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Comment: Re:Bound to work... (Score 2) 144

by turgid (#43796741) Attached to: Immigration Reform May Spur Software Robotics

It's not racism, it's just a sad fact and here's my experience.

For several years I worked as a Software Engineer at Xerox in the UK and we survived for 3 years after the global economic crisis hit in 2008. But management, always looking to save a few percent on the Engineering budget every year (despite always breaking even and returning to profit), finally cut it to below a level where they could continue to fund us as a cohesive unit, so they did a deal with HCL where we were all transferred to HCL who could do the work for the price (allegedly) and provide more engineers!

So HCL's plan was to take as many of us as possible off the Xerox work and to replace us with Indians, sending us newly-acquired, expensive staff to do contract work for better-paying customers (many miles from home for months at a time).

The HCL CEO sold the story that Westerner engineers are spoilt, lazy and ignorant, compared with intelligent, diligent and self-motivated Indians.

What HCL provided was very young, inexperienced and very poorly-paid Indians, perhaps straight out of university, to acquire knowledge, pick up work and to train off-shore teams of similarly-inexperienced staff.

Nothing was impossible. They were instructed to say "yes" to everything.

They were posted here for 3 months at a time, often expected to assimilated decades-worth of institutional knowledge in that time and to work all the hours god sends.

You see, they were brainwashed that everything is possible if you just try hard enough and that success is entirely down to the individual. Managers wielded metaphorical sticks, and let me tell you, they had the pointiest hair I've ever seen.

This is "empowerment."

If you don't succeed, it's because you didn't try hard enough. Not that projects were completely mismanaged...

So these poor young men and women, being paid a pittance and with no living expenses for being in a much more expensive foreign country, were apart from their families for several months at a time and living in tiny rooms, expected to work night and day, to do the work of entire teams of people who'd taken a decade or more to learn their craft and getting shouted at and lied to by their management.

That's the reality, so cut these poor guys a bit of slack. It's not their fault. It's the fault of The System.

Comment: Outsource to HCL (Score 1) 292

They'll bring in fresh Indian graduates for no more than 3 months at a time at 20% each of what you're paying your local developers. When one guy finishes, he'll go back to India and his replacement will arrive. The only fly in the ointment is that he'll have to be trained from zero. And the cycle repeats.

Comment: Re:Royalty? Just say no. (Score 2) 214

by turgid (#43678877) Attached to: Did the Queen Just Resurrect the Snooper's Charter?

Phil the Greek is ace. He produces a never-ending torrent of politically-incorrect and quite amusing quips. LIke the one he asked the local driving instructor on a remote Scottish island: "How do keep the locals sober long enough to get them through the driving test?"

Money and/or votes can't buy that. It's priceless.

Comment: Re:The best reason for DRM (Score 1) 684

by turgid (#43584281) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Are There <em>Any</em> Good Reasons For DRM?

none of those links do anything but prove my point - rock is tedious and repetitive.

Aha, Mr Hipster, your irony does not escape me! For you obviously saw the link to the "rock" music that does not involve any guitars and was done entirely on synthesizers (and electronic drums played by a human) on scales that contain no conventional octaves.

don't you ever get bored of manufactured teen angst and synthetic teen rebellion?

Yes, I don't listen to BBC Radio 1, Scuzz or Kerrang! The music's better on Radio 4.

Or even just the sound of rock guitar and drums?

Occasionally, but I always miss my electric guitar adrenaline fix.

I am interested to hear what your definition of "not boring and repetitive" is.

Comment: Free speach (Score 1) 95

by Dynamoo (#43564105) Attached to: Suspect Arrested In Spamhaus DDoS Attack
Cyberbunker are trying to paint themselves as proponents of free speach (sic) and through some magic PR they've got Anon worked up into a frenzy. But I don't really equate being able to blast out pharma spam and hosting malware as a freedom that I cherish. Blocking traffic to and from 84.22.96.0/19 is pretty effective IMO.

Eternity is a terrible thought. I mean, where's it going to end? -- Tom Stoppard

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