive shift away from the laissez faire approach of the outgoing Bush administration. Of that, it...
O'Reilly Week in Review for Jan 5th, 2009
January 6, 2009
This week's podcast has a commentary from editor Kurt Cagle on the potential opportunities that this year could bring, a conversation with Tim O'Reilly about ways the SEC could leverage search technology, the answer to last week's quiz and a...
MadTux Closes Its Doors
By Caitlyn MartinJanuary 2, 2009
After eight years in business California-based MadTux, an online retailer specializing in systems preloaded with Linux, has closed.
Thinking About Wendell Berry's "In Distrust of Movements"
By Tim O'ReillyDecember 30, 2008
I'm just reading a Wendell Berry essay from 2000, entitled In Distrust of Movements, reprinted on a blog with the inspired name The Irresistible Fleet of Bicycles. I was going to just tweet the link, but realized that more people need to read this, and I ought to quote more extensively. (I hope that fans of Michael Pollan's books like...
Needed: A New IT Employment Model
December 24, 2008
It's Christmas Eve as I write this, but after having put the children to bed and turning off the tree lights, I find that my thoughts are not on Santa Claus tonight ... at least not in a very positive way.
Through A Glass (Very) Darkly: XML 2009 (Part 1 of 2)
By Kurt CagleDecember 22, 2008
A year later, the IT industry was in the worst recession that it had faced in fifteen years, a time that became known as the Tech Nuclear Winter. Senior programmers with thirty years of experience and post graduate degrees - people who sat on standards committees boards and often served to shape the industry - could be found at coffee shops "working on their next projects" while waiting for a job to open up.
Expanding The O'Reilly Forums
By Kurt CagleDecember 13, 2008
Forums have become an integral part of many communities over the years - as a webmaster on a number of different social sites, I found that the sites tended to live or die on the strength of their forums more than on any other component of the site. They provide a way for people to express their feelings, to communicate with one another, to explore deep concepts (and silly ones) and to learn, and as such they often form the vibrant backbone of communities regardless of the subject matter expressed.
A Healthcare Renaissance: Could Peak Oil Inspire America To Create A National Health Service?
By Julian DarleyDecember 11, 2008
The decline of petroleum seems to be one more awful problem facing the US, but could it actually be an extraordinary chance to create a fine and fair national health care system?
Why Are Newspapers Dying?
December 9, 2008
While newspapers are likely on their way to the recycle bin, editorial journalism isn't. We are moving to an era where journalistic integrity and personal prestige of the individual journalist is becoming more important than the prestige of the newspaper or other media that the journalist writes for. Journalism is becoming decentralized, and there are many indications that this is, just perhaps, a good thing.
Catch 22: Too Big To Fail, Too Big To Succeed
By Joshua-Michéle RossDecember 8, 2008
Hat in hand the U.S. Auto Industry lined up for their slice of government aid and it appears as of this posting that they will get the money they are asking for. These titans spent years hiding behind the “free market” shibboleth when convenient (the market wants gas guzzling SUV’s) and when punished by that same market we hear that...
Regarding three economic advantages of Open Source
By Andy OramDecember 8, 2008
William Hurley recently posted an article titled Three Reasons Open Source Will Save The Economy one a new weblog of his.
When Times Get Tough, the Tough Invent
November 21, 2008
The best ideas are risky ... and often are not necessarily beneficial to the originator. At O'Reilly we recently had a discussion about the distinction between invention and innovation. Invention, the creation of truly novel ideas, especially the paradigm changers, is comparatively rare. It requires focused dedication, persistence, intelligence and a willingness to fight the status quo. This is because the status quo - our society overall - is resistant to the idea of change, and inventions by their very nature bring change.
Obama's Emerging Tech Doctrine
By Kurt CagleNovember 12, 2008
The weeks after a presidential election are a sobering time for incoming and outgoing presidents alike ... as well as for followers of both. It's usually the day where people "come back to the office" and start to assess just how much work needs to be done. In the case of the incoming Obama administration, this to do list is likely already huge and growing.
Top Tech Jobs for 2012
By Kurt CagleOctober 30, 2008
Trying to predict the future is always tough, but in many ways its toughest for those in college, trying to figure out where they'll find jobs when they graduate ... especially if the thrust of your interest is in technical fields. It used to be that you could look at the industry as it stood and pick the job that you wanted to graduate into, but increasingly it is likely that the job that you'll have within ten years doesn't even have a name today.
