Not anymore. Fat devs and programmers don't get hired on as full time staff anymore. If they manage to get hired at all, they'r contractors. If you're under thirty and skinny, basically, then you will be hired because you're perceived as being a minimal risk in light of rising health care costs. Oh, and you send the informal corporate message that Health is In.

Dude, I got no problem with socks and sandles guys. Knock yourself out--hell, send me photos of yourself giving me a goatse in socks and sandles and I'll critique your thread counts and anal wrinkles. What I have a problem with are senior devs that smell like they live in a dumpster that's been coated with the oils from their armpits, wear clothes that came from said dumpsters, and who insist on eating only vegan bean soup from Whole Foods for every meal because they are recovering from an eating disorder (and gawd forbid I should eat anything else other than vegan bean soup from Whole Foods around them because I might trigger their eating disorder again or a sudden food allergy they didn't know they had until yesterday). AND said dudes make a LOT of money--more than enough to hire a therapist to help coach them through managing sensory input and a maid service for their clothes.

but gawddamn, if I meet ONE more unshaven skinny ratty-haired white dev/programmer in his late twenties/early thirties with an aversion to water, soap, matching colors and food (what is it with devs and eating disorders???) here in Seattle, I might just have to defenestrate the fucker to save my sanity. Preferably out an upper window at the downtown Macy's, so that said dev/programmer might actually observe cleanliness and fashion through visual osmosis prior to becoming one with pavement. I don't care if said beautiful mind is autistic, aspie, or what-not--Hygiene is source code!!!!!! Execute it on a daily basis! And if the sensory stimulus is THAT much of an overload then spend some of your six figure salary to get therapy and coaching on how to minimize input while maximizing the ability to incorporate the close proximity of other people!!! I much prefer the Indian and Chinese devs and programmers, not least because they don't have eating disorders and they both understand and practice a minimal standard of hygiene.

One more level down--that politician was elected by a population that is overwhelmingly white, elderly, doesn't travel much, gets their news from television, and has elevated children to the level of sacred cows.

There's a basic foundation that's roughly agreed upon, delineated by rules and best practices. Once those are mastered, then coding becomes an art form. And as art it can be subjective, defy description and all apparent rules of logic, and yet work incredibly well. If there's one thing I've learned on /. over the years from reading all the arguments between coders, it is that there is more than one way to become a master of one's craft (where coding is considered) and that coding becomes Art. Which I personally think is cool.

Because if those kids are brown or black skinned, then we don't want to feed them. Tribe comes first and foremost. Always.

Because we don't want to give blacks, hispanics, Arabs and freeloaders the same benefits and privileges that middle-to-upper class White, South Asian, and East Asian Americans enjoy.

In my experience, harsh language is best tempered (and employed) by someone who uses it to judge the situation and provide correction, in such a manner as to insure it doesn't happen again. The language used gets as personal as it needs to, and no further. Ideally, no personal attacks would be used, just a critique of the work. And if that person who employed it happened to be in the wrong, they apologize. Does Linus acknowledge his own mistakes? And, if Linus goes over the line, does he acknowledge and apologize for it? If he does, then he'd be someone I'd want to work for--because I know that the occasional negative reinforcement would be beneficial and it's not personal. From what I understand, Steve Jobs was that way at Apple: a giant asshole, but capable of admitting when he was wrong, and backing his team to the fullest.

This is actually a very good piece of advice. Now that I'm in my late thirties and an established professional, I am shocked at how many of my peers don't know how to cook, clean, handle money, or their domestic affairs in general. These are invaluable skills to have, and form the basis for many good jobs.

Particularly west of the Mississippi and excluding Californians (Californians: like Floridans except less crazy)?

But there's a lot of people, especially on /., who refuse to acknowledge that, because it threatens their beliefs.

I get what you're saying, Curunir, but I have to agree with OP because the men and women making these decisions are looking at the business like a game. And in that perspective, American workers do cost too much. To illustrate this, I'm going to give anecdotal evidence based on experience.

I work with/for men and women who are VPs and product/program managers. Every single one of them has an MBA, and every single one of them knows the business aspect of our given technology field. They are all upper class white American Anglo-Saxon protestants who came from upper class/upper middle class families. They view our business as one big game--a very intricate, intriguing, and never-ending game. They take this game very seriously, and they pay attention to the technology and quality issues insofar as it advances the business. And business is all about profit, loss, and sustainability. Because they're all MBAs, they're all aware that every company and every business venture has a life cycle. If they happen to be employed for a company that's in the beginning half of its life-cycle, then they will make decisions that 1) grab maximum market share, 2) produce profit, and 3) reduce losses. Everything they do falls in those three criteria. If they determine that the company they are employed in has reached maturity and will start sliding towards dissolution, then they adjust their priorities to 1) Maximize profits, 2) cut costs, 3) Extend profitability. This turns their business into a cash cow that gets milked, taken over, disassembled, and outsourced. As such, they'll pay for American talent during the start-up phase, but once the business has reached maturity and maximum market share, that is when they lay off the American talent and get H1B's/talented college grads to come in for a third of the operating cost in terms of salary cap, to operate the business for as long as they can before the profits give out. It is how business works, and short of going very protectionist and starting trade wars, that will always be how it works. The worst is, if YOU were to be a business owner, you would have to fight against being seduced into that mindset.

Rachel? Battle Mountain? Ely? Or waaaaaaaaaaay out in the boonies?

If one has a strong currency, then one commands the privilege of the market. That means one would get first pick of new opportunities, new investments, and everyone wants to do business because of that strong currency. What you pointed out is the adverse consequence of having a strong currency--lots of buying power, but limited ability to actually generate new income. Strong currencies benefit the investor class and continues to give them privilege in the market--and to a degree, at the expense of everyone else.

This is the clearest, most coherent argument in favor of Swartz's side I've ever read. Now I better understand the context of why his suicide matters. The whole "blame the USDoJ" thing didn't quite make sense to me. Adding in the extreme difficulty of trying to get access to research journals due to paywalls and other "closed-shop" barrier tactics of the academic journal world plus MIT's reluctance to challenge that culture and stand up for Swartz--now that make sense and gives me context. I wish someone had phrased this point in such a succinct manner when it all first erupted.