[thelist] rentacoder.com

[bruce]

Steve...

I tend to agree with what you've said...

However, I would also point out that the quality of the software and the
underlying processes coming from overseas is improving at a serious rate...
It's going to only get better/worse..depending on how you view the issue...

I would also agree with you with your assessment that the top/major apps
required to run a business are likely to stay close to home... But I would
add that I believe you're going to see more apps coming from overseas and
from Open Source that will affect the software biz....

Think about it for a sec... the affect of Linux/Apache/Perl/PHp/etc... could
easily have started in India.. and these have had major ramifications on the
software biz...

And not only that.. but there appears to be a different mindset with some in
India... Right now, we're setting up a biz structure and we're going to need
developers. When we've approached some developers in the US.. We've had
little to no interest in starting something with sweat equity... However, in
India, we've had responses that have been positive... Now, the vetting
process might produce few who are qualified.. but we'll see...  We would
love/like to find guys in the US.. but they don't seem to be around....

Anyway.. my $0.02 worth....

Peace...

Bruce
bedouglas at earthlink.net

ps... To the Joshua post... If you produce a seriously good quality work,
and the customer's really happy with what you've done... then you can pretty
well find a way to make a living.... regardless of the biz...assuming that
customers want what you're selling!!!!!!



-----Original Message-----
From: thelist-bounces at lists.evolt.org
[mailto:thelist-bounces at lists.evolt.org]On Behalf Of Steve Lewis
Sent: Monday, July 28, 2003 11:10 AM
To: thelist at lists.evolt.org
Subject: Re: [thelist] rentacoder.com


bruce wrote:

>New things supplant old things, technology makes some industries obsolete,
>etc... I recall that there used to be rows of guys doing drafting work in
>certain companies, Cad-Cam applications ripped that profession to shreds...
>While the draftsman complained, technology continued!!!
>
>
Interesting observation but I would say that technology is not the
culprit here, jobs are not being lost--they are just moving oversees; it
is cheap oversees labor that is our culprit..

>who has the first app might complain, he now has to lay off someone, you
>say.."..hey..innovate..etc.."..
>
>
Innovation is irrelevant, what is significant seems to be:
- living in a country where $6.00/hr is great money,
- and where you learned to speak a second language (often english),
- in addition to finding a way to gain access to the technology and
learn to wield it.

>you might feel doing software in Atlanta, or whereever... And in fact, the
>quality is reasonably comparable... The barriers to developing software in
a
>distributed fashion are being removed... It's becoming a different world...
>
>
My experience is different.  My experience says that the general quality
of work done oversees in the cheap market is passable but that if you
have a large ongoing project you will sooner or later have problems if
your entire development team is 11 hours away and speaks your tongue as
their second language.  At my current employer, we are the North
American development team for an international corporation.  That
corporation also employs two development teams oversees.  One in Russia,
the other in India.  They maintain one person in North America for every
two people oversees because they need quality folks (ok, so my place
amongst my coworkers may be a bit dubious ;) here to fix bugs, direct
product development, and 'manage' the teams oversees.  Left to their own
devices empirical evidence here over three years has shown that if the
ratios drop too far in favor of oversees hours, the overal product
quality suffers and the bottom line of the parent corporation is
effected.  This reflects what I have seen from other crews producing
code oversees too:

1) there are some clever and even brilliant developers to be had but
communication *will* become an issue at some point and it is only a
matter of time until wires get crossed and major time and trust is lost.

2) you still get what you pay for to a degree.  In manufacturing
sneakers, a single lapse in quality costs you $8 to replace the shoes if
the customer discovers it and returns them.  In software a single lapse
in quality with an oversees development team could easily cost you more
than that in time, and energy when you have to explain to a
client/customer why it takes 3 days to fix a typo.

Based on what I have seen, many development jobs will continue to flow
out of the G8 countries, but the cream of the G8 software/web
development crops will still be useful.  Job hunting will continue to
become more difficult for folks like me however.

cheers
Steve

--
* * Please support the community that supports you.  * *
http://evolt.org/help_support_evolt/

For unsubscribe and other options, including the Tip Harvester
and archives of thelist go to: http://lists.evolt.org
Workers of the Web, evolt !