I have personally been through this. When companies (or at least the sales people in companies) aren't making their monthly quota they start to get desperate and throw every piece of trash against the wall to see what sticks. I used to think this was a bad thing so I feel a certain kinship to this author. As a developer the consequences of delivering, or attempting to deliver what they told/sold the customer causes their requests to become more and more asinine until eventually they are selling software with features only found in fairy tales.

But just because sales has started promising free elevator rides to the moon so that customers will buy your product does not give you an excuse to not build it... that is what we, as developers do. We make the impossible seem easy, we make it seem magical. That is the career path we have chosen. Alas, perhaps you're not that talented. Perhaps you should consider a job at best buy and continue the 9-5 grind.

The path I will suggest is arduous it will not be paved with roses and cupcakes. Yes, projects will crater, and the disasters will be spectacular -- with enough shrapnel flying every direction to damage everybody. Your companies reputation will become the equivalent of a "turd sandwich", and you will on some days resemble an angry hobbit screaming rants in languages long since forgotten during this age of men. You will need to bend time, and find a way to work 30 hours a day, and your body odor will, at times cause small children and virtuous women to shun you. (It helps if your office has a shower) .. But your skills through this process, they will become uber, nay.. "legendary".

Some slashdot trolls here will say that what I propose is impossible - that you cannot dodge bullets shot at you at point blank range -- but they don't realize you won't need to dodge the bullets at all.

So if you believe the force runs deep and strong in your blood young padawan, then trust it. Give yourself over to it, let it control you and guide you. You'd be amazed what you can do with the blast shield down if you just fucking try.

Oh.. and to respond to your question: True JEDI's don't apply for jobs, they choose which job they want and take it.

ps> After 7 years as CTO .. I ended up getting the CEO's job. (true story)

Assumption: the 'product' of a news channel is the education of their viewers.

Schools are given scores based on how they educate students.

Seems a similar grading scheme could be applied to news organizations based on surveys of their 'regular' viewers (students).

It would be valuable for [news channel] to be able to say "our viewers are smarter, and better informed than the other guys when it comes to facts."

Leading to the slogan: don't be dumb, watch [our channel]. Our viewers scored 75% smarter than the other guys.

Seriously - we should be able to grade news channels based on the job they do, or rather *should* do.

This grading could even be segmented further into topics revolving science, elections, politics, religion, etc. Hopefully this would lead to less time being spent on analysis, or at least more fact checking on pundits and their outrageous claims.

On a personal note: I'm normally a CNN viewer. I agreed to watch Fox for a day because my parents told me "how much better it was".
The first story of the day was about the LHC and it was titled "Doomsday machine starts tomorrow" after that I turned off the TV. I booted up world of warcraft and ignored the news for the rest of the day! it was fun.. I should do that more often.