I've been sitting on this item all day. Technically, it's about patents and the like, and even I understand I've been beating this dead horse so often it almost looks like it's alive. However, this is an interesting opinion piece by Craig Hockenberry, long-time employee at The Iconfactory, one of my favourite software development houses - these guys breath software and beautiful design, and employ one of my favourite artists, David Lanham. The gist of his story? Software patents are killing the independent developer scene.
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Member since:2011-01-28
rhavyn,
Someone I know used to live near there and said there were empty buildings everywhere and that it looked like a deserted ghost town. I don't know how true it is, but on employment boards SV has a reputation for being much less viable than it once was:
http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6987699n
Then again it could all be bias. All I know is that it has been extremely frustrating for me. I have exceptional skill in some areas, but getting a job which fits is a never-ending struggle. I resort to doing low end webdev work, mostly through connections, but the pay is terrible and the work is boring - I'm an algorithm guy. I'm quite depressed about it, I don't know what to do any more.
...enough with the personal sob story though, on to better topics!
Member since:
2005-07-06
I don't know where you live but in Silicon Valley there are definitely more jobs than qualified candidates for software engineering positions. But beware, most Silicon Valley software companies file for patents.