November 6th, 2009

Facebook profile privacy: Take control, student style

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 1:25 pm

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Multimedia, Security, Social networking, University, Weird and wonderful

Tags: Facebook, Advertisement, Privacy, E-mail, Online Communications, Zack Whittaker

A question arose in one of my seminars yesterday, asking whether universities spy on students through Facebook.

Yes, they do in many cases. But then the discussion evolved into another topic and this got me thinking. I get emails all the time asking about Facebook privacy settings and those who are worried about certain things being discovered, and the employment problems for future reference.

With the multitude of settings, and more often than not rather confusing and somewhat contradictory, how do you effectively lock down your photos, notes, profile and information, to not only certain people but everyone else outside your close-knit networks?

There are articles already on how to lock down your Facebook through the in-built settings, and this one is particularly good. However there are tricks and subtleties I’ll mention here which you may not have considered before.

Feel free to leave verbal heckles, but in the meantime - are you sitting comfortably? Shall we move on?

Network hacking to avoid staff/student snoopage –>

September 15th, 2009

IT support: Cut the jargon or find another job

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 7:49 am

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Gratuitous rant, Skills development, e-Learning

Tags: Job, DNS, Generation Y, Information Technology, SSL Certificate, SSL, Domain Name, Ssl/Tls, Domain Names, Authentication/Encryption

I had a phone call from an extended colleague working for a charity here in the UK. The website they have is throwing up SSL error messages due to the extended security in modern day browsers - Internet Explorer 8 and Firefox 3 are the best examples.

The domain name for the site stands, but the website is hosted by another company which has an SSL certificate for their own subdomain, which covers this charity’s website and every other website they host. When accessing the members-only part of the site, they are faced with an SSL certificate error, which is causing havoc with non-technical users and deterring them from using the site.

So from the charity’s domain name, hit the Login button and it throws an SSL error because the SSL certificate is issued to the hosting company’s subdomain, and not the charity’s domain name. It’s a domain name mismatch issue and quite common nowadays. Keeping up?

Their support response was to “advise your visitors to ignore this warning”. That threw me back quite some way. Is that really the best solution? Or perhaps installing another SSL certificate to accommodate the additional domain name would have been a better idea?

This colleague got in touch with me to ask for my advice after emailing back and forth for weeks, ladies and gentlemen. Weeks.

The first question she had asked was in fact spot on, “Can just purchase a certificate to cover our domain name?” Instead of giving her a valid response, they quite simply bounced around jargon and technical bull which would have made very little sense to someone outside of the IT community.

This happens every day, in every organisation, and this is what I truly hate - hate - about the computing industry. It’s the self-important, arrogant nonsense which IT professionals bounce around. They use language which confuses the lay person and causes them to feel inferior, when in fact they are the paying customer.

The reason people ask me for advice is because I don’t bounce around technical language, or when I absolutely must, I explain it in almost gratuitous detail so they actually learn from what I say. More often than not, they don’t just want an answer or a solution to the problem; they want to know what the problem was and learn from it.

One of my friends working for the Home Office didn’t go in for two days claiming she was ill, because she was too terrified to speak to the IT technician on call, because of the flurry of patronising and condescending comments she would have to endure as a result of not knowing something.

Another example was last year. I went to the IT support desk at the university with a friend whose laptop was playing up. I was hungover and tired, and didn’t have the energy. But I went for morale support because English wasn’t her first language. From memory, this is how it went:

IT support: “So what’s the problem?”
Friend: “The Internet won’t work. I plug it in and network doesn’t connect. I need to submit my work otherwise my marks will be zero.” [Bad English, I told you]
IT support: [sighed and rolled eyes] “Fine, open it up.”
[The laptop loaded and she put in her password]
IT support: “Well it’s clear to me that the DNS cache is clogged and needs to be refreshed, so I’ll open up a command prompt and flush out the DNS. I’ll resolve it and the IP configuration will automatically reset. If you [something, something] the DNS resolver will fail and the connectivity will cease.”

All good and well to me, as I understood roughly what was happening. For some reason, the DNS cache needed flushing out and the slate needed to be wiped clean. He did this in a matter of seconds and it was all good and well.

But the attitude he gave my friend - perhaps because of her lack of technical skill or the fact that she was did not speak in eloquent English tongue - he was clearly “attitudey” and made her feel like it was her who was in the wrong. Sometimes computers just screw up, and this was one of those occasions.

