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Full length items that typically deal with career issues, product reviews or test drives of the latest Web 2.0 services.

The Deflating Non-Bubble
Web 2.0 Review
Written by Brian Austin   
Wednesday, 03 December 2008

Call it irrational exuberance, over hype or cheer leading, but don't call it a bubble. That's the take away lesson from the recent tech start up meltdown. While sites like ValleyWag delight in the misfortune of the latest gaggle of VC funded companies and spin events as the end of the world, the truth is that this has been nothing more than a simple boom / bust cycle for tech.

Nearly a decade ago as Silicon Valley hype reached stratospheric levels many early pundits used words like "historic" and "new economy". Companies that were little more than a fancy website were raising immense amounts of capital with IPOs while communications companies laid thousands of miles of fiber optic cable. It was if the Internet commerce sector could not be stopped and millions of average Joes sunk their retirement funds into companies like Flooz and Pets.com. In the end many companies went bust others suffered with inventory or bandwidth they could not sell, and many others lost most of their nest egg as the stock market fell.

If the events of the first great Internet crash were any indicator what we are experiencing in no way approaches the events of those heady days. For starters most of the cash infused into the latest group of startups has been venture capital and not equity. This long touted point means that equity market forces have not played as great a factor in the fate of many outfits. However the VC companies bankrolling many organizations do rely upon both equity and credit markets which given the recent crisis has meant that most forms of funding have dried up. Essentially companies are cut off from further cash injection and as such are subject to the same fate as a generation before: sink or swim.

Hype was another factor during the tech bubble and in some ways achieved historic notoriety among other manias such as the tulip and railroad bubble. In contrast today's hype has largely focused on a handful of tech companies who've embraced the sycophantic love relationship of VCs and the Valley. While names like Calcanias, Cuban and Zuckerberg are common on the electronic pages of gossip rags and blogs, few outside the industry know who they are or what they've contributed to the Internet. Furthermore many of the recent tech failures have been anything but high profile and in fact are quite unknown to all but a few hard core industry watchers.

The last great divergence between Bubble 1.0 and the so-called Bubble 2.0 is the number of jobs created and lost. During the first boom hundreds of thousands of tech or IT workers inhabited the posh offices of Silicon Valley firms. These days companies are thinly staffed and typically located in lower-end rental space typically reserved for small businesses. While you can argue that the latest generation programming languages and hardware requires fewer people the fact of the matter is that start-ups have chosen to stay small and modestly accommodated due to budget concerns.

Finally the biggest difference is in the attitude of start-up entrepreneurs. In the early days founders often touted the lofty goal of "changing the world" however these days start-up folks are more concerned with simply bringing a good idea to market. The latter is more in line with the behavior or entrepreneurs in other sectors and represents a more pragmatic approach and more reasonable milestones of success. As such founders are more level headed as to the possibility of success and the statistical probability of disappointment.

Still despite these differences the current downturn in "Web 2.0" is not without consequence. For many who've committed countless hours, deferred job security and lavish compensation, and poured themselves into an idea the thought of failure can be outright depressing. Despite the fear and anger founders may feel in the face of an untimely demise it's important to take away the lessons of failure and apply them to the next iteration of innovation. After all there will new ideas and re-imagined concepts that will require the same effort and perseverance as in boom times before.

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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 03 December 2008 )
 
Alachisoft NCache
.Net Development
Written by Brian Austin   
Thursday, 14 August 2008

I recently had a chance to review an enterprise level caching solution from the folks at Alachisoft called NCache. Our development team was in the market for a scalable solution to high database load which was sapping the life from our database server. NCache is an in-memory cache which can be distributed among a cluster of servers to both improve reliability and performance of data intensive apps.

Last Updated ( Tuesday, 23 September 2008 )
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Interactive Weather
The Bleeding Edge
Written by Brian Austin   
Friday, 25 July 2008

Weather Underground's latest feature presses the boundary

Google Maps has been around for a while but I'm repeatedly amazed by the addition of features by both Google and third parties via the public API. I recently uncovered a new feature from the venerable meteorological site Weather Underground called the WunderMap. WunderMap is a customized weather layer atop the already familiar Google maps engine. However unlike standard radar, the WunderMap displays real time data which includes current storm activity and trajectory.

Last Updated ( Sunday, 17 August 2008 )
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Crossroads of the career path
Career
Written by Brian Austin   
Monday, 10 March 2008

Sometimes changing jobs can bring unexpected changes

Three months ago I found myself at a new job, a new company and in capacity different from what I was used to. The former startup company that I worked for faced hard economic times and as a result I found myself on the job market in December. Looking for a job is a scary proposition especially when you're not currently employed. You brace yourself for the worst and hope for the best. After a mere two weeks I had three interested companies and one solid offer to digest before the holidays.

In a nutshell the offer that I eventually accepted was a bit of a departure for me personally and professionally. It was presented with an opportunity to grow into a position and to become the lead technical guy on a day to day basis. This role required me to be the "go to" person for more junior level developers, a position of leadership which while new to me in my career is something I've become comfortable through other life experiences.

Last Updated ( Monday, 10 March 2008 )
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Patterns of Microsoft
.Net Development
Written by Brian Austin   
Wednesday, 02 January 2008

It stands to reason that there are more than a few characteristics that contribute to a good developer. Obviously you must have the desire to constantly learn and evolve, but you must also be willing to apply brand new technologies. You must also have a certain amount of faith that you'll be able to make any sort of solution work in the end. Many times we find ourselves beating our heads against a wall while trying to solve a problem, but it is only through persistence that we find success.

Thankfully there are resources that help developers better utilize the tools that Microsoft has given us. One such tool is called patterns and practices and though it's been around for years I've only recently, that is over the past three years, delved into the lessons contained within.

Last Updated ( Monday, 10 March 2008 )
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