15 awful mistakes made by designers in the music and apparel industries - such as not charging enough, ignoring typography, and unprofessional behaviour.
posted on Jul 25, 2008 - View this thread

In an artificial world, only extremists live naturally. Or: You weren't meant to have a boss. On the other hand, maybe you are.
posted on Mar 21, 2008 - View this thread

A Resume Experiment. In which career blog JibberJobber responds to a request for resume help by assembling a team of hiring managers and professional resume writers to review the document: Part 1 : Introduction | Part 2: First Impressions/Reactions | Part 3: Formatting the Resume | Part 4: Content is King | Part 5: Wrap Up
posted on Feb 25, 2008 - View this thread

Advice on Academic Job Talk Visits by Siva Vaidhyanathan.
posted on Jan 10, 2008 - View this thread

Triumph of the Nerds is a 1996 three-part documentary recounting the rise of the personal computer, including interviews with Gates, Wozniak and Jobs, among others. It was originally produced for British television, and aired on PBS in the USA. Part One: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Part Two: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Part Three: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Transcripts here. After you watch, you can play the "Guess the Computer" game.
posted on Sep 29, 2007 - View this thread

High Voltage Cable Inspection
posted on Sep 25, 2007 - View this thread

Ever wonder much about those anonymous men and women who pass out towels, soap and toiletries in upscale restrooms? Me either, until I read this. But apparently some people do. Well, one man sees it as a creative outlet, and another sees it as his road to stardom! "just wash your hands for god’s sake"
posted on Aug 10, 2007 - View this thread

Popular Science's Annual Worst Jobs... in Science
posted on Jun 19, 2007 - View this thread

“There has never been a massively successful consumer device based solely on a touch screen” ...designers and marketers of electronic devices centers are having a spirited debate about whether consumers will have the patience to overcome the hurdle that will be required to type without the familiar tactile feedback offered by conventional keyboards. Any significant number of returns of the iPhone could conceivably undermine what until now has been a remarkable promotional blitzkrieg that culminates in the phone’s release June 29.
posted on Jun 13, 2007 - View this thread

The Bill and Steve show: Jobs and Gates sit down together and discuss the past, present and future at the D5 conference.
posted on May 30, 2007 - View this thread

"The difference between BJ and AJ, Before and After Jobs, is not the process," [Don Norman] continues. "It is the person. Never before did Apple have such focus and dedication. Apple used to wobble, moving this way and that. No more."
posted on May 8, 2007 - View this thread

Remember this? While randomly reading some assorted Digg posts, I saw someone mention the old Toshiba Liberato laptop. On doing a GIS search, up came a link to the "Apple Doomsday Clock". It just floors me that this anonymous anti-Apple blog (which even predates the word "blog"), is still online. It dates from the period when Jobs retook the CEO chair, and started turning the failing company around--the last posting was in June, 1999. Perhaps it should be treated as a historical site, and preserved for the future amusement of Mac users?
posted on Apr 14, 2007 - View this thread

Thoughts on Music "...in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store." — Steve Jobs
posted on Feb 6, 2007 - View this thread

India's Outsourcing Problems One of the most controversial aspects of the global economy has been the newfound freedom of companies from physical location and the subsequent spread of outsourcing jobs. No country had embraced tech outsourcing with the passion of India. Of late, problems there are beginning to rise: engineers start a project, get a few months' experience, and then bolt for greener pastures, bringing a level of attrition that replaces entire staffs within the course of a year. Combine that with salaries in Bangalore that are rising at 12% to 14% per year and it is no surprise that companies are leaving India for a slew of emerging hot spots for IT outsourcing such as the old Soviet Bloc, China, and Vietnam. This comes as companies such as Microsoft continue to laud outsourcing and proudly proclaim that it is here to stay, and it looks as if Ho Chi Minh City will be the next Bangalore.
posted on Dec 11, 2006 - View this thread

Rat race got you down? Grabbing for the brass ring? Looking for a land of jobs and opportunity? Live the Irish Dream!
posted on Oct 20, 2006 - View this thread

Straight Dope on the birth of the iPod from the sharp pen of WIRED's Mac maven Leander Kahney. Quoth Steve Jobs: "Most people make the mistake of thinking design is what it looks like. That's not what we think design is. It's not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."
posted on Oct 17, 2006 - View this thread

Help wanted: must be eligible for government secret clearance, and willing to forget everything you learned about intellectual freedom in library school.
posted on Sep 22, 2006 - View this thread

Much of the “jobs of the future” rhetoric surrounding the eagerness to end shop class and get every warm body into college, thence into a cubicle, implicitly assumes that we are heading to a “post-industrial” economy in which everyone will deal only in abstractions. Yet trafficking in abstractions is not the same as thinking...
posted on Sep 7, 2006 - View this thread

