Posts by onyxruby

IT security pro salaries: Silicon Valley? You'd be better off in Minneapolis

Sec pro in Minneapolis market

At the latest local security conference they were complaining of a negative 15% unemployment rate for security professionals in the Minneapolis area. The quality of life is far better than the coasts and the cost of living is far lower. The area in general is one of the best job markets, and tech job markets in the country.

http://minnesotabusiness.com/minneapolis-named-top-big-city-job-market-2015

http://media.dice.com/report/august-2015-fastest-growing-states-for-tech-jobs/

One third of the year we play in snow, we don't have the crazy crime rates, unemployment, age discrimination, cost of living or similar problems.

VCDX: The elite certification just 105 people hold

Rare certifications aren't as useful as you might think

I used to travel as an AAC, at the time there were about 200 of them worldwide. The process involved base level certifications, a background check and a you submitted your resume showing appropriate experience just as if you were applying for a job - and you had to be sponsored by a partner that was willing to put their name on the line. That was just to be accepted into a week long training course followed by a day long test.

I've discovered in the years since then a lot of explaining what that meant to people that had never heard of it. If you were in that particular field it mean something, but otherwise it just didn't seem to have any weight. I've since learned to change my resume to emphasize the skills I used as an AAC instead of the certification itself.

Post-a-puppy woman hit with cruelty charges

Unfair title

This occurred fairly close to where I live and so I've already read the local articles about it. The title is unfair, it was only due to the diligence of the postal workers in the first place that this puppy was found and saved before it was killed in transit.

The women who shipped the puppy lied about what was inside and shipped the animal with a service that doesn't support shipping live animals to begin with. It's a bit like complaining about someone's Honda failing to be able to tow a small yacht, it was never advertised as being able to do such a thing to begin with! To top it all off the same women then returned and demanded a refund of her shipping charge.

Verizon to refund $30-$90m in 'mystery fees'

I should be owed some of these

My wife and I both had a pair of Palm Treo 650wx's. Mine had a data-plan as I traveled for work, however she didn't see any need. Such charges could be incurred by doing something as simple as bumping the 'c' button on the telephone (this phone has the keys on the outside).

I got hit with at least 10 bucks worth of charges off of my wife's phone per month for a couple of years. The irritating thing about this is that there was no ready way to disable the automatic feature. Each feature had it's way to disable it, and any given feature automatically hit you with the fee.

They also had a one button click for an information call (at 1.99 per) that was extremely difficult to disable. The phone was a disaster as it was literally one button (from several possibilities) away from additional $2 charge. You had to treat it as fragile to avoid getting sacked with extra fees every month.