The Dirty Jobs of IT

dantwood writes "In an Infoworld article, Dan Tynan writes about the '7 Dirtiest Jobs' in IT. Number three? Enterprise espionage engineer (black ops). 'Seeking slippery individuals comfortable with lying, cheating, stealing, breaking, and entering for penetration testing of enterprise networks. Requirements include familiarity with hacking, malware, and forgery; must be able to plausibly impersonate a pest control specialist or a fire marshal. Please submit rap sheet along with resume.'" Paging Mike Rowe, Mike Rowe to the IT desk.

What?

[Anonymous Coward]

No spammer/antispammer?

What about the guy

[antifoidulus]

who publishes stories on IT web sites and only puts a tiny amount of information on each page but has tons of pages in a desperate attempt to increase ad revenue? I think that should be #1 on the list.

Depends what you mean by "dirty"

[NMajik]

If "dirty" implies unpleasant to preform, I think anything that forces you interact with an end user should be higher on the list. If "dirty" implies morally wrong, only the espionage engineer seems to apply. But if "dirty" implies physically dirty, only 1 and 2 apply. This article seems to combine all the different definitions, but I enjoyed reading it anyway. I think intern would fit somewhere on the list event though it isn't a job, exactly. You get to experience whatever other people would like to avoid, so you get a nice spectrum of unpleasantry.

Again with the Wikipedia!!

[sczimme]

What is the point of linking to the Dirty Jobs entry on Wikipedia? What's wrong with the actual Discovery Channel site [discovery.com] ??

Re:dirty job?

[nomadic]

Oh really, I think corporate spy would be a simple job. Find out what they want you to do, turn in your company/boss, flip them off as the FBI takes them away, collect the reward and get a new job.

And hope your next employer doesn't hear about what you did...

#7 seems pretty sweet

[sokoban]

Hey, that #7 job doesn't sound bad at all. Legacy systems? I'll take that any day over most of those other jobs. It's probably not very outsourceable and is obscure enough that when you actually do a good job you'll be revered as a god by those who depend on your work.

Servicing equipment neglected for years

[Anonymous Coward]

How about equipment in an 'institutional' environment? Replacing printers, terminals and interface hardware in areas where the dust lays almost an inch thick like dryer lint. One spark in the wrong place and FWOOOM. How about facilites where there are wiring problems? Never touch a metal doorframe and a metal computer case at the same time, cause you'll get a jolt (not cola). How about servicing a line printer with five guys with guns on one side and a score or more of arrestees peering at you behind an expanded steel screen with the place smelling like BO, spit and fingerprint ink?

Re:Again with the Wikipedia!!

[dubl-u]

What is the point of linking to the Dirty Jobs entry on Wikipedia? What's wrong with the actual Discovery Channel site?

Well, I looked at your link [discovery.com] and I see some ads and a big Flash thingy. (I'm using FlashBlock [mozdev.org] so I have to click to view Flash. Wonderful!) If I load the Flash, I see some fancily designed animated cruft with a bunch of buttons that may or may not lead to actual information. Much of text is at slightly random skewed angles, and there's no obvious place to find basic facts.

When I look a the Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org], on the other hand, I see no ads, no Flash, and some nicely formatted text, written to give quick answers, laid out in tidy sections, all using a standard format that I'm familiar with from a bunch of previous visits.

Other than that, no reason.

I don't think so...

[painandgreed]

...help desk zombie, but even lower on the totem pole, is the on-site reboot specialist...

Having done both, I completely disagree. In fact, I have yet to meet a help desk zombie who hasn't dreamed of becoming an on-site reboot specialist. It doesn't take long for a help desk zombie to wish they could simply get the person on the other end of the phone to do what they tell them and nothing else, or even just understand what they have told them. Getting to be an on-site reboot specialist allows one to work directly on a machine without the person who has no idea playing a literal game of telephone with your instructions to mess things up. In addition, on-site rebooters usually get paid more for doing less and can get rid of angry customers at least for a time by telling them to go get coffee. The only real exception I've seen to this would be the Graveyard Support Vampire who have other priorities than more money or getting the job done ASAP to meet quota.

#2 isn't dirty in the least

[nurb432]

It may be undesirable by most of the kids around here, but there is nothing bad about coding COBOL for a living:

You are always in demand, unlike several other IT fields
Pays well
Stable work
Stable code.