She left that office with a negative experience. But it was his fault, the spotty, rude and arrogant idiot who clearly shouldn’t be in a public facing job if he cannot grasp the concept of basic social skills.

So this is a plea to the IT community. For crying out loud, get a grip. Sure, you may hate your job and hate people asking you for advice when their computers or devices screw up. But you are a specialist in your field and are respected for knowing that knowledge.

So pull your finger out and learn some social skills, because I can tell you now, ladies and gentlemen, that the Generation Y will not put up with your attitudes. The Generation Y do not appreciate being patronised because we’re younger. The Generation Y will rip you to shreds.

Thoughts?

September 15th, 2009

Employment after college: Start off low, work your way up

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 6:13 am

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Events, Industry connections, Money, Skills development, Workplaces

Tags: Credit Card, Industry, Experience, Industry Connection, Sales Channel, Productivity, Financial Services, Strategy, Sales, Management

A question risen on the Guardian Money section asked:

“My daughter is off to university to study physics, but I’m concerned that she’s planning to do paid weekend (and possibly) evening work while there. We are not well off, so we can’t help out much, but I would prefer her to focus on her studies. What is the best paid work to combine with university studies? Or should she restrict earning money to her vacations?”

An interesting one which I have debated over many a minute of a frothing pint of English ale.

There is no doubt in my mind that I am one of the luckiest students in the country today. Not only do I earn a living working here online, or more specifically from my office at home, but I gain experience and industry connections and have the time to study also.

However the vast majority of students simply do not have the same luck as me.

What does annoy me to the root core of my being is when Daddy with a Range Rover and Mummy with the pony, give their child a credit card and any payments made are repaid by the parents. One student came to me (as a friend) in tears because, “Daddy cut off my credit card, and now I can’t go into town and buy clothes and have a good time”.

Had I not also been a welfare officer for the union, I probably would have slapped her and told her where to shove her sodding credit card.

So, you have a number of options. And considering this is a technology website, I’m somewhat limited to writing about the technology side of industry - but most are synonymous with other areas and industries.

Industry connections are important. A university-level education nowadays is worth diddly-squat. You can easily walk out of college with a first-class degree with honours in engineering or computer science. You can tell this to your office manager at your new job, and they’ll still tell you to make the coffee for everyone else.

During college, make the efforts to go to events, conferences and places where people within the industry you want to go into meet. Yes, they will be boring and most of the time you will question your own sanity at the boring tripe these people come out with. But making an appearance and a positive impression will do you well in the future.

But working in a local computer store - that is, if you are studying computer science - gives you the experience and the real-world scenarios that future employers want to see. Just because you have a piece of paper with your name on it doesn’t prepare you for what the real world throws at you.

How do you think medical students cope? They have years of lectures, seminars and medical training, but the only real-life experience they get is once they kill their first patient on their first day.

Not only do you get money for working but the experience is more valuable in the long run. It is important to remember that. Most jobs strive for previous experience which leads me to question as to how you gain this experience in the first place?

The answer is simple: by starting off low, and working in the crappiest of the crap, and working your way up.

If you want proof of this, do you remember where I used to work before getting this gig? Microsoft. You have to take some serious knocks in life to get to where you want.

September 9th, 2009

Real cash for virtual cash: FarmVille's business sense

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 6:03 am

Categories: Careers, Major breakthroughs, Money, Next-generation technology, Productivity, Skills development, Software development

Tags: Farm, FarmVille, Games, Personal Technology, Zack Whittaker

FarmVille has become of the most popular social game applications for Facebook for my generation, and the creators must be laughing in almost incomprehensible proportions at the millions they must be making.

The application is a simulation-based game that not only involves community spirit by other application users with gifts and extra tasks (which give the recipient farm coins to spend within their own game), but exploits the virtual cash (”farm coins”) based marketplace for real money.

See Screen Gallery: Real cash for virtual FarmVille cash

When a user accepts the game/application, you  are presented with a blank canvas with which you are expected to create a virtual farm. You can plant seeds and they grow over time, and when you harvest the produce you receive farm coins, which perpetuate further spending.

Like other simulation games, you build up to different levels and can purchase more and more items - decorations, animals, trees and produce of higher wealth which then give a more substantial return. It’s addictive and keeps you playing by offering the farm cash incentive.

