Showing posts with label jobs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label jobs. Show all posts

04 February 2012

If Politicians Pushing SOPA/PIPA Want To Create Jobs, They Should Support The Internet -- And Stop Treating Copyright Companies As Special

A key element of the political rhetoric around SOPA/PIPA was the idea that it was about jobs, and that jobs are so critical in the current economic climate that safeguarding them overrides any other concern the Net world might have about the means being proposed to do that. But then the key question becomes: who are really more important in terms of those jobs - the copyright industries, or companies exploiting the potential of the Internet that would be harmed if the Net were hobbled by new legislation?

On Techdirt.

17 February 2011

The Economic Consequences of Piracy

I've noted elsewhere that there is a major piece of FUD being put about by content producers: that piracy causes massive damage to a country's economy. But as that post explained with regard to the BSA's claims about the harm of software piracy, here's the reality:

Reducing software piracy will not magically conjure up those hundreds of billions of dollars of economic growth that the BSA invokes, or create huge numbers of new jobs: it will simply move the money around - in fact, it will send more of it outside local economies to the US, and reduce the local employment.

The basic idea is really pretty simple to understand. When people make unauthorised copies of content or software, they save money. But that doesn't mean they put it in a bank: human nature being what it is, that money is generally spent elsewhere in the local economy.

And yet despite the simplicity of this crucial idea, report after report seems to have difficulty grasping it. Here's another [.pdf], this time on film piracy, put together by UK Ipsos MediaCT and Oxford Economics for AFACT (the Australian Federation Against Copyright Theft). The top-line "results":

6,100 Full Time Equivalent (FTE) jobs were forgone across the entire economy (equivalent to more than six times the number of job cuts announced by Telstra in October 2010) including nearly 2,300 forgone directly by the movie industry and retailers. These impacts of piracy on employment persist as long as piracy persists.

Allowing for effects on other industries, some A$1,370m in Gross Output (Sales) was lost across the entire Australian economy.

This was equivalent to a loss of GDP of A$551m across the Australian economy – reducing national economic growth and Australia’s ability to invest in its future.

Tax losses are A$193m, representing money that government could employ for other social uses in areas such as education and healthcare.

What's sad is that the report does try to make reasonable assumptions about piracy:

We do not assume that every pirate version equates to a lost sale.

We do allow for ‘sampling’ - those who see an authorised version subsequent to the pirate version are not treated as contributing to lost revenue. In fact, we make the very cautious assumption that no lost revenue results from piracy if any authorised version is seen subsequently.

We do allow for ‘over-claim’ – we apply a ‘downweight’ to those claiming they would have paid for an authorised version (had the pirate version not been available).

But this laudable attempt at rigour is completely undermined by the fact that nowhere in the report is there any recognition that all this "lost" money does *not* disappear, but is simply channelled elsewhere in the Australian economy, where it might actually create more jobs than it would if spent on films (because of revenue outflows to the US, and the fact that local money would be spent on more labour-intensive industries like retailing or catering.) Similarly, it *does* produce tax revenue for the Australian government, just from different sources.

It would be far more conducive to producing an honest debate about the *real* effects of unauthorised copies on national economies if these key facts were included for a change; by continuing to ignore them, these misleading and one-sided reports amount to little more than industry propaganda.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca.

23 November 2009

Has Microsoft Got a Job for You...

Since it's Monday morning, I thought I'd start the week gently, with a little humour, courtesy of a Microsoft job ad. After all, who could read the following without laughing?

On Open Enterprise blog.

06 February 2009

Proof that Microsoft Now Fears for the Desktop

Hmm, lookee here: Microsoft wants to hire a Director, Open Source Desktop Strategy. Here are the details:

The Windows Competitive Strategy team is looking for a strong team member to lead Microsoft’s global desktop competitive strategy as it relates to open source competitors. Our team mission is to gather intelligence, create business strategies, and drive action in the marketplace for the Windows Client business. In this job, you will be asked to think strategically, put yourself in the mindset of our competitors, influence multi-million dollar marketing campaigns, and drive high-level executive thinking around business strategy.

As the Director of Open Source Desktop Strategy you will need to drive research and build holistic strategies across dynamic market segments like PCs, NetBooks, and mobile internet devices. You will be responsible for bringing our business strategy to life by discovering and sharing the market insights that set the foundation for our platform value dialogue with customers and the industry.

Nothing could say plainer that Microsoft now fears for the desktop. You don't appoint someone whose job is to lead a "global desktop competitive strategy" that embraces PCs, netbooks and mobile internet devices after years of assuming the desktop was yours forever unless you have a clear and vivid idea that there is a new and real threat in this sector. And you don't have to be a mind-reader to guess that Microsoft is thinking of GNU/Linux here.

The job would probably be quite attractive to people were it not for two killer responsibilities:

Create a rational set of proof points that promote Microsoft’s comparative value

Build a fact-based marketing plan that articulates the Windows Client value proposition to partners and customers

The problem is, of course, that there is no "rational set of proof points", and no facts on which to build a marketing plan. It will be interesting to see which masochist gets the job. I look forward to, er, analysing his or her attempts to square the circle. (Via Matthew Aslett.)

01 September 2008

Wanna Job?

How about a professorship in source?

University of Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany

Applications are invited to fill a permanent position as
Professor (W 2) in Open Source Software

at the Computer Science Department in the Faculty of Technical Engineering, beginning at January 1st, 2009.

The successful applicant will be expected to represent his discipline both in research and teaching. He has actively worked in a major Open Source project and has excellent scientific qualifications in this area, including research experiences in at least one of the following areas:
• Process management, quality assurance, team building for Open Source Software
• Development processes and tools for loosely coupled, distributed software engineering
• Essential characteristics of successful Open Source architectures
Furthermore, business and legal aspects of Open Source Software are of interest. Contributions to the department's degree programs, including the one on Information Systems are expected.

Prerequisites for the job are a university degree, good teaching skills, a doctorate and proof of further academic research or publications. The latter can, alternatively, be in the form of a post-doctoral habilitation or similar academic qualifications which may have been attained in specialized fields other than at a university or in the course of a junior professorship.

Don't all rush.

18 June 2008

How to Get a Real Job in a Virtual World

Interesting:

My name is Simone Brunozzi, a 30 year old guy from Italy.
What’s interesting about me? Well, I’m a brand new Technology Evangelist for Amazon Web Services in Europe!

I’m going to tell you how I landed the job of my dreams, and I suggest that you pay attention because it’s a story you don’t hear every day.

30 May 2007

Mozilla Trumps MSN

The virtual tracks left by people as they change jobs delineate the shifting patterns of the business world: a concentration towards or away from a company speaks volumes about the subtle and mostly invisible dynamics that lie below. So this news truly speaks volumes:

Li Gong, the former top executive for MSN in China, has joined Mozilla's Chinese subsidiary, Mozilla Online, as its chairman and CEO.

Microsoft, are we worried yet?