Social Media — All In? “Social media” has become an accepted term to describe a variety of communication forms over social networks. Initially, it had a positive connotation. But as the medium has evolved, so have its negative aspects. Social media will continue to evolve over time, but as of today, people tend to view certain categories of postings with a measure of skepticism, thanks to exaggerated claims and links to false information. The bottom line is that though social media is an effective form of communication, its associated pitfalls mean that care must be taken when selecting a [...]

Trust in Advertising One of the fundamental truths in any civilization is that trust is hard to build and easy to destroy. If you research the elements of trust, you will find sources covering a range of elements (approximately 3–9) that are mostly focused on building trust between individuals. But what about commercial trust—say between a solution provider and a developer? For this relationship, we propose the elements of reputation and longevity for consideration. The first element, reputation, means that products or people are inherently trusted because they have a reputation which reduces our anxiety and mitigates our fear. [...]

Introduction Let us consider for a moment the software developer. Many people use the terms software engineer and software developer interchangeably, but there is a distinction. Software engineers design software solutions, while software developers build those solutions to ready them for consumers. Designing and building are how things get done — for everything from houses, to cars, to reactors, to spaceships. In the 21st century, our lives run on software, and without it, the world would grind to a halt. In ancient times, a developer might have been considered royalty. Developers wield tremendous power, because according to OwlGuru, software [...]

Decisions, Decisions, Decisions… Decisions can make or break a career, depending on the costs and possible outcomes, but risks are mitigated for developers if the responsibility for a decision is spread amongst the project team. And while the team leader is fundamentally the decision-maker, they will generally gather input from all team members, and may involve stakeholders outside the development team who have a vested interest in the project. Those stakeholders could include business leaders, financial staff, or sales and marketing. Businesses understand that their success is a matter of producing results, so the critical part of the decision [...]