I’ve been playing for only five days and the feedback received from the game in terms of farm cashflow, the experience level received and the number of neighbouring farms accepted (from other friends in my actual social network) all make the game quite addictive. It doesn’t take up much of my time and constantly offers further advancement to a better farm.

It’s pathetic that an online game has gripped me so much, but it’s truly fantastic. But what has impressed me more is the business side behind the scenes of the game itself.

If you tried hard enough, you could earn your farm coins and farm cash through buying and selling of produce and animals. This would take you through weeks of repetitive tasks. The urge to bypass this laborious process and inject your own, real money into the game to convert into farm cash and coins is constantly playing on my mind.

Until I did. I spent $160 (£97) in the course of one hour just so I could expand my farm and further my game.

The interesting side is the real money vs. virtual money system. While this isn’t a new concept, exploiting the popularity of the game and the exchange of real money for further tools, plants, crops and decorations would have no doubt gripped so many people - myself included.

The trick when generating games or applications such as these is the monetary remuneration. Nothing can be created for a truly free amount, therefore this system of money exchange has propelled Zynga, the creators of the game, into an entirely new dimension. The key fact here is that you don’t have to spend money to further your advancement in the game, but if you do then you have the opportunity to fast track.

The temptation to spend money to engage with this cultural phenomenon is constant, for myself at very least.

My point is that if you are a budding entrepreneur and struggling to consider ways of gaining financial reward from the software you create, something like this should be taken away with you to the next developer meeting.

Business software could work on a pay-as-you-use-a-feature process - such as Word which restricted areas of the application to only the very basic functions. By linking in your credit card and requiring the use of a feature - say a SmartArt feature once and once only - you pay a few cents to use the feature and as a result the overall price of the software would go down.

With this, every copy of the software would be suited to the person who may only use a small handful of features, each application would be customised for that particular person and piracy could also be nearly-eliminated.

Would this work? Could you see software going this way, or has Zynga got the nail on the head with their process? Comment away.

September 7th, 2009

Students exploit optical phenomenon to create 48-inch multi-touch surface

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 3:59 pm

Categories: Careers, Hardware, Major breakthroughs, Next-generation technology, Research, Skills development, University, Windows 7, diversITy, e-Learning

Tags: Multi-touch, Zack Whittaker

A group of engineering students at the University of Waterloo have recently completed building a 48″ multi-touch device, which could potentially rival the Microsoft Surface device, by exploiting an optical phenomenon.

The device is a massive multi-touch input and output screen, very similar in usage to a Microsoft Surface device but with a very different underlying technology. It was constructed during a fourth-year design project at the university. Running Windows 7, the first operating system to really utilise multi-touch technology, the input and feedback are impressive from the very start.

Although not an entirely new concept, the surface technology uses frustrated total internal reflection (FITR) where light reflects off the surface of an object such as prisms or fibre-optics. A real-life example would be to hold a glass of water and seeing the impression of your fingertips on the surface of the water.

In simpler terms of how FITR and indeed the device works, as described on their announcement post:

“If you shine light into the side of a sheet of acrylic, the light will be trapped inside due to total internal reflection. Now when you touch the surface, it ‘frustrates’ the light at that spot and so light escapes. You use a camera to capture this image and [through mathematics] figure out where the finger was pressed.”

Using FITR in this way isn’t new as was displayed by Jeff Han at the 2006 TED Conference in California. Multi-touch computing was being experimented upon in the 1980’s and since then, this concept isn’t the first FITR-based multi-touch device created.

What surprises me is the sighs and sounds of disbelief in the audience of the Jeff Han demonstration whereas now, we consider multi-touch technology as firmly embedded into our lives - the iPhone being a prime example.

But it’s still so damn cool.

What I am most proud of is the contributors to the blog where this is mentioned involve women in this engineering project.

Not only that, the university actively encourages participation of women in ‘non-traditional’ degree subjects, and clearly praises them when they are proud of the work and research they accomplish.

With female students clearly being as intelligent as they are to complete a project such as this, it again exposes the question of the glass ceiling in the IT industry. Even though I still believe the old boys network plays the major role in limiting women into success of higher paid jobs and those with greater responsibility, this will most definitely change when the old boys running the show either die or retire. Literally.

August 27th, 2009

Communications 101: How a single word cost me $100

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 4:16 am

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Productivity, Skills development, Social networking, Workplaces

Tags: Message, Twitter Inc., Generation Y, E-mail, Online Communications, Zack Whittaker

Yesterday, I woke up at the crack of dawn and narrowly missed my train into London. After walking half a mile through the city and mentally prepared myself for the interview of a position I was hoping to get, I realised I had misread the original email and that I was a month early. FML.

