No, I'm definitely part of the reason too.

It's ok, there's plenty of blame to share. Maybe you'd like some too, or did you use the power of your mind to add your reply to the Slashdot database?

The hardware is built from raw materials. They come from somewhere else, and who can say we aren't internally recharging a reasonable market rate for their purchase.

The hardware is built to a design. How much should we charge for that design? Which company and which country should we make that charge from?

The hardware is built for a cost. Why should we sell it for anything more than that cost? We could even sell it for a loss. Which of our subsidiaries should buy it ready for resale?

The hardware only exists because there is a market demand for it. We have tremendous expenses building up that market demand. We'd better transfer the cost of marketing too.

Profit? What profit?

Sure. Four companies that work explicitly in the IT space take people on.

The four hundred thousand non-IT companies have a very fucking different approach.

I see a fuck of a lot more millionaires in the movie industry than I do at my local garage.

It could be coincidence, or it could be because they're still charging fifteen quid for a film released three decades ago and demanding jail time for anybody that thinks its earned them enough money already and they should be incentivised into producing something worth watching now, not Fast and Furious fucking 6.

Yeah, you understand completely. That's exactly why the Infosys staff I worked with didn't want to move to the UK.

Or maybe it's because in the UK they wouldn't be able to afford multiple houses earning them a second income, a household staff so that the wife doesn't have to work, the early retirement they're planning to enjoy.

Indian salaries may be low compared to the UK or the US but Indian IT salaries are way off the scale when you factor in the cost of living.

The big problem is that the pipeline's been cut off.

You used to be able to interview 20 local people and get a choice of great candidates because the local people had come through the ranks and had to learn their shit.

These days you don't take on junior people and train them up. For the same money you can get the already experienced person over from India, or Malaysia, or China, or Bulgaria. Or if you're a multinational, don't even get them over: Open the office there, it's even cheaper.

So there aren't the junior learning roles, the apprenticeships, the low paid jobs in which people can learn the skills and become the great IT people we need.

It's a fucking tragedy and it's taken a failure of the outsourcing model to reveal the sudden disconnect and gap that's been created, and it's going to be another decade before that gap starts to be filled.

So right now it's actually true: there is a shortage of great people. Not because the locals aren't capable, or couldn't become great, but because there just haven't been the openings to let them develop those skills.

Articulating algorithms in your programming language of choice isn't rocket science, but neither is welding a fuel tank. The analysis, mathematics and design that occurs before you do either of those things is more comparable than you think.

Yes, of course.

Sadly being British, human and/or alive is also considered a terrorist offense here too. The law really is that badly written.

Agreed. My company provides a warm secure well equipped environment in which I can do my job. If I choose to work in a warmer more secure even better equipped environment of my own choosing then they're very graciously not stopping me; why would I expect them to pay me extra?!

If only there were third party apps that let you secure access to exchange on iPhone and Android devices.

Oh. There are. Fucking hundreds of them.

Remind me, what's the current exchange rate on Palestinian children to Israelis?

I can make that concession only because even war follows some rules, and Aussie football clearly does not.

Meanwhile I can find and use the email address of your head of HR and include within my application a suggestion that I can help them move off archaic technology and attract candidates that want to work with forward looking companies.

Or I can just apply for a job with a forward looking company.

His wife is an idiot, she's driving away potentially great candidates with her artificial barrier to entry.

I greatly dislike prostitution. I regret that some people feel it's the only way they can earn a living. I would prefer that there wasn't a market for such services.

None of that makes me hate people that provide such services.
None of that makes me a bigoted twat that hates transgendered people for no reason other than my own ignorance.

I'd rather be a clown.

Terrorists in the newly declared 'Islamic State': 10,000ish
Terrorists supporting Hamas: 40,000ish

Lets assume that half the Muslim terrorists in the Middle East are inexplicably not aligned to either of the above causes.

Even those generous estimates leave the number of Muslim terrorists just half the size of the organisation actively bombing children, making people homeless and preventing a normal life for millions.

I guess I just have a different definition of 'terrorist' to you.