Yeah I get the jokes "but it's China of course it's spyware".. everyone seems to ignore the sentence in the summary "After the researchers got in contact with companies that developed these keyboard apps, the majority of the loopholes were fixed".

The same people that say China is incompetent at tech then blames them for willingly having this security flaw. Pick a lane! In this case it's much likely to just be incompetence. After all, they don't need an intentional security flaw; even if the traffic was 100% secured to the Baidu servers, the only thing the government needs is say "Baidu, please give me all the data in your servers".

I appreciate the response. I also have an engineering degree and an MBA, and my experience has been a bit difference than yours.

In my personal experience, the education (both engineering and MBA) taught me basic skills. It may have shaped how I approach problems (split into logical blocks, try to understand every single detail of every situation and the exception cases, etc.), but not the worldview. Even during the MBA, other than some operations classes where you had to optimize for output / profit, most of the others were just basic knowledge. Perhaps the school was different from others too; it heavily emphasized doing right for society, and that was discussed in many of my classes.

On the other hand, after my MBA I've been put in position where my ethics are assailed more frequently. The jobs you get out of an MBA put you smack in the middle of modern capitalism. You end up in managerial or advisory positions, where the good of the corporation is the party-line, and THAT is focused on profit (or you're told it is). You're right in the sense that MBAs tend to work in specific roles, where capitalistic thinking prevail, whereas engineers can work in positions where profit-making is a secondary objective. That doesn't mean the education or the people are intrinsically worse (in the sense of.. more capitalistic), though they've chosen that path. The jobs are just different. In one, it's to make sure the engineers develop a product that makes money, and in the other, it's to develop that product.

A Youtube coder can hate the fact they have to inject ads everywhere, but they do it anyway or someone else will. The manager of that coder can hate the fact they've been told to told their teams to work on the ad project. The VP can hate they've been told to increase profitability in under a year, and could only come with ads as a solution. You can blame the MBA VP, but do you have much better solutions when your job is literally "increase profits now"?

Anyway the sad part is it's a vicious cycle, and I don't have an inkling of a solution on how to break it. I fundamentally dislike this race towards uncapped growth, but I see no escape.

Kudos for admitting it - same for me, I've had to "make decisions" I disagreed with, but it's that or me losing my job with a mortgage on my head. So I justify it to myself. It sucks. Also, your signature quote is on point.

MBA students don't learn a lot of content either. Honestly the MBA is basically a coding bootcamp; it makes sure everyone has some basic knowledge of the field (101-level or so of finance, accounting, strategy, etc.), that's about it. Most of the "learning" is how to present yourself to others, how to work in teams, how to network, adding a bit of "polish" to you as a person. Nothing complicated, just common sense stuff for neurotypical adults. All things engineers can master, easily.

There's nothing evil that's intrinsic to MBAs either. You don't become a better or worse person after your MBA. However, you may find yourself in roles that pressure you to make decisions, or enforce decisions, that prioritize profits at the expense of people. You can go against that (and often times get fired or damage your professional future), or cave in. Engineers do the same (that's how we get enshittification of most tech services).

Interesting. I never play sports games so have never noticed, thanks for letting me know.

I don't mind AAA games, there's something to be said for great graphics (and I don't mind the 6h campaigns either if it's well done), but agreed on indies. Plenty of good offerings there at minimal cost.

I'm glad you have your hobbies. Gaming is just one other hobby, maybe you just needed to get into it when you were younger, I don't know. I'd also say, many gamers also have other hobbies, it's not the only thing that matters, but given the generation gap, they don't always have the money to rent a plane or get a $200 burger (nice humblebrag there).

The biggest difference age makes, I think, is that you know more about what you want, and you have less time. As a kid, I had the whole summer off, I could spend all day on the computer playing. If a game was hard, you'd practice; if it required grinding, you just put in the time. Now? I may have a couple hours an evening, a couple more on the weekend. I don't want to put in 30h of grinding to get through a 35h game. If I know what matters is the 5h of story, that's what I want.

Also I haven't seen actual ads (Coke, cars etc.) in games, unless you're talking mobile games that are based on ads. A "normal" PC / console game may have some product placements, and definitely in-app purchases, but no pop-ups / interruption of the gaming for ads.

Good for you. My point is that McKinsey 1) doesn't typically employ bad workers, so even if the "best" leave what's left are still good workers (in your words from another comment, easy to blackmail since they're so insecure) and 2) won't see a massive exodus from the "best" because if they're ok staying in consulting in the first place and know they have a shot at partner+, why would they not stay to get the multi-million compensation.