Little Citadels. "Dine, shop, live, work, and be entertained in a unique and alluring environment," says the Time Warner Center website - all without ever stepping outside your gleaming Manhattan skyscraper. San Jose's Santana Row, which at first glance seemed no more than a Beverly Center you can live in, is now being compared favorably to urban European living. And MGM-Mirage's new, mysterious and costly ($7 billion!) Project CityCenter brings the trend to Las Vegas - with gambling, of course. They're not Arcosantis - and they don't, as yet, require an Oath of Fealty - but by all accounts they're thriving. What do they have in common? Wealthy tenants, megacorporate sponsors, and a shared desire to integrate efficient, conspicuous consumption into every aspect of civic life. Paolo Soleri may have been right after all - maybe he just forgot to account for the effects of capitalism.
posted on Aug 28, 2006 - View this thread

"Workers were also told not to flirt with one another." After eight years of "fiasco", Wal-Mart bails on Germany.
posted on Jul 29, 2006 - View this thread

Dual Boot, Officially. Now that the contest is over, it could be time for both sides of the Cola OS War to put aside their differences and shake hands ... though not without a little good-natured snark: "Macs use an ultra-modern industry standard technology called EFI to handle booting. Sadly, Windows XP, and even the upcoming Vista, are stuck in the 1980s with old-fashioned BIOS. But with Boot Camp, the Mac can operate smoothly in both centuries." Oooooh ... burn.
posted on Apr 5, 2006 - View this thread

Bush's "pepperoni" defence of outsourcing. "India's middle class is buying air-conditioners, kitchen appliances and washing machines, and a lot of them from American companies like GE and Whirlpool and Westinghouse. And that means their job base is growing here in the United States. Younger Indians are acquiring a taste for pizzas from Domino's, Pizza Hut..."
posted on Feb 23, 2006 - View this thread

Bill Gates or Steve Jobs? Who is changing the world more for the better? Some people believe Bill Gates and Microsoft are the Spawn of Satan, while others praise him for his philanthropy. [subs. req'd] Steve Jobs has more buzz on the internets than Bill Gates and a near religious following for his products with Apple. One might not give like the other, but one definitely is much more Zen-like.
posted on Jan 25, 2006 - View this thread

Disney eats crow. Disney, whose former CEO Michael Eisner rejected the idea of Disney being hired to market Pixar's movies, who insisted on owning their sequel rights, and who apparently hoped Finding Nemo would flop so that he could get better negotiating terms with Pixar, is now in talks for buying Pixar outright for approximately $6.7 billion in stock. Steve Jobs gets his revenge... again. How much revenge? 50.1% of $6.7 billion dollars, apparently.
posted on Jan 19, 2006 - View this thread

CronyJobs.com
"Apply" now to secure a lucrative career both decrying and luxuriating in the spoils of Big Government! No experience necessary! Don't miss your chance to suckle greedily at America's soon-to-be-bankrupt bureaucracy teat!
posted on Oct 10, 2005 - View this thread

Costco pays its workers 42 percent more on average than its closest rival, Wal-Mart's Sam's Club. Even though this is Newsfilter, I was amazed to find that 'Wall-Street" may pressure businesses about their labor practices, and found Costco's approach encouraging these days.
posted on Jul 21, 2005 - View this thread

Legitimate Job Test or Something Wacky? H.J. Cummins of the Minneapolis Star Tribune writes about personality tests--never meant to screen job applicants--being used or misused by employers. Test sample items: "I see things or animals or people around me that others do not see." "My soul sometimes leaves my body." "I have a habit of counting things that are not important, such as bulbs on electric signs, and so forth."
posted on Jun 30, 2005 - View this thread

10 most bizarre employment cases of 2004 - At least two of these cases were previously discussed on Mefi. (1), (2)
posted on Apr 30, 2005 - View this thread

The worst jobs in history. Channel 4 takes you on a journey through 2,000 years of British history and the worst jobs of each era for minions like you and me. If you are curious whether you are best suited to be an Anglo-Saxon guillemot egg collector or a Georgian loblolly boy, take the career guide quiz. (via Malbec.
posted on Mar 20, 2005 - View this thread

How does your marketing salary compare?. The Aquent AMA Compensation Survey of Marketing Professionals 2005 has recently been released. (scary staring people warning). Or view the AIGA Aquent 2004 Designer Survey. Apologies - US salaries only.
posted on Mar 7, 2005 - View this thread

Fun with statistics. Why the PHB is a mathematical certainty.
posted on Feb 10, 2005 - View this thread

Speaker Touts Stripping to 8th Graders as a lucrative career, causing a collective freakout in our sex obsessed culture. If your considering stripping as possible career path here are some things that you should know.
posted on Jan 14, 2005 - View this thread

Why the Mac Mini may signal the end of Apple as a traditional computer company. Jobs might well be looking beyond Apple's role as a niche computer maker with this new product.
posted on Jan 14, 2005 - View this thread

BBC warns regarding dangers of being "dooced" Not long after making the Wired Jargon Watch, I finally got to see the term "dooced", in action as the BBC posts an article regarding the growing conflict between employers and employees when it comes to blogging.
posted on Jan 4, 2005 - View this thread

