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Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Like Legos? Check out 5 Jobs where Play is Required

Who wouldn’t want to get paid for playing with Legos? If you raised your hand, just move on because you are apparently crazy. Talk about balancing work and play, the name 'LEGO' comes from an abbreviation of the two Danish words "leg godt", meaning "play well." Hopefully that’s one the qualifications for consideration because I excel in play time.


Lego culture in the workplace is characterized by an informal atmosphere, an open dialogue, and respect for each other. The head office is in Billund, Denmark but Lego products are sold in more than 130 countries. There are job opportunities at retail stores, administrative facilities and theme parks worldwide as well as other options outside of the company.


Check out these five fun jobs to start building your ideal Lego career:


Brick Specialist – Experience equivalent to a retail sales associate can land you a job as a Brick Specialist in one of the many Lego Store locations across the world and most offer room for rapid advancement from specialist to expert. Not your typical toy store clerks though, Brick Specialists are hands on helpers who meet the company motto on the front line by inspiring the builders of tomorrow. They organize Lego club meetings, free monthly mini builds and birthday parties. Perks of the job include an awesome discount and the fact that employees are encouraged to engage with the product through in-store play.


Concept Designer – If you ever wonder who comes up with all the ways to take tiny blocks and arrange them in a way that assembles as an entire universe, it is Lego’s concept designers. In a nut shell their job description is “turn ideas into toys.” They come up with the toy sets and the elaborate back stories that surround them. Candidates need to be out of the box thinkers with a strong graphical background having skills in Adobe and 3D modeling as well as being able to sketch by hand. Pinch me, this might be my dream job.


Sculptor/Artist – People all over the world have stumbled on a new medium and are using the little bricks build big art. Typically the work is sporadic since it is usually commissions and can be tedious but in the end the sense of accomplishment is rewarding for Lego artists. Their masterpieces can hang anywhere from private homes to iconic galleries and appeal to observers young and old.


Digital Insights Manager – Aside from toy connoisseurs, the Lego brand has embraced virtual consumers as well. Digital insight managers research the global market and trends monitoring, tracking and reporting industry activity across new digital products, channels and platforms like video games, mobile apps and social media. The advice of the Digital Insight Manager is strongly regarded as the company decides which endeavors to pursue.


Robotic Pedagogical Expert – This is the job for people who speak robot. Lego realizes one of its strengths foraging into the future of toys is at home robotics for everyone specifically in reference to its Mindstorm system. A Robotic Pedagogical Expert orchestrates events that explain how this technology works and the importance of making it available for children -  especially in schools. They work with the Lego Foundation to train instructors and raise awareness about Care for Education and their efforts to make the Lego robotics programs available in more schools.


What do you make when you build with Legos? I've noticed boys make vehicles and girls construct houses. Let me know your play preferences in the comments below.


By Heather Fairchild - Heather is a multimedia developer with experience in web, film, photography and animation as well as traditional fine arts like painting and sculpting. In addition to writing for Beyond.com, she is co-founder of a design and promotion company. Heather’s spare time consists of making puppets, teaching Sunday School, building Legos and doing science experiments with her children.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Yahoo Founder Leaves. What Will Happen?

English: Jerry Yang, one of the founders of Yahoo!Image via Wikipedia
Jerry Yang leaves Yahoo.


Jerry Yang is certainly on the list of great pioneers of the Internet Era. As the founder of Yahoo, he created one of the first internet companies and just about all of us have used Yahoo at one point or another. His departure from his company is certainly something that has many in the tech industry wondering what will happen to Yahoo.


The company has been struggling for some time now, and Yang is often criticised for not accepting the buy out offer of $45 billion by Mircosoft in 2008. Many people thought that he should have taken the money and ran, but he made it clear that he wanted keep his company's independence for as long as possible.


Even then, Yahoo had already lost their search market share to Google and Facebook was on the way to social dominance. It seemed like the perfect time for Yang to cut his losses and sell to Microsoft. His decision made his shareholders very unhappy. Especially because Microsoft offered $30 a share. Since then, share prices haven't topped $20.


With Jerry Yang leaving the company, it opens the door to selling the company or breaking up the part. It would be sad to see a company as iconic as Yahoo leave the internet, but it has been coming for a long time now. There have been several attempts to revitalize Yahoo and make it more relevant, but it has slowly been losing more and more market share.


It will be interesting to see what happens next. The company's chairman says that they are now exploring strategic options for the future of the company.


What do you think will happen to Yahoo? Please share your thoughts in the comments.