You stay strategy consulting for a few things: at junior levels, because of the "prestige", it looks good on your resume/sets you up for other opportunities, and you do learn about business and how to work with people. At mid-levels, you stay because you either enjoy the job or cannot find a position that pays as much / has as much compensation growth. At even higher levels (senior partners etc.), you stay because it's your business, you're an owner of the company and you like it, it doesn't matter if you could retire with 1 year of compensation. Or maybe they stay for the same reason you do, to belittle other people while feeling smug about themselves, who knows. :)

Note I didn't say a word about their ethics or value system. A lack of either of these don't change the fact they are people-pleasers, and from a work ethics (not actual ethics) perspective, I'm sure the bottom 20% of McK folks are similar to the top 20% of most companies. They won't have that much trouble finding a job, and McKinsey is not going to lose significant talent from this, because very few companies can give you the compensation growth McKinsey can.

One thing.. this is McKinsey we're talking about. I don't know how aware you are of the hiring practices, but there's NO ONE doing the bare minimum. They are all bright, ambitious, captain of the soccer team president of the consulting club builder of habitats, anxious and people-pleasing overachievers. Everyone also gets access to the network, because when someone leaves managers/partners will share their connections and help you get a job.

And they've almost always done it. That's how MBB works. It's up or out, the vast majority of people are there for 2-3 years (intentionally), and a lot of others realize the work-life balance isn't for them or they could make more money in VC/PE or whatever and jump ship. You can even get e-mails advertising job opportunities directly sent to your work e-mail, from a staffing manager (who usually manages your studies/cases, not you leaving the company). Sure, some people really want to stay to partner+, and are resentful when they're told they need to leave, but they also know it's a very likely scenario when they join.

And yes, when you leave, you have a job search period during which you're paid and have access to career coaches, the network of partners, etc. The duration of the period varies depending on your level, and whether you elected for it or were told to do it (up or out). You can also elect to do it if your performance evaluations indicate stagnation (i.e., unsure if you're going to get promoted), at which point you get the full "layoff" package.

Now I only have experience in NA, and the average is not 9 months (it's between 3-6 from what I remember), but this is not surprising. At the end of the day, those folks usually get placed in decent corporate / startup jobs, and continue promoting the company because y'know what... half a year of salary to do what you want and have access to an amazing network for jobs does a lot to mend your relationship with the firm.

It's almost as if most people have no understanding of modern American corporate culture, especially at the executive-level. We have a lot of engineers here, hating on the MBAs, hating on the managers, and thinking they'd do better. Very few understand that 1) management is a completely different job, 2) most "managers" have little decision-making power until they reach VP+ levels, 3) everyone is a cog in the machine, including the CEO, and must face external pressures.

If Boeing has an engineering-focused CEO, that deeply cares about safety, they will hopefully do what they can to improve QA and manufacturing quality. However, they're still the head of a public company, and will be told by the Board of Directors or their compensation package that profitability matters. You need a strong CEO with fantastic levels of support from employees AND shareholders to change the culture, and even then it's an uphill battle. It's the type of job that grinds you down, day after day after day. I still hope they find the right person that can effect the change, but I also know what they're fighting against, so I won't hold my breath.

fighting for justice*. Ha.

It's almost like we've had situations like this before, and our ancestors fought for workers rights. It's almost as if the "market" can be regulated, if only the populace had the will.

The US has a history of fighting for injustice, rebelling against the powers that be, but somewhere in the last 50 years it became a haven for laissez-faire capitalism, and the working population was taught to beg for more abuse. Yep, let's just fall on our backs and take it. We can't control the market, just let the rich do what they want. Great.

Fuck I wish I could react in a "hahah ok bud" fashion, not a "hahah ok fuck that may actually work in today's environment" manner. You should work for an investment bank.

Essay-type questions can be somewhat subjective, but I don't understand why it's bad. It's the only way to check if students can make a cogent argument (or simply chain some thoughts together in a coherent manner). It has no place in some classes (e.g., physics or math) but I don't know how one would teach and grade history without essays.

As for "low hanging fruits" like spelling mistakes.. damn right these should be noted and have an impact on your grade. It's important that kids get subjected to grammar nazis, because it will teach them to write accurately. Why is that bad? Isn't that the whole point of education? Othrwise u gotta b ok with tiktok nation lulz.