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Mitchell Ashley
Microsoft Is Perfect Example Why Executive Pay Is Broken
Written on Fri, 11/06/09 - 8:34am
Text message this morning from CNN: Unemployment hit 10.2% in October. Microsoft announced earlier this week another 800 employee layoffs to the 5,000 previously announced employee layoffs. If you look at Microsoft's financials you see why, a 14% revenue and 18% net income drop for the last reported...
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Ray Ozzie's Inspiring Talk Is Just As Applicable To You
Written on Mon, 07/06/09 - 6:15am
On July 3rd, Ray Ozzie spoke to the 444 youthful competitors at the annual Imagine Cup competition held this year in Cairo, Egypt. Ozzie spoke about his own technology journey, the people who inspired him and the insight, the ah-ha, that set him on his mission to create collaboration software like Notes...
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Twitter and LinkedIn - Valuable Social Media Tools For Contracting and Locating Jobs
Written on Mon, 06/22/09 - 12:46pm
We all often wonder how our employers could do something as devistating as lay someone off from their job. Despite any social obligations to the community or altruistic wishes we may have for our employers, companies ultimately have to cut expenses when their business suffers a downturn, especially during...
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5 Tactics Microsoft Is Using To Battle Linux for Cloud Dominance
Written on Fri, 04/03/09 - 3:02am
Can Microsoft really battle Linux for dominance of the cloud? It's a one versus many proposition. Sides have been chosen and the battle lines are clear. The Cloud Manifesto developed by Sun, IBM, RedHat, Amazon and Google, didn't include participation by Microsoft.
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CS Degree? Constant Learners and Self-SysAdmins Are Required
Written on Tue, 03/31/09 - 10:22am
I enjoy the conversation sparked by the Network World article Does A Computer Science Degree Matter Anymore? I've hired lots of software developers and IT professionals and whether they have a degree or not isn't usually a top factor. When you can, developing a technical screening questionnaire...
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IBM Steps On American Workers - Future IT Managers Replace IBM
Written on Fri, 03/27/09 - 12:06pm
That great sucking sound isn't NAFTA, it's IBM (and their empty headed executives) thumbing their nose at 5k of IBM's productive, loyal North American workers, while IBM sucks their jobs right from under them and the American economy. Layoffs are layoffs, most companies have been forced...
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Windows 7 Post-Beta Leaks - Why You Should Care
Written on Fri, 03/06/09 - 2:00pm
If you're a BitTorrent user you might have noticed that another Windows 7 post-beta build (7048) has been circulating in the wild for curious downloaders.
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Great Week To Reduce That IT To Do List
Written on Mon, 12/29/08 - 11:38am
I always enjoy working the week between Christmas and New Years. It's a great time to take care of those projects you can't do while the office is full and busy with business and people. It's also nice to enjoy a little bit quieter atmosphere around the office, and maybe spend time hanging...
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Job Hunting - Send Me In Coach
Written on Tue, 12/02/08 - 1:52am
Economy. Recession. Layoffs. Yuck already, let’s get on with reving up this economy again and creating lots of new jobs. Think positive. Lets find you a job. If you’re actively in the job market, I have an important idea for you: find a job search coach. Getting that next job might be hard or it...
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Yang Reaches End Of Yahoo's Rope
Written on Tue, 11/18/08 - 2:33am
Microsoft's $33 per share offer for Yahoo! is looking pretty darn good after their close today at $10.63 today. And while Microsoft's stock price has taken a beating right along with everyone else, they've tracked pretty close to the Dow's fall, where the same can't be said for Yahoo....
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Top 5 'I've been laid off' to-do's
Written on Wed, 11/05/08 - 3:31am
We're hearing about layoffs in IT and technology companies on what seems like an almost daily basis. And many say we could be in for a long recession. It's hard to say what's really going to happen, but the reality right now is that companies are doing layoffs because of poor quarterly financial...
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Why you need multiple streams of income in a down IT economy
Written on Wed, 10/15/08 - 2:39am
Layoffs. Downsizing. Recession. Job security. Is your IT job safe? Is a layoff in your tech company just around the corner? Can you count on the job you have today being there tomorrow? Are you living in a constant wonder of what all this economic turmoil fundamentally means for you? Sometimes you...
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Windows XP Just Won't Die
Written on Tue, 10/07/08 - 2:24am
Despite Microsoft's best efforts, Windows XP is the operating system that just won't seem to go away. Seems as sticky as DOS 3.3 was back in the day. Microsoft's officially cut ties with selling new copies of XP but PC manufactures can still downgrade new Vista PCs to Windows XP until...
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Top 5 Strategies For Surviving A Recession
Written on Thu, 09/18/08 - 8:11am
Layoffs. Recession. Bad economy. Job hunting. Those are the topics around many water coolers right now. I was quite a bit younger but I lived through and tried to get a job right out of college during the recession of late 1970's and early 1980's. There weren't many jobs around when I graduated...
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4 Reasons Microsoft Will Crush VMware
Written on Thu, 09/11/08 - 9:05am
Microsoft's momentum in virtualization is growing quickly, as evidenced by September 8th's "Get Virtual Now" virtualization extravaganza showcase. Microsoft announced Hyper-V Server 2008 will be free to download along with System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 and Microsoft...
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Development Costs In The Cloud
Written on Tue, 08/05/08 - 10:31am
As more of our applications migrate into the cloud, some interesting questions for development rise up. What about development? How will developer use cloud services in the development process? How do you attract developers to develop on your cloud services? How much will cloud services cost you...
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Linux Not The Savior For Our Economy
Written on Thu, 07/17/08 - 3:46am
You knew the argument had to come up sometime: survive the economic downturn by using open source to help you save money. Now ComputerWorld blogger Steve Vaughan-Nichols makes that claim in his Linux Will Save Us blog post. The title almost has religious overtones. I found Steve's article thanks...
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Meet Me In Houston At Microsoft WPC
Written on Tue, 07/08/08 - 6:07am
This week I'm attending the Microsoft WPC, Worldwide Partner Conference, in Houston Texas. It's going to be a hot one, oh and the conference should be really good too, lol. If you are in town for the conference, stop by, introduce yourself and say hello. I'll be at the Absolute Performance...
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7 skills for IT fame and fortune
Written on Tue, 07/01/08 - 11:52am
With the economic downturn on everyone's mind, assumptions about job security come under question, and everyone starts reexamining their skills. There are lots and lots of valuable jobs performed in IT, but some skills are valued even more highly than others. With all the upheaval we're experiencing...
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Apple User Saves Microsoft From Collapse
Written on Thu, 06/19/08 - 12:33am
At least that's what Microsoft is counting on, in a manner of speaking, as it pertains to its brand image. On my recent business trip I picked up a copy of Fast Company and read the article about marketing genius Alex Bogusky working on Microsoft's new marketing campaign. Apple's been very...
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About Converging on Microsoft
Mitchell Ashley has a diverse background in software development, network engineering, information security, mobility, collaborative technologies, and IT management and operations. An early adopter of social media in business, he began blogging about security and information technologies in 2006 at theconvergingnetwork.com. Mitchell is VP of Information Technology at CableLabs in Louisville, CO, and previously held positions as CIO, CTO and VP Engineering at prior companies.
 

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