> I can't imagine a more elitist, entitled attitude than being seriously upset at people trying to pay you lots of money to work.
I think the recruiters that most people complain about aren't "trying to pay you lots of money to work." The recruiters people complain about are just looking for people and don't really care whether or not those people actually fit the job description.
They may not even have a job they're recruiting for and may just be looking for people to keep "on hand."
So rather than "paying lots of money," they cost money in terms of time spent filtering them out and communicating with the duds.
In addition to that, the recruiters themselves aren't actually the ones paying money... the companies are. I don't think anyone is getting upset about companies offering jobs -- just shoddy recruiters who waste our time.
So saying that complaining about bad recruiters is an "elitist, entitled attitude" seems to me like saying that people are elitist and entitled for not liking Nigerian scammers... hey, they're offering you free money!
Imagine that you're thinking about buying a house sometime in the future or are in a situation where you know you'll probably buy a house somewhere in the future and would welcome leads/connections.
You even blog about this, being quite open about what you want in a house and what your dream house is like.
Realtors keep e-mailing you saying that they have the perfect house for you, but never tell you where it is or if it's even in the same country.
Sometimes they describe the house and it's nothing like what you've publicly said that you're looking for. Or if it is what you're looking for, it turns out to be a bunch of fluff and vapor to get you to respond so that they can show you other houses that you really don't want.
If you try to keep in touch with a good realtor who doesn't have what you want now but may in the future, he just completely forgets you or what you wanted to begin with. Or maybe he just disappears in a month or two.
That's what recruiter spam feels like, to me. The semi-targeted nature of recruiter spam makes it even worse because it's aiming for something I will probably want or need in the future but doesn't actually address any of my wants or needs.
> ICQ originally had an interface which didn't show a running log of the conversation.
The earliest version I remember, before 98a, had a history button that would show the running log on the top of the message box window, which was nice.
The nicest thing about ICQ for me back then was the fact that the message disappeared when you sent it -- it wasn't there filling your taskbar or occupying your mindspace.
This is purely tangential and me venting about recruiting spam in Japan.
I live in Japan and still get a bunch (~3-5 messages a week) of low-quality recruiter spam. I have the following guesses as to why it's so low quality:
1. Recruiting companies, from what I've observed, tend to draw from a big pool of English teachers looking for steady non-teaching work. That is, they are not technical or versed in the field they are recruiting in.
2. A lot of times the companies or recruiters aren't exactly sure what they're looking for.
3. Sometimes in addition to not being technical and not knowing what they're looking for, English is not their first language (whether they're Japanese, Chinese, or Indian).
I always try to engage them in some way in case I need them in the future (since Japan is the land of networking), but it never goes well.
They refuse to tell me the company they're recruiting for, responsibilities, salary range, benefits, or even basic things like whether it's a contracted (契約者) or permanent (正社員) position or, god forbid, a dispatch (派遣) position.
Whenever I ask for details, they insist that we meet in person so they can "get a feel for me and my needs." And usually meeting them would entail traveling an hour across Tokyo, or in one case, all the way to Osaka.
So essentially, it seems like they have nothing and they want to add me to the Rolodex.
Disclosure: I found my current job through a very good, very communicative recruiter who was up-front with me and worked with me to secure the terms I wanted.
I think this was a big factor in why AIM trumped ICQ in America. ICQ had that "sending mail" icon that took a few seconds (or more) to "send" your message and it didn't quite feel instant.
> 2. A login page that literally just two inputs and a submit button.
> 3. A signup page that was similar.
I don't think I'd be amiss in pointing out the login page of the site we're using right now, which has one page with both of those forms in exactly that format. :)
> Y combinator startup regalii is working on the first point.
They seem to be aiming to pay bills from the US; I want to send money from another country to the US and just do whatever I want with it.
> Autodesk Homestyler
I looked it up and it doesn't quite seem to be what I want. For one thing, I live in Japan, so none of my furniture is in the catalog.
For another, want to find a chair that physically (not cosmetically) fits my kitchen table. This goes back to my complaint about comparing specs, actually. :)
Comparing products across brands (they all have specs but the way they sort the specs is different and it's a pain to flip through tons of tabs).
Finding a chair to fit my kitchen table (given the dimensions of both).
Diagramming my bedroom to try to figure out if I can build a better bed.
Finding furniture that fits in a given volume (in my case, I want to find a trolley or counter that's Y cm high, at least X cm long, and between Z1 and Z2 cm deep).
> If I were making one of these I'd make several tethers, spaced such that a single object can not break more than one at once.
What I'd worry about is security, honestly.
What if some nation decides that the space elevator existing isn't in the best interest of their national security, or some paramilitary group wants to make a point?
Bombing the base station would hurt the elevator. But of course, we should expect that to be secured. That still leaves the entire length of cable running up and down the elevator -- that's a huge volume of space to secure against anything explosive or fragmentary.
I think the recruiters that most people complain about aren't "trying to pay you lots of money to work." The recruiters people complain about are just looking for people and don't really care whether or not those people actually fit the job description.
They may not even have a job they're recruiting for and may just be looking for people to keep "on hand."
So rather than "paying lots of money," they cost money in terms of time spent filtering them out and communicating with the duds.
In addition to that, the recruiters themselves aren't actually the ones paying money... the companies are. I don't think anyone is getting upset about companies offering jobs -- just shoddy recruiters who waste our time.
So saying that complaining about bad recruiters is an "elitist, entitled attitude" seems to me like saying that people are elitist and entitled for not liking Nigerian scammers... hey, they're offering you free money!
But they're not.