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Cake day: July 2nd, 2023

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  • Firing middle managers is a fun way to kill the company. Not that cleaning house is a bad idea. Unfortunately the people making decisions of who to keep and who to let go are usually idiots.

    Middle Managers are promoted for two reasons: technical expertise and ass-kissing expertise. Now the technical experts tend to not mix well with incompetent parasitic c-suite types idiots. The ass-kissers are beloved by the c-suite as that is their only role in life.

    So when firings come around guess who they get rid of? Then 1-3 years later everyone is shocked when everything starts to fall apart.


  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzBitey
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    1 month ago

    Yes.

    For a long time identifying bacteria required growing them on different media. If then bacteria didn’t grow on the media, we didn’t know what it was. However for most pathogenic bacterium we did figure out how to culture them.

    Then molecular biology advanced to a level where we can amplify and sequence a single bacterium’s DNA. This has led to a continuous stream of new species discoveries from different environments.

    Finding a new pathogenic bacteria for humans is still a rare discovery.




  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzAcademic writing
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    2 months ago

    Academia is usually about minutiae, not concepts. Sometimes they get so hyperfocus in small areas that they are completely unable to give a general summary of what they are doing in the bigger picture. To do so would require them to understand things outside of their very narrow field of study.



  • I have been using custom start menus since the whole win8 full screen disaster. Every time I see the default win 10 or Win 11 menu I cringe. So much crap in the way.

    Process optimization reaches a point of diminishing returns. Then if tweaked further it degrades the performance. Microsoft reached the close to the optimal OS design at Win7. It’s all been downhill since then.

    The mobile OS systems are reaching the same point. Optimization has occured and most of the “new” additions degrade the user experience.



  • Large corporations rarely innovate and try new things. Most innovation comes from smaller players with limited market share taking risks.

    Large companies buy out smaller ones who create cash cows from taking large risks. The large company then milks the cash cows until they are completely dead.

    The consolidation of studios to a few megacorporations has led to this inevitable end. The solution is simple: break them up. If we have 30 or so similar sized studios competing, we will get better movies/TV again.


  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyz2 Kinds
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    2 months ago

    After much debate over copious drinks at the bar, we finally decided to settle the argument with darts.

    0 are all crossed.

    1’s are written as l

    7’s are all crossed.

    And 9’s… Well we got kicked out and it was never settled. How was I supposed to know the nickname Nicky sounds like the French word “Niquer” and somebody (Nicolas) got all bent out of shape over it. “Hey Nicky it’s your turn!” apparently was not well received by a drunk frenchman.





  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzPhD Grads
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    2 months ago

    No - you missed my direction.

    The paragraph is an overly polite way of writing to avoid any semblance of disparaging the other person. As mine was clearly written as a personal anecdote there is no need to qualify your remarks as non-derogatory.

    Generally I see people develop those types of phrasing habits when they have negative experiences with misunderstanding in the past. Very common with many PhD’s communicating with MBA’s, sales or production teams. A little overly verbose but carefullly respectful to avoid conflict. It’s a very good habit to have professionally but quite funny when out of context.


  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzPhD Grads
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    2 months ago

    First paragraph had me laughing. Somebody has spent a lot of time in private industry and has gotten burned a few times.

    As for #2 it depends on the age of the industry. Here is the life cycle of research driven industries as I see it.

    Historically in research driven industries the foundations have been started in academia. Private companies start up relying on the universities research.

    Money flows into the university systems from private companies and they start producing a lot PhD’s in the field.

    Next the private companies decide they can make more money doing the research in-house. They offer large sums of money to the established professors and get fresh grads at bargain prices.

    Pretty soon most of the best and brightest are drained to private industry. The funding from private industry slows to a trickle and all that is left in academia is those with more social connections than ability.

    For the next 30 years, private industry has great talent. Then the first first wave of PhD’s retire. The new PhD’s grads are trained by the social connections crowd.

    That’s when you start to see fun job descriptions posted like:

    PhD + 2 years of experience, Masters + 5 years experience, Bachelor’s + 8 years experience.


  • The_v@lemmy.worldtoScience Memes@mander.xyzPhD Grads
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    2 months ago

    I spent most of a decade in industry doing what is generally thought of as a PhD’s job. In order to fill in some gaps, I took a ton of graduate classes on the companies dime and looked at doing a fully funded PhD. I didn’t end up doing it.

    Why?

    1. The industry paid better than academia. So the brain drain was real. The informal training I had from PhD’s in the company was vastly superior to the graduate level training at the university. Anyone who was any good at the applied side was not in academia. The ones left in academia were a very odd group with zero applied knowledge.

    2. Most PhD hires failed miserably in the field. 9 out of 10 of them could not make the transition to the practical application of knowledge.

    3. I saw a trend where smaller companies where hiring mostly industry experienced people for the positions (like I was).

    So for me the time and investment was not worth it.

    One of my friends made it halfway through his PhD. He then got sick of the politics and drama and noped out.


  • I am of the opinion that most “supply” issues are due to investors. Except in certain geographic areas we do not have a shortage of actual physical housing. What we have is a shortage of available housing at a mixed pricepoints for purchase.

    All housing that investors purchase for rentals removes it from the supply.

    Traditionally investors have sought out entry level housing for rent. They invest in building rental complexes. They make all cash purchases and then rent it out to people who otherwise would have been first-time homebuyers. Investors used to be the low end offer. Blatant price fixing has increased rent outrageously. Now investors are the high end offer and removing supply constantly.

    With AirB&B, the middle and even upper range market that traditionally has had less investor competition is now a major target. This has led to price wars for investment purposes on previously safe segments.

    The first solution to the housing supply is simple: taxing income from rent so that selling the property is financially more lucrative. It will have to include a prohibition against rental increases to cover the taxes as well.

    The second is to mandate zoning and new construction to match the market needs not the needs of the investors.

    Last would be to create a program where builders who focus on entry level housing receive incentives from governments (also include hefty penalty for substandard construction).


  • I did a little assassin creed run this summer. Started with Unity and went to Odyssey.

    Unity by far has the best story-line. The game mechanics are also more focused on being an assassin, not a brawler. Sneak and stab, drop smoke and disappear when you get in trouble.

    Syndicate - they changed the focus to more brawling. However the mechanics were pretty bad and the storyline was predictable and stupid to say the least. You can still play the assasin for most of it if you want.

    Origins - They went all out into brawling with this one. Complicated all of the controls. Easiest way to make it through the game is as an archer. The story lines are dull and some are just plain weird. The offer you tons of different options in gear but only a few are worth keeping. Not much chance to actually assainate anyone. Lots of weird half baked stuff like the naval warfare in the story line but nowhere else.

    Odyssey - it’s basically the same as origins. They spent more time fleshing out the mechanics. Added in a ton of options but you only use a few. Added in a ton more brawling combat and very little assassination. In many instances trying to play as an assassin is just not possible. The combat is often broken. Beating the bosses is all the same. Spam arrows while dodging until they weaken, get a hit in and run away- repeat. Save often because the game crashes regularly.

    Yes I played all the way through and beat the main quests and side quest on all of them.