Everyone and Their Mother

This is hardly a scientifically proven or statistically backed statement, but for the past couple of months, I've noticed in the Bay Area high tech job market that:

Everyone and their mother wants a product manager!

To make my point, check these out. These are all live job links, as of this blog entry posting, in no particular order:

iPhone >> Blackberry

I just got my very first Blackberry issued by my new job.

OK, so I'm not complaining about having to carry an electronic dogleash, and I appreciate the nice integration with MS Exchange for persistently sync'd work email, calender, and contacts. And I like not having to pay for it or having to submit any expense reports on its charges.

But I gotta say, the Blackberry's user interface, its screen pointer and little trackball, the tiny click keyboard, the cryptic screen icons, and the oversized in-browser action buttons, are all very tedious indeed. Even tiresome.

It all seems so 2006, like in an alternate bizzaro universe in which Apple and Steve Jobs never existed.

The iPhone, with it's multi-touch screen and easy UI, are just light-years ahead of RIM's Blackberry.

I very much prefer the iPhone.

Facebook Privacy Concerns Are Overblown

Now that the backlash seems to be subsiding, I gotta say that I don't share the recent concern that a lot of people have expressed about Facebook's privacy practices.

First and foremost, FB is a free service, if you don't like it, nobody is forcing you to use it.

Second, the whole point of FB is to share info with a sizeable audience.

2010 is turning into "2012"

Devastating earthquakes in Haiti, Chile, and China, plus other significant quakes in Mexico and Indonesia, and now this volcano in Iceland seizing up airline routes and freight flights (imagine no FedEx!) and shutting airports throughout Europe, all in 2010, which is only 3.5 months over. If this pace of natural disasters keep up, the premise of the movie "2012" won't seem so ridiculous after all.

Pasta with a Fresh Tomato Sauce From Scratch

Tonight, I cooked up angel hair pasta with a fresh tomato sauce made from scratch, inspired by the Chef Scott Conant segment of last week's Anthony Bourdain No Reservations "Techniques" special episode. For my first time ever, I blanched fresh tomatoes, removed their peels, removed the seeds and watery sections. I did Conant's high heat, hot olive oil, generous salt, potato masher technique with the tomato segments. Also, I did the extra virgin olive oil infusion with garlic, fresh basil, and red pepper flakes. I then cooked the pasta and finished it in the sauce, with parmessan cheese, the infused and strained oil, fresh basil bits, and butter. I mistakenly overcooked the pasta, in part because I seldom cook with fresh pasta, but the overall flavors worked out well. But I gotta say, it was a lot of work for only a small improvement in flavor from my usual quick and dirty spaghetti sauce. Perhaps I shouldn't have used ordinary supermarket tomatoes, since a couple were kinda mealy to start with, but my hope was the techniques would bring the best out of ordinary ingredients. 



Princeton News: A sweet problem: Princeton researchers find that high-fructose corn syrup prompts considerably more weight gain

Princeton News: A sweet problem: Princeton researchers find that high-fructose corn syrup prompts considerably more weight gain

How To Motivate Corporate Recruiters

Originally posted 19 June 2007, on LinkedIn Answers:

There are multiple components to motivating recruiters. Here's my take:

1. Hire only high performing and/or high potential recruiters as they will self-motivate and help motivate each other. Poor performing recruiters pose the risk of demotivating others, so coach them as best you can; and, if that fails, manage them out as soon as possible.

2. Respect the recruiter's strengths, established relationships with hiring managers, and total workload, when it comes to assigning new reqs. One-to-one recruiter-to-hiring manager relationships are far more important than letting any one recruiter own all the reqs from a whole department.

Initial iPad Criticism Will Soon Be Irrelevant

While mainstream media rode the tsunami of anticipation and orchestrated faux-secrecy for the Apple iPad announcement, now tech media is awash with criticisms of what the iPad lacks in functionality. I contend such criticism, largely from techno-geeks, will soon prove to be irrelevant following the product's actual shipment.

During the iPad announcement, Steve Jobs clearly stated that the iPad is positioned to be a new product category between smartphones and notebook computers, and in particular, the iPhone and MacBooks. As a new product category's conceptual starting point, it makes sense, but I believe consumers will embrace the iPad, and its descendants, for reasons other than just something in between.

Job Search Thankfully Concludes

I didn't widely announce when I was laid off and began my job search, but I am happy to now say that my job search has thankfully concluded. Upon actually starting my new position, I will then discuss more about what I will be doing next.

For now, I wanted to mention that I feel quite lucky that my period of unemployment was relatively short, just a few months. I was able to use the time to spend with my family and also to enjoy a vacation trip spanning the holiday period. Essentially, it has been a painless unemployment period, which I know quite well is not typical of what so many other people have and still are experiencing.

Sharing More and More

We all know about how much anyone can easily share about their thoughts, their web discoveries, and beyond, on Twitter and Facebook. The media seems to be turning it's attention on sites where people share where they are, through geotagging, now that the iPhone and so many other smartphones log GPS coordinates to be then displayed on sites ilke Loopt, Brightkite, foursquare, and others.

Now, you can even easily share what you buy or spend money on with Blippy. While others can debate how useful or careless it is to share or overshare matters that some would consider critically private, I'm wondering, what comes next?