-Harold
The Crapolla According to Fek'Lar
You Know You're DOOMED When...
You walk into Fry's and hear, "The gas mask demonstration will start in just 90 seconds here in the Bose Theatre!"
You've stumbled onto another issue of The Crapolla, a journal written for software professionals. No not the managers; I mean the people who do the work.
This Crapolla is sponsored by...
In This Issue...
Not being seen, for free!
Take A Letter
Harold Peterson, jacking in from Yahoo (What's the matter? Did they kick you out of Oklahoma?), writes ...
In the interest of seeing another car painting, I'd like to point out the following:
"You know you're DOOMED when your Thanksgiving Turkey as a bug in it": "has" instead of "as"?
"But I've always been good and making up new dirty words.": "at" instead of "and"?
Now I've run out of things to do besides homework.
-Harold
Harold,
I'm still pleading the insanity defense. Miss Proofreader is still gallivanting around the world which makes using words like "gallivanting" and "has" a high risk operation.
I'm not really painting cars right now. But it is the holidays, and I know you're really praying for something better than a C-, four D's, and an F in PE. So here's a little holiday cheer I stole off the net.
Personally, I think the reindeer are on speed.
The other week I visited Big A Software, a company I worked for eight years ago. Big A has grown since then including the building of their sky scrapers in Downtown San Jose. Ole Possum Head was giving me the tour. (as it turned out, if you've seen one floor, you've seen them all.) I noticed a familiar name on one of the offices. It turns out Ole Possum Head wasn't the only one to survive all these years and several lay offs.
Ole Possum Head had survived by being extremely adaptable. If Big A said "Go to Siberia" he did that. If Big A said to QA the product of a company they just bought, he did it. Ole Possum Head spent the better part of the 90's being the ideal employee, and not causing nearly as much trouble as I have. But I did discover another class of worker I hadn't seen before, the familiar name I saw on the door was an Anonymous Employee.
I tend to work with people who are real "I'm on a mission from God, get out of the way!" types. There's nothing anonymous about them. Apparently, the Anonymous Employee is the opposite. They sit in their cube, collect dusk and paychecks. This kind of reminded me of that old Monty Python skit about the way to not be seen is to not stand up.
Is your division about to march off a cliff? Maybe so, but pointing it out to the Field Marshal from Product Marketing is just going to get you noticed. Stand in the back and stay quiet. After the first few platoons fall to their horrible DOOM on the jagged boulders below, some one else will scream, "Halt!"
I guess that's why I don't work at bigger companies.
Apparently, if you stay anonymous in a large company people will forget you work there and your name won't come up when HR starts working on that new RIF list. Something to note in case you're a little worried about your seat. Just crack open another Diet Coke and drink it very quietly.
After all, it's getting a little lonely out there on the freeway.
The other theme that kept coming up was the utter shock of people when they saw me in the building.
"Are you back???" they would ask, I'm not sure if in mere surprise or in complete horror.
"Relax, I'm just slumming it."
I see Real Networks is taking a stab at the pay for content Holy Grail. What's the matter, guys? Wasn't going to Vegas and putting your paycheck on green exciting enough?
The problem with pay for content on the internet is that anything that has been "free" in the past, is considered a right by the internet population. In fact, even many online magazines which had unique content that was never free, have died off. Then of course there was PointCast, the inventors of "push" technology. Neat stuff, just no money in it.
The only pay for content play I have seen work are the very high priced news services. (Not newspapers! Even the Murky News' Mercury Center went from a paid service to a give away.) The other service that seems to do alright as a pay for content play are the NASDAQ Level II stock quoting services. But then people have always been willing to spend a little money to make more money. If you're seriously into trading stock, a NASDAQ Level II service is a strategic must.
What's the big deal with Real Networks' Real One offering? Online music.
Nice knowing ya, guys.
It's going to take a very long time to get customers who are used to downloading what they think is free music, to agree to pay for it. There's two dynamics here. First is that feeling that if they could ever get the content for nothing, people seem to think they are entitled to it. Second, the recording industry is doing everything it can to turn their customers into enemies.
Just about every new CD on the shelves is over-priced. Add the Metallica fiasco from last year, where the band turned on its own fans, and you have an online consumer base that is gnashing at the teeth to stick it to the bands and the producers. Add all of the peer to peer swapping networks, and I don't see the online music subscription bird getting off the ground soon.
Call me cynical, call me a pessimist, but I have a feeling that I've seen this movie before. They all die in the end.
This Issue's Headline submission to the National Daily World Enquiring Globe.
Massive Pile of Bullshit Appears in Front of U.S. Capitol!
It's Business as Usual for the 107th Congress!
Let's play, "Who said this?"
Heard in the halls of various software companies.
"Honey, did you record "Boob Fest"?
"No, Tivo did that all by itself. I love Tivo."
"My method is investigation through intimidation."
"I should just become a dyke."
"What the hell are you doing?"
"Just running a credit check. You should really try to pay your Visa on time more often."
"Don't tell me how technical you are. You opened the attachment and infected the whole company!"
"Oh God, I'm an idiot!"
Excuse Me
The boat needs rocking.
Fek'Lar
(The Last Honest Geek)
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EOJ
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