Sunny in San Diego

Recently, I’ve been working on a few projects and most of it involves coming up with some ideas, plans, designs, etc and then implementing some theories, diagrams and content. Or maybe research something a little more. At the same time I look around for some help regarding web development, software engineering, artistic design, etc. What I’ve learned is that most people are either idiots or con artists. That’s not exactly true. The majority of software engineers seem to be an intelligent bunch. Except for one guy who probably wasn’t even a software engineer. This guy was a trip. Read my other blog posting(Project Risk to hire this Manager) about this individual.

Back to the original point. I can see why a lot of people assume Information Technology professionals or more importantly, web developers, are nothing special or a pain in the behind. I shouldn’t throw most people under the bus. Like I said, most of the software engineers seem respectful and know what they are talking about. Then again it’s because most of them went to college and learned about computer science. They actually come up with original thoughts and analysis or maybe they have what’s called critical thinking knowledge. But it’s almost a lost cause when it comes to web developers/designers and graphic artists. I know the technology and I hear people trying to sell me a bag of goods regarding what they can do for me, how they can market my website, and how much a site like mine would cost. Of course they claim to give me some huge discount. And it’s funny how half these ‘people’ send replies that refer to themselves as ‘we’ and so on. Hell I even had one person inform me that they haven’t used Flash in years, but they could relearn it again if I needed them to. Yeah I’d pay them to learn something. If I were to do that, I might as well just learn it myself and save the damn money.

Another project was designing a logo and banner. The damn logo and banner were already drawn, designed, etc. All we needed done was for somebody who knows photoshop or illustrator very well to digitize it and maybe show a few different color and font options. A few people claimed this could be a thousand dollar project. Thousand bucks for what? They didn’t’ come up with the idea. They didn’t even freaking draw the thing. They really didn’t do a damn thing. Yes, their time would be worth money. But their time isn’t worth what some of these people think. To top it off, some of these people email a sample with watermarks that had nothing to do with the original concept or drawing. Do people even read?

Even after hiring somebody to do some artwork, it takes over a month to come up with a simple damn update. Like I said everything was already done for them. They only needed to touch up the drawing and digitize it a little better. But half the time they don’t bother reading what the requirements are and what you need done. Or they come back with (i can do this for this much, but anything more will cost a little more). It’s one thing if they came up with the concept, drawing, design, etc, but a month for a logo that was already done? How stupid.

Oh and there are plenty of ‘artists’ who seem to ignore your requirements and then design something on their own time you don’t like or want and then claim, ‘hey I spent such and such time on this so I deserve such and such money.’ That’s like going to a job interview, it doesn’t go well, they go home and decide to make something up, and then email that company and ask them for a paycheck. People are really stupid.

Hell, on another project I threw out an idea of what I wanted and needed, so I could get a feel for what some artists could design for me or if I needed to change my idea altogether. You know what, half the people who got back to me asked me to come up with a sketch so they could get a better idea. If I’m drawing the damn thing(i’m not an artist) why the hell am I paying them? All I wanted was for somebody to come up with a concept and design after I gave them the original idea and concept.

I understand people should charge for their services, but it really seems there are a lot of unprofessional people out of work who are really out of work for a valid reason. You ask them for something and they don’t bother reading what you asked for or they ignore it altogether or they think their 5 minute unoriginal half assed job is worth thousands of bucks. Go figure they need small jobs. They shouldn’t be doing what they are doing.

I’ve come to the conclusion that people might as well not hire web developers or designers or even artists/graphic designers. Not for what they are charging. Or maybe that’s why people offshore and outsource work. Just look at some of the examples of these people and it’s obvious they seem to throw together a template that takes about 10 minutes(hell you can buy a template and edit it yourself for under 100 bucks and you don’t even have to know much about programming or even html). Don’t go around claiming some simple 5 page website you threw up using some other persons template, that took you under 5 minutes to do, is worth $5K. It’s not. Or maybe most of the web designers/developers and graphic artists need to inflate their egos because the reality is their work isn’t worth much in the real world anymore.

Nobody should be paying somebody $30/HR for somebody who knows html and wordpress. Yes, if you need a shopping cart, a content management system, some flash, and a ton of original real programming work done to some complicated e-commerce site or backend system, it might be worth it. There is actually programming or real design involved. But somebody selling some $30/HR unoriginal template cheap ass work is a scam. Plain and simple.

Whether it’s a website or a graphic doesn’t really matter. Playing on people’s technological ignorance is what a lot of people seem to do. Everybody needs to make a buck, but when your work is worth $1 and you charge $10K….then it’s just a scam. A con. A rip off. And in all honesty people like that should be thrown off a cliff never to be seen again. End of story.

