Out of work... :-(

[gerti]

With fax technology going the way of the Dodo, I just found out that the Fax-over-Internet company I had been contracting for as lead developer for the last 10 years has decided to go out of business. I wish the prospect of short-term more shop time would somehow make me happier...

If anyone knows of any software developing work, preferably Mac OS X and Cocoa, but also Linux and perl, please let me know!

Gerd

[gjbivin]

You know linux and perl; you have more advantages than me. I've been out of work for several months now, and am having a difficult time finding anything I qualify for. I was at my last job for 12 years, which meant that the field moved 12 years further on while I basically was doing the same things I had been. Just knowing C or C++ isn't good enough any more. Everybody (at least in the Phoenix area) wants Java, linux, web development, SQL, and so on. The fact that I never got a degree is a big minus, too.

Good luck in your search! I hope you have better luck than I have.

OK, enough whining: back to making sawdust...

[gerti]

You know linux and perl; you have more advantages than me. I've been out of work for several months now, and am having a difficult time finding anything I qualify for. I was at my last job for 12 years, which meant that the field moved 12 years further on while I basically was doing the same things I had been. Just knowing C or C++ isn't good enough any more. Everybody (at least in the Phoenix area) wants Java, linux, web development, SQL, and so on. The fact that I never got a degree is a big minus, too.

Bummer!!! I pretty much made similar experiences though. Application development seems to either not be happening at all or being outsourced to countries with lower wages. The majority of the work offered is either web design or sysadmin, where they seem to want folks that know everything and are willing to work for $20/hour.

Good luck in your search! I hope you have better luck than I have.

Good luck to you too! Hope things pick up for both of us.

[wreckwriter]

My company is closing May 31 so I sure know the feeling...

[Bruce Cohen]

How about 4 Years

I was the Creative Director for a medium sized Ad agency in NYC.

Unfortunately, the majority of our clients were Internet or Internet-related companies. All we did was B-to-B, no consumer stuff. At one time, there was so much business, we resigned a 40 Million (yeah, 40 Million) a year client. Mainly because they were mostly 20-somethings and had no business getting $75 Million in venture capital. Two weeks after we fired them, we picked up 3Com, (remeber them) which more than made up for the account we fired.

Anyway, when the dot com's had their melt-down, so did the agency.

Since then, I've worked at Home Depot for the amazing salary of $13.00 an Hour, then an independant kitchen design firm for mainly for commission, and at the moment I'm back on unemployment once again.

The moral of this odessy is what I use as my signature "Ain't technology great"

I'll probably be way too old to take a good job, if it ever comes around.

Bruce

[just4funsies]

I got tired of getting fired about 13 years ago now, so I started my own business. Now the only one who can fire me is ME (and I have been tempted to do so several times, because I often can't get me to do things the way I told me to do them...).

Seriously though, don't rule out the possibility of putting your skills to work to benefit YOURSELVES. It's scary at first, but the satisfaction potential is considerable. Best of luck to all y'all.

[rbfunk]

Both the wife and I got booted to the curb with the dot.com bomb and off-shoring. The only advice I can give is that if you have the opportunity, get yourslef into something that can't be done offshored. I can see that anything that can be done cheaper somewhere else is going to be done somewhere else. It's the most shortsighted corporate policy that I can think of. Save a buck today and ignore the risks of tomorrow.
Bob

[gerti]

I got tired of getting fired about 13 years ago now, so I started my own business. Now the only one who can fire me is ME (and I have been tempted to do so several times, because I often can't get me to do things the way I told me to do them...).

Seriously though, don't rule out the possibility of putting your skills to work to benefit YOURSELVES. It's scary at first, but the satisfaction potential is considerable. Best of luck to all y'all.

Well I am selfemployed (I contracted for that job I described), and have been so for 25 years. But with the market the way it is possible clients seem to prefer hiring, as they can pretty much dictate the wages currently. It doesn't help that OS X/Cocoa is a niche market, and as far as Linux is concerned there seem to be plenty of folks willing to work for very little money.

[dlminehart]

Ditto from me. Did prepress and publishing tech support for years. Come the dot.com bust and corresponding drop in tech advertising, and therefore in tech publishing, and I got laid off. Took over a year to find a job, with a 77 mile commute each way at half my last salary (in fact, less than I was making 12 years ago, but with all that expertise still required plus a lot more), with more expensive gas expenses, credit card and home equity debt, and other costs the same or higher. Many of the jobs that are turning up locally include preferences for those with experience working with Asian teammates, knowledge of Chinese languages, familiarity with facilitating outsourcing efforts, change management, etc.

As Bob says, if it can be offshored it will be. Especially if it involves making or knowing something, without a need to actually be physically present. E.g., to fix a leaky pipe, one needs to be there. To speak to someone, even if it involves seeing them while speaking, one can often do it through electronic media. Medical exams will involve an low-paid local technician generating digital data that'll be transmitted to India or China for experts to evaluate, at costs half that in the US. Divorce lawyers may do OK, but routine corporate law work will be increasingly offshored. Where Americans have long been going abroad to less expensive medical schools, they'll be going abroad for engineering and business as well (my daughter starts college in the fall, and I've been wishing we'd looked earlier at Canadian or European options). I imagine even a lot of aspects of real estate work will be outsourced, as folks get used to viewing homes online, FedEx-ing documents for signatures, etc.

The scary thing is that most of our citizens and politicians don't have a clue. Politics, of course, can't be outsourced (any more than it already has been!) so those guys can perhaps be excused. But the folks that go into debt buying piles of needless crap (and imported, at that) while voting for politicians who spend all OUR money (and then some, and then a lot more, of what amounts to our children's and grandchildren's money) on stuff that is not improving our international competitiveness but is in fact making us increasingly dependent on the Chinese government's loaning us billions a day . . . well, the dot com bust showed how fast things can implode, and how flimsy a sense of entitlement can be.

[jziegler]

It seems like this hits just about everyone in the tech field at some point. Hardware design jobs are tough too right now. I had worked in the telecom equipment field (optical backbone amplifiers), and got laid off when the whole business was going to China. I got brought back in as a consultant to do a little more work, then the whole thing got sold to Malasia, I think. Offshoring strikes again.

There are good jobs out there, it just takes time to find them. It seems like all of the companies want to hire an engineer that has done the exact same thing before. Makes it hard to find something. Companies also seem slow in responding after interviews in some cases. I had one finally get back to me months after the fact, when I was about to start my current job.

A bit of advice, look for a more heavily regulated industry if you can. Yes, there's more paperwork involved. But, that also makes it a little bit harder to offshore. Also, small to midsized compaines seem less interested in offshoring. I'm currently working for a midsized medical imaging company, and there is no talk at all about sending even production overseas that I have heard.

Good luck to all of you that are currently unemployed, in the end, it may work out for the best (it did for me).

Jim

[jAngiel]

You also may want to look into positions with government contractors that require a security clearance. I think it will be a while before the government will allow those postions to be pushed offshore. I have some relatives that are in those positions and they seem to be doing pretty well.