Ugh... As if working in an office isn't enough. This is one toy I will NOT be buying for my kid. I get the irony, but man, how depressing would it be to see this under the xmas tree?
posted on Dec 16, 2004 - View this thread

Overqualified: A new letter every Tuesday
Joey Comeau wrote cover letter after cover letter, listing the same store bought traits in the same wording, day after day, hoping to find another job. And then one day he just snapped a little. He sat down to write a cover letter, and something entirely new came out. So he sent it anyway, but also publishes them on the web. (Or at least he used to.)
posted on Nov 27, 2004 - View this thread

Fired from Friendster.com • Scott Sassa, CEO of Friendster, has canned a programmer named TroutGirl for blogging about her job in what appears to be a generally positive and non-specific manner. Some are suggesting we cancel our accounts in protest.
posted on Aug 31, 2004 - View this thread

Add to this week's professional “secrets”, and scams to rube employers another idea of work: one person’s career can be your next hobby.
posted on Aug 27, 2004 - View this thread

Outsource Your Own Job! -- "Says a programmer on Slashdot.org who outsourced his job: "About a year ago I hired a developer in India to do my job. I pay him $12,000 out of the $67,000 I get. He's happy to have the work. I'm happy that I have to work only 90 minutes a day just supervising the code. My employer thinks I'm telecommuting. Now I'm considering getting a second job and doing the same thing." " via BBspot.
posted on Aug 23, 2004 - View this thread

Tax Man Bush says tax cuts stimulate the economy. Unfortunately, he's fallen more than 2.2 million jobs short of the projection made by his own economists.
posted on Jul 28, 2004 - View this thread

Canadian Tax Dollars at Work I am sure there are some hard drinking working Metafilterites out there that could be Canada's official wine co-ordinator. You would have to give wine away to senior politicians and hard stuff like that.
posted on Jul 20, 2004 - View this thread

The Watchmaker Crisis - While mechanical and high-end quartz watches are becoming more and more popular in the U.S., over half of its watchmakers are nearing retirement age. The nation's 10 watchmaking schools just cannot attract enough apprentices, even though tuition is cheap or free.
posted on Jun 21, 2004 - View this thread

Sun Microsystems gives each employee a blog. Will other companies follow?
posted on Jun 8, 2004 - View this thread

The Outsourcing Bogeyman by economics professor Daniel Drezner describes the myths, facts and economics behind offshore outsourcing. There is also a critique and rebuttal on Drezner's blog. (via kuro5hin).
posted on Mar 24, 2004 - View this thread

Say goodbye to more jobs? This is an interesting research report from the Gartner Group on the future of banking, money and economic transition. One of the participants at a conference that Gartner cites is Bernard Leitaer, who is interviewed here. Leitaer is the author of the book The Future of Money. He argues " the malaise Japan has suffered since the early 1990s reflects an economic challenge the whole developed world has begun to face. Today, European and U.S. factories, too, suffer from overcapacity. The vaunted productivity growth spurred by the digital revolution has raised the economy’s stall speed. If the natural growth rate of the U.S. economy has risen to 4% annually, anything less than that rate will cause firms to trim capacity. A firm’s revenue growth often must come at the expense of competitors as well as its own profits because companies have trouble raising prices. In response, companies cut costs any way they can, usually by laying off employees and squeezing suppliers, which causes further layoffs. For developed countries, the safety valves that limited damage during contractions in manufacturing may not work. In past recessions, laid-off factory workers in the Great Lakes states, for example, could migrate to the growing Sun Belt to find new jobs. In the present transition, areas with job growth may lie overseas." The long heralded rise of the information economy, the death of distance and the rise of the global knowledge workers is paradigm shift that our goverment leader's seem ill equiped to handle.
posted on Mar 16, 2004 - View this thread

Interviewing with an Intelligence Agency (or, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Fort Meade) is a really fascinating read of one fellows experience while attempting to pass a security clearance for employment with the National Security Agency. Ironically enough I have to wonder if perhaps you need to be just a little bit crazy to do it. But of course crazy in a NSA/DOD friendly way, as opposed to standing on a table clucking like a chicken...
posted on Mar 15, 2004 - View this thread

Survey of design salaries 2003 - how do you compare? The American Institute of Graphic Arts and Communication Arts team up to offer a white paper summary of national and regional salaries and benefits for web designers and developers, copywriters, art directors, print production managers, freelancers, and related positions. The survey is based on responses from 3,184 people in 17 job categories. (28 page PDF)
posted on Mar 5, 2004 - View this thread

McManufacturing Jobs
posted on Feb 20, 2004 - View this thread

Best cover letters, ever. "Nothing has ever excited me the way that Dictatyping has. Nothing has ever moved me with such force."
posted on Feb 6, 2004 - View this thread

Another Letter I Should Have Written
posted on Nov 26, 2003 - View this thread