It seems our president (Mr. Obama) wants to spend another trillion dollars( Yes $$$$1 TRILLION) on saving the US Medical/Health industry. Or more like he wants to provide some kind of medical coverage/insurance for those who might be uninsured or under insured. I haven’t dug deep into his overall plan but I’ve heard some reports and read some data to know $$$$ 1 TRILLION bucks is a hell of a lot just to cover those who don’t have medical coverage now. I’m not too happy about his last billion dollar bailouts where it seems the people who screwed everybody over are the ones benefiting.

Please Explain to me how Citigroup is going to pay back the ‘taxpayers’ when they were removed from the stock market? I doubt they are going to hand me and everybody else a few bucks. And what about the extra refund check we got in 2008? Yeah the same check that I had to pay back in taxes this year on. Oh thanks for the helping hand Mr. Bush last year and Mr. Obama this year. But now I’m getting off topic, which I seem to do often. It’s that ADHD or ADD or whatever.

If every single person in the US would be covered under some universal health plan, I’d consider it. If it meant higher taxes but excellent medical coverage where I either don’t pay for crap or have to pay some small co-pay like 50 bucks, I’d consider it. But this plan seems to only favor those without insurance. Hey I’m all for helping less fortunate people than I but when taxes and other living expenses are rising but salaries and income seem to be increasing only by about 3-4 percent, if you’re lucky, something doesn’t add up. Those kind of raises won’t even keep up with inflation, yet alone tax increases. And as far as inflation….it seems we might be heading for some scary numbers if oil keeps going up and we keep printing meaningless money to bail everybody out but the taxpayers who need to foot the bill for generations to come. Capitalist society my behind. Obama seems intent on building some kind of socialist/communist country.

Government owned auto manufacturers, government owned banks, government owned this and that really seems like we’re heading that route. So who really won the cold war? Moscow right now has more billionaires than NYC. How can that even be close to the truth, but it seems to be the news. Where are we heading? You can’t just keep bailing everybody out and not provide jobs for people in the US. Oh I forgot about the Green and Environmental jobs Obama proposes. From all the reports and stats it seems like a hell of a lot of $10-12 an hour jobs. Great if you can get it but if our taxes rise because of trillions and trillions of dollars in bailouts, food and gas keep going up, etc probably means those kind of jobs aren’t exactly jobs that will help people survive. Not in the long run. Or maybe it is true what a few people who were mostly shunned over the years said. The big corporations and executives and the elitist wealthy want the US to compete with the rest of the world. And that’s a world where over half the population in some countries live on less than a dollar per day. We’ve already heard Microsoft make claims that they might have to offshore and outsource more jobs if new tax regulations go into effect. We can’t compete with that reality. If a company wants to go cheap, how the hell can anybody in the US compete with somebody in a country where over half their population live off of $1 a day? We can’t.

Or maybe I’m wrong and this is all for the better good. But at this point Obama doesn’t look any different than Bush except half the lemmings worship Obama like he’s Elvis or the Beatles or some celebrity. Hell, I bet half these people look at him as some ‘savior’, some kind of Jesus or Moses or Mohammad or Confucius or the Dali Lama. People are lemmings, plain and simple. They search for somebody to answer their prayers because half the time they are too lazy, too immature, or too desperate to fight for hope themselves. Or maybe most people just are followers. They hope somebody else can save their day. Or maybe people are hopeless and need somebody else who will save them. The reality is if you can’t save yourself nobody else will be able to save you. But nobody ever wants to hear that. They just want to assume some magic pie in the sky or some ‘savior’ politician, celebrity, religious fanatic, or whatever will be the answer to all their prayers. Sorry but it doesn’t work like that. Even if Obama or somebody else came along and had all the answers to your prayers, do you really think they’d help you if you’re just somebody who comes off as a desperate leech? Everybody needs a helping hand now and again. Some more so than others. But if you don’t want to work for anything and expect everything to be handed to you by some magic formula, don’t be disappointed and blame your presumed savior when it doesn’t turn out like you hoped.

And this Trillion dollar Medical insurance bailout will just be another taxpayer nightmare that seems to favor those who shouldn’t get any favors at this point. These bailouts have done what for who? Given money to those who scammed everybody. Given money to an industry that is more full of crap than based on facts. Now we want to give money to an industry(insurance) that is based on (as Chris Rock once said) ‘In case shit happens.’ The insurance industry is another big scam. And the government run Medical Insurance industry would be what exactly? Another industry run by the government. No I guess that’s not how the Communists did things. Government controlling everything.