Happy New Year

[Andrew Robinson]

I used to work upstairs from a company that had found an interesting niche
in the sports betting industry. Imagine a well known football star has an
accident in training. This means his team is no longer favourite to win
their next match. If gambling site A has updated to reflect this, but site
B has not, it's possible for a gambler to bet on one team on each site and
be guaranteed a profit... and this process could theoretically be
automated. The company's business model was to keep tabs on lots of betting
sites and charge for providing responses to millions of automated 'what
odds could we offer on team A without creating a win-win situation
anywhere?' questions.

- Andy_R

On 1 January 2016 at 19:01, Peter Korsten <peter at severity-one.com> wrote:

> Op 1-1-2016 om 13:37 schreef Jay Vaughan (ibisum):
>
>> This next job for me is definitely one to deal with the frustration in my
>>> current one. It'll be just Java, and not Java, and code reviews, and
>>> helpdesks, and JIRA, and Confluence, and Subversion, and Jenkins, and
>>> Artifactory, and god knows what else I'm doing. I'm very careful not to
>>> label it as an 'in between' job, because it isn't; it's definitely a step
>>> up. But I don't think I'll be staying for another 15 years.
>>>
>> Gotta keep those code reviews going though Peter .. they’re worth it.
>>
>
> But they're also draining, and they were particularly badly organised.
> Nobody really cared, so I stopped doing them. Too many other things to do.
>
> The problems I have with code reviews is that people generally write crap
> code. There's just no satisfaction in it. You nurture some bright Indian
> developer, have him constantly improve, and because he's so bright, he
> moves to a better-paid job, while his successor is someone straight from
> university. And the focus is always on production and deadlines.
>
> And yes, it's an entry into the online gambling/betting industry. If you
>>> work in IT, and you don't mind year-round sunshine, and you're willing to
>>> work for a wage that would be considered average in the Netherlands for a
>>> similar position: they're happy to hire you, and help you move.
>>>
>> .. except: Java.  Meh.
>>
>> ;)
>>
>
> Java is simple. Simple is good. I'm not yet convinced about closures in
> Java 8, and generics are particularly badly done, but Java is everything
> that C++ could have been, but isn't.
>
> (Also, I already went through interviews for a company like this here in
>> Vienna, called GreenTube.  I realized that I really, really didn’t want to
>> be involved in gambling - which is a huge social problem in this part of
>> the world.  But, they sure were doing some cool things ..)
>>
>
> For me, the defence industry is on the other side of the red line. The
> betting industry doesn't cause social problems, it merely facilitates them.
> :)
>
> Still, I like the idea of moving to Malta.  Maybe they’ve got a new R&D
>> division that is devoted to technology nobody really cares about?
>>
>
> Unfortunately, the Maltese are very good at making money, even though the
> country itself isn't very rich, or at least not as rich as its western
> European friends. Having said that, the change over the past 15 years has
> been momentous. Whereas before the Maltese would go abroad in search of a
> better life, now others are flocking to Malta for the exact same reason.
> Finding Maltese working in restaurants is becoming difficult.
>
> So, because the Maltese like to make money, there isn't a lot of R&D going
> on technology that nobody really cares about. There is some R&D done here,
> but it's very specialised, and less than half of the EU average as a
> percentage of GDP. If you like R&D, move to the Nordic countries.
> Year-round sunshine might be a bit tricky, though. Plus, they drive on the
> wrong side of the road.
>
>
> - Peter
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