There are about 3.5 million in IT, according to the BLS.

There are over 1 Million cheap workers here on the H1/L1 Visa program. That's quite a sizeable percentage of the total U.S. employment. And it's FAR greater than the total number of unemployed IT workers.

The basic fact is that if you want to eliminate or seriously reduce unemployment in the IT sector in the U.S., all you have to do is to eliminate all of the H1/L1 visas.

This would have the added benefit of opening up jobs to those in other fields (like the automotive industry). Yes, there would have to be some retraining. But we have such programs around, and they are a lot better than the fake educational systems (I.e. diploma mills) overseas.

It's time to eliminate the guest worker programs, and send the H1/L1s back home.

That's the truth. Sun, Xen and even Microsoft are giving VMWare a run for their money nowadays.

There's one interesting thing which has struck me, that I haven't seen any comments on. Namely, that VMWare is stuck competing between Microsoft on the one hand, and several Open Source projects on the other (with some of the Open Source projects having serious financial backing).

Being positioned between Microsoft and Open Source generally hasn't been a good spot to be in (indeed, has anyone succeeded here?). So I have to wonder how VMWare is going to stand up in the future?

I've been a big fan of VMWare in the past, as it has saved my butt more than once. However, now I find myself using Xen more, and seriously considering Sun's offerings.

To VMWare's credit, they have arguably the best person in the world for the job as CEO (at least on paper). Some might remember Paul Maritz as being one of the top people from Microsoft, as well as having led Microsoft's original *NIX strategy (I.e. Xenix). So if there's anyone who can compete there, it is him.

But still, it is not an enviable position to be in, and it makes me wonder how they are going to compete in the long term? Especially since, from a technology basis, the Open Source efforts are arguably better.

Anyone care to add some insightful comments on this? The only way that I can see VMWare winning is if everyone else screws up. While that's possible, there's a lot of money at stake in the Virtualization field, and I think the odds of that happening are low.