Re:Again with the Wikipedia!!

[georgeav]

Wikipedia is lynx [wikipedia.org] friendly.

Re:Again with the Wikipedia!!

[dubl-u]

So your grumbling boils down to a) Flash and b) your comparative lack of familiarity with the Discovery Channel sites.

No, my point is that Wikipedia is easier to get information out of. That's because they understand that fancy design reduces utility [useit.com]. Further, their only reason for existence is to provide answers, whereas the Discovery Channel has different purposes, like promoting their show, reinforcing the fan base, and selling my attention to advertisers.

And suggesting that it's somehow more efficient to become familiar with every primary-source site on the web rather than just one? You can't expect to be taken seriously with statements like that, can you?

it is silly to use Wikipedia when there are better/more direct sources. Basic critical thinking skills will allow you to see that.

Basic critical thinking skills? Yes, please use them before posting. It will save us all some time.

More direct sources are very rarely better for a quick overview, which is why I have shelves of dictionaries, almanacs, concordances, indexes, encyclopedias, guides, maps, analyses, abstracts, and literature surveys. I also have plenty of primary sources, and go to them when needed. But the whole point of an encyclopedia, on-line or off-, is to make basic info more conveniently available than primary sources. Which is what 99% of people want as a starting point. If you don't, fine. Post your little link and move along.

Left out Multi-Level Marketing

[Anonymous Coward]

Pretty early on in my career, I worked at a Multi Level Marketing [read: Pyramid Scheme] company.
The company makes multi-millions, and I was personally in charge of the systems that calculates, tallies, and print out "reward" cheques every month. I had to be intimately familiar with all the details and clauses and sub-clauses and secret definitions of obvious words like "one week" or heck even what "50" means. I knew first hand that what our marketing people said was very different from what our sales people said, which is different from when people call our customer service, and which in turn is many miles away from how the system actually works.

They never lie, because you get sued when you lie.

But ever since, I have been convinced that it is dirtier to speak in half-truths and equivocations than out-right lies.

[confession]
I was young and dismissed my disgust at the company as my being too "picky" about jobs. I convined myself to tough it out. Eventually I found out the company was stealing from ME, and only then did I quit. So I already got what I deserved. [/confession]

sorry about posting as AC, but I have a rather unique handle I've been using for quite a few years.

Re:Mixed Metaphors?

[Faylone]

While a spelunker isn't likely to be going to explore underwater wrecks, they very well may be going to explore underwater caves. [wikipedia.org]

Re:Link covers several pages

[waterwingz]

Sorry - the OP of this thread is not really that informative. On most websites that insist on stretching their articles out over many pages there is often a "Printer Friendly" link at the top. That usually gives you the whole article on one page with a minimum of ads and dancing baloney.

Dr. House said it best

[nhtshot]

Even though medicine and IT aren't obviously related, I've garnered a lot of wonderful problem solving theory from Dr. House.

Rule #1: Patients lie

Re:I don't think so...

[DeathElk]

Wrong, verging on flamebait. Chances are they're supporting software running on a Windows OS, and the first point of call when troubleshooting is to start from a fresh reboot.

Re:What about the guy

[techno-vampire]

No, because whoever wrote that isn't in IT, he's a journalist. Writing articles to maximize the number of ads is an important part of his job. If he thought that writing pages like that was a Bad Thing, he'd be in a different industry.

Re:#2 isn't dirty in the least

[Adambomb]

Stable code.

trust me, all COBOL is not created equal.

Re:"Help Desk" is customer service

[Darth_brooks]

I was just chatting with someone about this the other day.

You're right, Help Desk is a horrible place to expect qualified techies to hang out. It's more of a litmus test than anything else. If you've got some level of skill, you advance out of the help desk and into something useful. If you suck...well...at least you're unlikely to be fired.

Every place I've worked that had a decent sized IT department had two types of people; Help Desk / Operators that had been there 10+ years, and help desk staff that got promoted or moved on within six months.

Rap sheet???

[advocate_one]

anyone who was really good at this wouldn't have a rap sheet... as they wouldn't have been caught

Re:What about the guy

[Inda]

gamecopyworld.com - that's got to be one of the best sites ever.