Geez... not this crap again...

Hello all. Just saw an article over at the NYT which discussed how chic it is to be "geek". While I'm glad that the computer pastime is no longer something in and of itself to laugh at, I'm really not sure what to think about the social consequences of "the age of the geek". I would honestly be happier if geeks were just a accepted part of society and not placed in the arena of dictating fashion, trends and pop-culture. To be honest, there are FAR too many wanna-be geeks.

Many of you don't know that I have a theory about the dot com bubble that burst some years ago. The theory is called "bubba got a book". And it, in my opinion, is EXACTLY why the IT industry has most of the problems it has today. The theory, in a nutshell, is that towards the close of the 20th century, more and more businesses were finding a need to have computer and network support. Everyone had an office network, EVERYONE was on the internet, and there was alot of opportunity for "geeks" to find work doing what they liked. Only, regular lay people started hearing about the "technology boom" and how much money that good computing professionals can make. Unfortunately, these people did not REALLY understand anything about computers and the internet, (of course most of them thought they were computer experts because they knew where the "Start" button was) and most of them had not even used a computer until well into their adult life. Well, the industry saw this coming and in its infinite wisdom, decided that they should make classes and tests about each company's technology. These were called "certifications". But what they really were giving was a glorified how-to manual and multiple choice test, charging a metric ass-load of money, and giving certs.

Of course the problem is that most of these "paper MCSE's or paper SCNE's" started getting job based on their certifications, but most of them had never acuallty done any IT work, Half of the Cisco certified people had never touched a router. And the industry got screwed a few times. They learned quickly and now if you don't have 10 years experience already doing an IT job you apply for, they won't even look at you. 'Course, you still had all these paper MCSE's running around thinking they are computer gods. And many of them had experience -- it was just BAD experience before they got fired.

I'm thinking that these "geek life" throwbacks are a symptom of this problem. Many of these paper cert people figure, "hey I am not a geek but if I act like a geek and talk like a geek"...
I just can't figure out why I'm a geek, I always was a geek, and I'm STILL a pariah. Damnit. That just pisses me off.