The story

Some weeks ago, I went through the motions of preparations for an interview for an open position, as part of a leading UK charity dedicated to a neurological condition I suffer from. Alas, time went by and correspondence was sent back and forth and eventually received a date and a time for an interview.

I was excited. But as the realisation of what I had already accomplished, the nerves set in as you would expect. The part of the message wrote:

“The Saturday 29th is now proving problematic. We wondered if you could make a meeting with us on the morning of Saturday 26 September at 11am instead?”

By now, it’s not too difficult to see the obvious mistake, but I had clearly missed it.

Read the rest of this entry »

August 4th, 2009

The glass ceiling and the next generation

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 8:24 am

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Industry connections, Legal and political, Money, University, Workplaces

Tags: Women, Information Technology, Glass Ceiling, Gender And Diversity, Human Resources, Zack Whittaker

The metaphorical glass ceiling exists still for too many people in the IT community. The ability to look up and see people, often men, progressing further in the company hierarchy but not being able to pass through it, is still a major issue on the agenda for women’s rights groups.

Eileen Brown, a good friend and unfortunate casualty of the Microsoft redundancies, considered whether men were to blame for the credit crunch. In this, Robert Peston, possibly the sole cause of the collapse of entire UK bank, wrote:

“The conventional explanation is that it’s a manifestation of the glass ceiling, of sexism in the City (and in politics, and in the public sector). Which is to say that women had a lucky escape: they are only innocent of this particular crime against global prosperity because men unfairly elbowed them out of the way in the unseemly race to the top.”

After speaking to Eileen, also a strategic panel member of the BCS Women’s Forum, she “truly believes that the old boys network is alive and well in most companies”, a reference to male-only private school graduates which cling onto the ledges of aristocracy and social elitism.

The key point here is equality: women are not trying to get automatic rights and hand outs, but the equal chance and possibility that those of men have.

From the Associated Content:

“Specifically, in the Information Technology field, there has been significant evidence which shows that both women and minorities have been prevented from attaining their true potential and have been undermined when it comes to wages and executive positions in this particular industry.

The problem in a wide range of careers had become so troublesome that The Glass Ceiling Commission was created as part of the Civil Rights Act of 1991. Its responsibility was to identify glass-ceiling barriers in order to promote employment opportunities for minorities and women, however barriers in the IT profession still need to be further discussed.”

Currently there is a case of weighing up the negatives between men and women in higher position jobs and jobs which demand more responsibility. Women sometimes choose to start a family which would allow them to take a year out of their jobs. If that job is a chief-executive position, the argument goes that it would be irresponsible and detrimental to hire that women in the first place.

Spinning this argument around, men are nearly three times more likely to develop antisocial personality disorder, symptoms of which would be catastrophic for a chief-executive position. My argument in this case is that I would prefer a woman who would leave after six months to start a family, than a man who is more likely to suffer from a condition which disregards safety of others, is impulsive with a lack of remorse and with a risk of stealing.

Smashing the glass ceiling shouldn’t just be a hope or a dream. Articles out on the web describe and explain how to take on this barrier and progress further and higher in the IT industry. But it isn’t the company as an entity which is the problem; the problem lies with the attitudes of the existing corporate aristocracy.

• Read more: Fixing failure: Shatter the technical glass ceiling
• Read more: Female leaders in technology [video]
• Read more: diversITy: the lack of women in the IT industry
• Read more: diversITy section on iGeneration

The first black British police chief-constable, Mike Fuller of Kent Police, believes he set an example by being promoted to the head of one of the biggest police services’ in the UK, and therefore proved there is no glass ceiling. Without wanting to cause a riot, there have been hundreds of years of black oppression whereas women of any background, ethnicity or culture are still being discriminated against.

Female leaders in technology met up this week at Stanford University to discuss how to get more women involved in technology. The ZDNet video can be viewed here. For female university students looking to break through the glass ceiling, the University of Westminster have a dedicated guide to run through.

Are you in the IT industry and faced the glass ceiling? What advice would you have to the next generation of IT workers?