Surviving the Pink Slip
October 20, 2008
Everyone's been nervous for months, watching the market numbers, the stock prices, the declining sales figures. In the IT department, it's not been uncommon to see programmers with one window open on code, the second on the app the code's supposed to generate ... and the third on a steady stream of plummeting financial indexes and bad news about the economy. Then, about two in the afternoon, your project manager taps you on the shoulder - special meeting in ten minutes. When you stand up from your cubicle and look around, you notice that there are several security types idling in the hallway ... and you know, instinctively, what that meeting's going to be about.
The Next Web: "Web * e^(t/Tau)" (or "Just Say No to 2.0")
October 16, 2008
It didn't take long for someone to say that the the financial crisis will bring about "Capitalism 2.0". In this article I talk about the overuse of the "2.0" modifier throughout media and identify three characteristics common to the everyday introduction of a new "2.0". With Money 2.0, Sport 2.0, Sex 2.0, Religion 2.0 has the "2.0" become the "e" or "cyber" prefix of the late 90s, and is it time to retire it? If so, what is the next "2.0" modifier?
Unintended Consequences of Nationalizing Banks
By Robert PassarellaOctober 15, 2008
This is not a post for or against the actions of the Treasury. This is a quick look at what may be on the horizon--so that we can all keep our collective eyes open. I invite you to add your own observations and questions in the comments. I'd like to start you off with a couple. Now that the US...
Jason Fried of 37Signals on Business, Focus, and Avoiding Interruption
October 14, 2008
Jason Fried discusses the day to day operations of 37signals and some of his ideas for minimizing distraction in the workplace. Fried talks about his view that startups should focus on profit and product before accepting venture capital. In this video, Fried's focus on the fundamentals of product design suggest an austerity and simplicity uncommon in an industry suffering from a pandemic of hype.
Torkington's Law
October 13, 2008
Here are two presentations that I've found particularly instructive in the market meltdown: Making Sense of the Mortgage Meltdown: many numbers, tables, and charts to help you see the full number of sigmas the last few years represent. Sequoia Capital on Startups and the Economic Downturn: this is a presentation from VCs about how startups should deal with the new...
Frightening transparency
By Simon St. LaurentOctober 10, 2008
Our current financial problems derive, at their foundation, from private transactions that weren't nearly careful enough about the prices of the goods underneath them. Perhaps the answer is to require that financial practices be done in the open. Everyone can see your positions and evaluate them, all of the time. How would that work?
The Connected Economy
By Nat TorkingtonOctober 10, 2008
As the financial markets battle the fallout of years of poorly regulated unwise greed, the language of analysis is revealing. Commentators talk of "contagion spreading", financial "gears jammed", and "turbulent" markets. This is the language of non-obvious connection, where it's theoretically possible but impossible in practice to predict the future state. Listening to This American Life's new episode on the...
Thoughts on the Financial Crisis
By Tim O'ReillyOctober 8, 2008
The other day, we received a blistering email from a Radar reader complaining about our silence on the subject of the economic meltdown. I wrote back: There are a lot of people bloviating about the financial crisis. It's outside of our area of expertise, so there didn't seem to be a lot of urgency to add to the hot air....
System Crash on Wall Street
October 6, 2008
The credit markets are seizing up, Congress-critters are trying to make the case for spending billions in a "rescue" package, the stock market gyrations are giving people whiplash, banks are popping like sulfur-filled bubbles and companies are suddenly having to make some hard decision about payroll at a time even when they have more than enough work. The end of the world as we know it seems to have come about all at once, and even as people are scrambling to protect themselves, not a few people are wondering just how everything went bad so quickly.
Short Gas Supplies Lead to Short Tempers, Long Lines and Telecommutes
By Kurt CagleOctober 1, 2008
While Hurricane Ike has long since faded into the ether, its effects on the economy continue to mount. One of the more significant (and unexpected) - Ike hit a number of oil refineries and gas distribution centers hard enough to know them offline for the last couple of weeks.
Is Telework the Face of the Agile Workforce?
By Kurt CagleAugust 3, 2008
The idea that twenty-somethings have to commute an hour plus each way to an office and work eight hours a day in a cubicle seems absurd to them. As they become the work force, expect the days of the cubicle to become numbered.
Is Sun Setting?
By Kurt CagleJuly 14, 2008
The global slowdown is beginning to take its toll on more exposed hardware and consulting companies. On Friday, July 10, Sun began sending out pink slips to more than 1000 employees, primarily in the marketing and sales areas as part...
IT Workers and the Gathering Economic Storm
By Kurt CagleJuly 3, 2008
IT workers are in general perhaps better prepared for the upheavals in that emerging world than most - a world where knowledge, flexibility, indepence of action and thought, and an ability to network will prove to be the most desirable characteristics, but that nimbleness comes at the cost of not tying yourself down to the older society's expectations. Even if the economy does manage to avoid the worst of the doldrums, these are traits to encourage in the days ahead.
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