Thomas Friedman writing for the New York Times:

“In a world where average is officially over, there are many things we need to do to buttress employment, but nothing would be more important than passing some kind of G.I. Bill for the 21st century that ensures that every American has access to post-high school education.”

It’s difficult to disagree with the majority of Friedman’s points, but two additional points are worth considering:

• Higher education will not save the unemployed in a “contracting” job market. I view Friedman’s argument as a band-aid to cure cancer. Government needs to re-evaluate policy to buttress local job growth rather than off-shoring.
• While technology continues to be disruptive, there is some degree of balance. New jobs are now available that previously did not exist. There’s likely a pretty good-sized disparity in the ratio of elimination to creation, but still – the forecast isn’t entirely gloomy.

And let’s face it, the story concerning the waiters and waitresses is just … disturbing.

Fantastic article by entrepreneur and software developer, Joel Spolsky, concerning the military tactic of Fire and Motion and how it relates to personal productivity and business.

Fire and Motion, for small companies like mine, means two things. You have to have time on your side, and you have to move forward every day. Sooner or later you will win.

Wikipedia makes a stand against censorship, this time in the form of the SOPA and PIPA initiatives. I’ve never given to their fund raising drives before, but chalk me up for a donation on the next one.

“Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet,” it said.