By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a 9 year blog veteran and a freelance writer for TechCareersBlog and Beyond.com. Along with helping others find the job of their dreams, she enjoys computer geekery, raising a teenager, supporting her local library, writing about herself in the third person and working on her next novel.

Tuesday, January 17, 2012

In The Hot Seat -Why

Extensive knowledge is essential in a technical career but don’t go into too much detail with the human resources department. Save the in depth explanation for when you’re In The Hot Seat with the department manager instead.






Have you ever had to answer an interview question that was way over your head? How did you handle it?


By Heather Fairchild - Heather is a multimedia developer with experience in web, film, photography and animation as well as traditional fine arts like painting and sculpting. In addition to writing for Beyond.com, she is co-founder of a design and promotion company. Heather’s spare time consists of making puppets, teaching Sunday School, building Legos and doing science experiments with her children.

Monday, January 16, 2012

Google Search Gets an Overhaul - Is it a Good Thing?



How Google Got Social.


The Google search engine has received a new face lift, one that has many in the tech industry wondering if it was a smart move or a huge mistake. Although Google has some amazing products and is the standard king of web search, they have also made some huge mistakes and come out with products that didn't quite catch on. Until now, they haven't integrated many of their other services into their search results, keeping their other products safely away from their big money maker.


Now, however, Google has Google Plus-ified their search result with the intention of making their search more social. With the new look, when you search for a specific topic, in addition to the typical results of links, videos, pictures and such, if you are logged in to Google +, you'll also find any Google + content.


This doesn't come as any surprise to me. I told everyone that Google + was going to be in the thick of everything ages ago. Even though it has been slow to catch on, I think that as more people sign up and begin using it with their web searches, it will become more popular.


The goal of the Google overhaul, aside from incorporating Google +, was to make search results more personal by understanding who you are and thinking about what you are really looking for. Honestly, I think it is a natural progression, because the thing that Google is really good at is taking the words you are searching and finding the results that are the most relevant.


Of course, not everyone is a fan of the new look. Twitter recently criticised Google for the Google + integration, basically saying that Google has an unfair promotional advantage and that these social search results featuring only Google + information will make it more difficult for people to find relevant Twitter results. That may be true, but Google hasn't ruled out making agreements with other social networking sites to add to their social search results.


It's still new and there's no telling how long it will take before everything is Google Plus-ified.


Do you use Google +? Why or why not? Please share your thoughts in the comments.




By Melissa Kennedy- Melissa is a 9 year blog veteran and a freelance writer for TechCareersBlog and Beyond.com. Along with helping others find the job of their dreams, she enjoys computer geekery, raising a teenager, supporting her local library, writing about herself in the third person and working on her next novel.

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

45,000 Facebook Users Wormed out of Login Information

A virus that originally emerged in April is flaring back up as a hybrid version of its previous self and other nasty malware. The "Ramnit" worm is digging its way through the web again chewing up Windows executable and HTML files and harvesting browser cookies, storing FTP credentials and other sensitive information.


Recently researchers from Seculert discovered a command-and-control server for the worm stole 45,000 Facebook users’ login and password information, mostly from France and the United Kingdom. Now the attacks have turned financial.


Aviv Raff, CTO and cofounder of Seculert blogged, "We see a growing trend of malware writers embedding social networks in the malware instead of sending the malware itself via email spam. This is the same for Ramnit."


Hackers behind the malware are capitalizing on the fact that many people use the same password on multiple sites. By piecing together logins, passwords and other packets of information the worm is able to “bypass two-factor authentication and transaction signing systems, gain remote access to financial institutions, compromise online banking sessions and penetrate several corporate networks," according to Seculert.


It is estimated that 800,000 computers were infected with Ramnit from September until the end of December. By gaining account access the worm posts infected links to Facebook that quickly spread through the user’s friend’s list. It also attempts to access other social media accounts like Twitter, Gmail and Outlook.


It is especially important for job seekers who use these social media tools to be diligent in securing their information. No company will want to hire you if you attach a virus with your resume. Perform frequent scans, update your account information and alternate your passwords instead of taking the easy way out and using one for everything.


What antivirus software do you use make sure your information is secure?


By Heather Fairchild - Heather is a multimedia developer with experience in web, film, photography and animation as well as traditional fine arts like painting and sculpting. In addition to writing for Beyond.com, she is co-founder of a design and promotion company. Heather’s spare time consists of making puppets, teaching Sunday School, building Legos and doing science experiments with her children.