New job after long unemployment

[arkuat]

I have a new job after a period of un(der)employment that predated the pandemic by many months. It has been a couple of weeks now, and today was the first day I ended my shift not feeling totally drained. If this keeps up, I'll be employed through November 3 of this year. The bad news is that it pays only a little bit more than Minneapolis's target minimum wage. The good news is that it involves the same skills I was using in my career before (answering questions by phone and email, usually looking up a lot of things in the process), except that this time it's all about elections and the rules by which they are conducted, instead of how to operate huge fast reliable data-storage-and-retrieval systems, which I've learned in the last ten years are under-regulated and being put to nefarious purposes. For this reason, I enjoy the actual work much more, even though it pays much less!

Bruce Schneier has repeatedly made the point that we need laws requiring the deletion of old data held by third parties (at least unless they get the explicit consent of the subject of the data for its preservation). He's right. We do.

Comments

[arkuat]

In only semi-related news, I have been earwormed by a certain Elton John song, which I will not disclose unless someone asks, for about as long as I've had this new job.

[carbonel]

Congratulations on being employed, and I hope it leads to something more permanent.

Data-Retention Law

[dewline]

I'm wondering if Prof. Michael Geist at the University of Ottawa might not have useful insights to share and resources to look at re: Canadian data-retention law. PIPEDA is an acronym to keep in mind in that regard, along with CIPPIC.

Re: Data-Retention Law

[arkuat]

I'm pretty sure the EU has better regulation in this regard than USA, although it didn't protect the UK from Cambridge Analytica. I hadn't thought to take a look at Canada's regs. Thanks!

Unfortunately even very fresh and new data can easily be used to manipulate elections and referenda.

[lcohen]

i didn't realize you had been unemployed (it's very easy for me to miss this sort of news, even if posts are made)! glad you're doing something that sounds so interesting. i, too, hope it leads to something more permanent, or that you find something equally interesting, soon.

re your comment, i am now thinking of elton john songs and earworming myself, so no need for you to do so!

[arkuat]

I figured that was going to happen to someone. Sorry! I hope it's one of his songs that you like. (I actually like the one I got earwormed with, it has just been UNUSUALLY persistent. I managed to dislodge it a bit by listening to some MGMT, which is of *much* more recent origin, like, as in 2008.)

[spiderplanet]

Congratulations on the new job! It must be a relief to be back at reliable employment.

Data storage = under regulated and nefarious!? Tell me more!

[arkuat]

Fb is/was one of the big customers of my former long-term employer. If that's not saying enough I'll just mutter "Cambridge Analytica"-- I don't know that they were a customer of ours, but they seem to have specialized in, among other things, exploiting the lack of needed regulation of the industry.

[spiderplanet]

Well, YUCK.

[athenais]

Getting some work is such a relief, I know. I'm working again after five months.

[quadong]

Huzzah!

[bibliofile]

Yay for paid work! Yes, it can be rather tiring. Also, yay for helping people with election and voting info. Extra points for that, even if the pay isn't fabulous.