•
In the past, we've talked a bit about issues of gender and technology , but today, this blog post brought another important aspect of tech and discrimination to our attention. We polled some of our friends on Google Buzz and asked whether ageism is something they've seen at work or that has effected their lives. And the responses were interesting - although some say they try to be as even-handed as possible, others said that age discrimination exists at both ends of the spectrum, especially when it comes to landing a job. Let us know your experiences and opinions in the comments. Sponsor What Experts Say A 2001 article from CIO started a conversation about ageism in IT. The response was dramatic. "Within days of being asked 'Do CIOs Discriminate Against Older Workers?' about 200 readers had posted answers; a majority of them gave a resounding yes... workers age 55 and older make up only 6.8 percent of the IT workforce." A couple years later, a 2003 study from the International Journal of Selection and Assessment explored how older and middle-aged programmers fared in the tech workforce. Results showed "that age was negatively associated with both annual salary and job benefits levels." But in 2009, another study showed what could have been seen as a turning tide. "The study, ' The Coming Entrepreneurship Boom ,' found that... the United States might be on the cusp of an entrepreneurship boom - not in spite of an aging population but because of it... The average age of U.S.-born technology founders when they started their companies was 39." What People on the Ground Say Perhaps the graying set are doing well as entrepreneurs, but what about when they apply to be programmers, information architects, web designers or other traditionally "young" jobs? In a lively conversation on our Buzz account , Aaron Hayes told us that ageism is alive and well, saying, "I turned 40 this year, and even though I can write Python circles around some... [and] have run several of my own small businesses - somehow, because the metabolic process of my cells has been occurring for several solar rotations beyond a subset of unspoken rules, I can be dismissed by some as a viable candidate for a startup. "And this apparently because people that have experience clearly can't have youthful enthusiasm, or passion." Even though, as Ruggero Domenichini said in the same thread, older employees might have "less ego, nothing to prove, been through failure [and] lived more." And person after person said that they had either hired older programmers and been totally pleased with their fit and performance or - in one case - not hired someone because of age and regretted it ever since. What Do You Say? We're interested to know what your experience has been, either as a younger startup exec faced with hiring decisions or as an older programmer working in IT. On a personal level, I have a great deal of respect and admiration for the older techies in my life - especially as I begin to earn a few gray hairs of my own. My old-as-dirt dad is a fabulous network engineer, and a lot of the best developers and entrepreneurs I know have lived long enough to have a mature, realistic and stable view of their abilities, the ecosystem and their colleagues. And in an amendment of the famous "Never trust anyone over 30" quotation, I'd have to say I'd gladly take the word of a 50-year-old who knew his stuff over a 25-year-old entrepreneur starting his first company. And the hypothetical 25-year-old would do well to take his older colleague's advice seriously, as well. As always, let us know what you think in the comments. Discuss
The rest is here:
Open Thread: Old Fogeys v. Young Whippersnappers, Ageism in Tech
Tags:
attention,
companies,
experiences,
friends,
ground,
international,
older,
open thread,
people,
python,
tech,
United States
•
U.S. authorities have tracked down the hacker who wrote the code behind the attacks on Google last month. The man is a freelance security consultant with ties to the Chinese government and military. The Chinese government had access to his work, although the man stated he "would rather not have uniformed guys looking over his shoulder, but there is no way anyone of his skill level can get away from that kind of thing," according to one analyst. This development makes it even more difficult for the Chinese government to deny involvement in the attacks. Sponsor The hacker, if he can even be called such, posted bits of his code to a hacking forum as a work in progress. Although this man did write the code, which exploited a security loophole in IE6, he does not work full-time for the government. He didn't launch the attacks himself, and the U.S. cybersecurity team that tracked him down said that he didn't want his work to be used for attacks of this nature and magnitude. The spyware's launch was traced to computers at Shanghai Jiaotong University and Lanxiang Vocational School, the first of which counts former government cybersecurity experts among its staff. Both institutions have denied involvement in the attacks. As U.S. officials continue their investigation, cybersecurity folks and others familiar with the situation wonder at how this series of attacks positions China in the international sphere. Does this news signal the beginning of a new East v. West cold war? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. Discuss
More here:
Chinese Hacker Behind Google Attack Found
Tags:
attacks,
China,
code,
international,
news,
thoughts,
work,
wrote-the-code
•
For months, we've been fielding rumors (and filtering out the facts) about MySpace's proposed redesign and rebranding. Tonight's report on TechCrunch outlines a few minor details of the overall plan to stop the site's hemorrhaging users and stem its financial decline. As we've known (and as we predicted last year), the site will shift its emphasis from pure social networking to content discovery and recommendation. The site's tagline is expected to change to "Discover and Be Discovered." But is that really enough to bring users back? What would it take for you to start regularly using MySpace again? Sponsor Disclosure: The writer of this post has been privy to a great deal of internal information about the redesign due to personal connections in the L.A. and S.F. offices. Because of confidentiality issues and NDAs, much of that information cannot currently be published here. We will do our best to let you know official MySpace news as it breaks. With the abrupt firing of CEO Owen Van Natta two weeks ago, we are reminded of his initial duties when he was hired less than a year ago. In addition to dealing with internal politics and negotiating the end of MySpace's ad deal with Google, Van Natta was expected to give MySpace much-needed boost in the areas of technology, branding and features. While it's unknown exactly how much of the forthcoming "new" MySpace will represent Van Natta's vision, we do wonder if anything is enough to save that sinking ship. Of course, the site still has a large userbase, particularly in the international market. But what do techies want to see before they start using the site again? The outlook isn't good, to say the least. We conducted an informal poll on Twitter, asking what folks would need to call themselves MySpace users. While a slew of respondents said bribes - from money to puppies to MacBooks - would do the trick, the noble @EricBurgess replied "They couldn't even pay me." @_Tycho_ wrote that the site would have to "be easier to use than Facebook, and then convince my friends to all go back on." A tall order, indeed, and one echoed by several others. But usability and attrition/retention aside, many users gave a common ultimatum: MySpace would have to do anything they try - from social networking to content and beyond - better than Pandora, Facebook or Twitter do the same things. Granted, in terms of content discovery, Facebook's not particularly kind on musicians or filmmakers; as evidence, you can check out some of the remaining MySpace users. If you've visited the site lately, your list of active friends might look like a wasteland of struggling bands. But is a new content recommendation engine packed with multimedia goodies and intuitive discovery tools enough to regain the public's love and trust? What do you think - is a site redesign enough to make you want to use MySpace again? Can the site succeed as a content platform rather than a social network? Or is MySpace doomed to sink like the Titanic, regardless of the products or features they roll out? Let us know your opinions in the comments. Discuss
See the article here:
Open Thread: Can MySpace Really Make a Comeback?
Tags:
check-out-some,
facebook,
forthcoming,
friends,
international,
MySpace,
Pandora,
poll-on-twitter,
social-networking,
titanic