July 27th, 2009

Five things for students to consider in the new workplace

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 3:41 am

Categories: Careers, Environment, Productivity, Skills development, University, University fun, Workplaces, e-Learning

Tags: Desktop, Job, Workplace, Beverage, Food & Beverage, Recruitment & Selection, Manufacturing, Human Resources, Workforce Management, Zack Whittaker

For most students who have just graduated, the thought of entering the workplace and leaving behind their friends and family (again) is a daunting and somewhat terrifying prospect. Eventually the nerves will subside and the path ahead of them will be clear: apply for jobs, promote yourself to the full and after much hard graft and arse kissing, you will land yourself a job.

Employers: You may find this a more relevant perspective.

I will tell you two things now. One, it will far from be the perfect job but it’ll no doubt be a stepping stone towards better and higher paid positions. Secondly, a degree really isn’t worth the paper it’s written on, so hopefully you will be able to cash in a few favours with those vital connections you made during your university experience. For all you know, the next chief-executive of a multi-national corporation could have been your roommate in your first year in halls.

Sadly, it really is who you know and not what you know.

For sake of disclosure, this is what I have personally experienced in the past. After speaking to a number of friends and colleagues (past, present and students), this list also represents the most common of them all.

Read the rest of this entry »

July 27th, 2009

Five things for employers to consider when hiring students

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 3:41 am

Categories: Careers, Environment, Productivity, University, Workplaces

Tags: Hiring, Workplace, Network, Recruit, Recruitment & Selection, Networking, Human Resources, Workforce Management, Zack Whittaker

At this time of year, no doubt a large portion of employers will have a pit in their stomachs, knowing they may well have to take on a bunch of new graduates, who swagger around thinking they are God’s gift to their subject whilst thinking they have the relevant life experience to support themselves financially, mentally and independently.

Students: You may find this a more relevant perspective.

The fact of the matter is that your workforce is slowly getting older, as are you, and times are changing as society often dictates. The thought of bringing on a new recruit straight out of university could well help the company at least for the short term, bringing new ideas and fresh perspectives to your department. You advertise well, pick a select few which might have the energy to bring something substantial to the team, and after much deliberation, you pick one - just one, for now.

But before you let them anywhere near your office, there need to be some unwritten ground rules put into place. Forget your existing staff for the moment; the new recruit will no doubt enter with a mindset hellbent on priming “inter-office relationships”, and productivity will be affected regardless of how you deal with it. What you need is to focus in on the mindset of the student, nip everything in the bud whilst you can and fix any further problems as you go along.

For sake of disclosure, this is mostly down to what I have experienced in the past. After speaking to a number of friends and colleagues (past, present and students), this list represents the most common considerations of them all.

1. Give them plenty of advice, direction and support.

Remember that new recruits can carry out tasks and their job to the full, but will still struggle on some level to cope with the office, the staff, the protocols and procedures, as well as the burden of trying to make a positive first impression. The psychological elements of being the new person in the office will stem all the way back to being the “new kid” at a different school. Try and picture a scared deer in headlights (number 1; number 2 is just a bit strange), and you will get a rough idea.

While they are still in their learning phase, it is important to ensure they are given constructive criticism to help them fulfill tasks in the future to a better quality, but praise is also very important to maintain self-esteem and boost confidence levels. With this, give extra, specific and almost gratuitous details of the task in hand but without sounding patronising.

Have a read up on Herzberg’s two-factor/hygiene theory and put yourself in the mindset of the new employee.

Read the rest of this entry »

July 24th, 2009

Next-generation students want careers in computing

Posted by Zack Whittaker @ 2:48 pm

Categories: Careers, Discussion, Research, Workplaces

Tags: Computing, Professional Development, Career, Zack Whittaker

Generation Z, the term referring to today’s teenagers who have yet to finish their studies or enter higher education, see the computing and technology industry as being their most likely choice of career.

In an online survey of just over 1,800 Australian teenagers, those aged between 12 and 18, say they would rather land themselves a career in technology based jobs, rather than careers in graphics design, teaching and acting.

One of the main reasons teenagers seek out careers in the technology industry is that they see the industry as self-perpetuating and survivable through recessions and bouncing trends, as well as having secure career prospects.

According to the AAP, only 5% of teenagers surveyed see a career as an IT professional as “geeky or boring”, whereas 30% wanted a career “on the cutting edge of technological developments”.

Wouldn’t we all?

As a bit of weekend banter, knowing what you know now about the length and breadth of how far technology goes in life - to mobile devices, space exploration, social networking and software development like we have never seen before - if you could go back to your teenage years and pick your ideal job or career, what would it be and why?