As an update to my last post:

• The interview with the company in Seattle went reasonably. They said they'd get back to me by the end of last week. When I hadn't heard back by Saturday, I emailed them and got a reply telling me that bureaucracy was happening. Turns out they weren't meant to even offer me an interview within 12 months of a rejection without first checking with the lead interviewer who had rejected me. Now they're trying to get in touch with him to retroactively get permission to interview me. Which I'm hoping is a good sign, as I don't think they'd bother if they were going to reject me anyway.
• I leave for Amsterdam tomorrow!
• I got rejected from the coding exercise. I wrote my code with efficiency in mind, using types supported by the Python language that aren't in other languages. They wanted me to prove that I could write Object-Oriented code, even if it's less efficient in this mini problem.
• Haven't bothered touching that coding exercise. Too much effort and too much on and I don't think I'd get the job anyway.
• Had two interviews and a coding exercise with company #5. They seemed pretty happy with me and are planning another interview soon.

This was on BBC's tech section, and it made me think about this thread: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27125728

http://www.oddworldforums.net/attach...1&d=1399390916

Food for thought. IMO, red tape, bureaucracy and corporate greed are much bigger threats to employment than automation, but it is (and has been) yet another factor.

Of course if those in power prioritised the welfare of the general population over extortionate profits, that'd solve a lot of problems, but we can only dream.

(and on a personal note, the thread topic scares me, especially knowing that most people in power have OANST's attitude.)

I'm the devil.

So you're the guy that Shaman worshipped.

You know automation actually was one of the things that scared some of the people in the warehouse I worked at. Like, it can't be hard for Bosch to automate the processes we were doing, the only manpower they'd need would be the mechanics.

I've decided I just wanna say fuck it and buy a big arse field, some hives and set up an apiary. MA you can beekeep with me too if you like. Farmers in kind and shit.

I still want apiaries to be places where monkeys are farmed.

We could train the monkeys to run the apiary. Which would then put the recently self-employed STM and MA out of work.

Sounds about right.

I was going to suggest designing a swarm of robot super-bees to do the job and put you out of business, but I've been scooped.

Bloody monkeys, taking all our jobs. They should fuck off back to the jungle.

yeah and take their abundance of half-eaten banana peels all over the fucking place with them. spinal/leg injury rates have gone up six billion trillion percent.

I was fucking terrified when I watched the first 40 seconds of that that those things were real. Can you imagine if we were that complacent...

I heard it was eleventy quadrillion per cent but then that's the Daily Mail for you, always blowing things out of proportion.

the Daily Mail is a very good source of information. everyone should read the Daily Mail. the Daily Mail does not lie or advocate angry mobs. the Daily Mail is truth is law. all hail the Daily Mail.

Make sure that you're not quoted out of context with that one. People may not realise that you're actually talking about monkeys.

Please elaborate on your views.

Well, 'fuck saving the honey bees, we'll just call it a lost cause and make some little robot ones instead.'

We'd be losing a part of our biological history that comes from the Cretaceous.

They'd be in very good company.

You can't honestly tell me as a man of science you wouldn't care if they died out? It's our fault they're dropping like flies (ha), we're seeing now that preventative actions such as the banning of dangerous insecticides in the EU, is slowing CCD.

Considering the advert is by Greenpeace, I think the point was to inspire a mild sense of disgust.

Yeah I assumed as much once I'd pieced together what I was looking at.

I think New Bees would be a pretty good supplement to Old Bees in areas where they have trouble surviving.

I think they'd be a good idea in China, where rapid industrialisation has made the air too toxic for bees to survive (and orchards employ hordes of people to hand-pollinate the trees). More competition for the bees we have left though, would be disastrous.

New Bees wouldn't take any nectar, though. I'm not sure what impact the reduced pollen count would have.

Pollen is very important for the continued development of brood, it's basically how they get their protein and fat. Bees don't consume pollen all their lives but larvae need it.

Just teach them to hunt big game.

:C you'd be less flippant if it was a species you cherished, Marcus.

The species I most cherish are already gone.

You're not that Tumblr guy who had a hard-on for Tyrannosaurs, are you?

Of course not. That makes no mechanical sense. That's like trying to fit a round plug into a square doily set.

yeah MM stop trying to fit your round plug into BM's square doily set.

You leave the doilies out of this.