as we may blog

Has anyone been presented with a similar dilemma in a job/internship search? I’m trying to collect as much advice as possible before Monday morning when, much like Jack Nicholson living in Diane Keaton’s Hamptons home, something’s gotta give.

Let’s commence with the intentionally vague description:

I’ve pursued summer internships with two organizations, one is local and smaller, the other is distant and much larger. Both make products that are held in high regard. I’m excited about both for distinctly different reasons. The latter option is enticing because it is a pretty competitive position, I’ve gotten much farther in the hiring process than I ever would have imagined, and I would get a chance to work on products used by millions of people (wow, I hadn’t thought about it in those terms until just now). The smaller, in-town internship is exciting because it’s close, would allow me to work on more creative and designy things, and I felt very comfortable with the organizational culture during my interview.

What’s best is that both would allow me to do exactly what I want to be doing. I feel lucky that both are seriously considering me and realize that things could be much worse than they are now, with two weeks to go in the semester. This is a fantastic problem to have, and one I hadn’t quite anticipated. Even though it’s a great problem, though, the consequences of how this resolves itself could be pretty huge in the long run.

So earlier this week Smaller Local Organization asks me to work with them this summer. This is awesome. I ask when they would like my decision–by the end of the week. Oh shit. So I scramble to get in touch with Distant Large Company all week, with no luck. I’ll spare you the details, but rest assured that I had limited means of contact and exhausted them all. I asked Smaller Local if this deadline was firm–it is, but I could wait until Monday morning to give them my decision before they continue with other candidates. OK, fair enough, I obviously want to respect their deadlines.

At about 7:30 yesterday evening the phone rings. I realize it’s Distant Large Company and have a near heart attack after Sprint PCS drops the call (@#$&!). I finally get the person I needed to speak with on the line, but I’m not able to find out much more except that I’m not disqualified from their search, only that they haven’t made any decisions yet. I may get a chance to speak with them again on Monday morning but given some time zone issues, I’m not counting on getting any new information before I have to make a tough decision.

This weekend’s focus is now decision-making with incomplete information (damn you, 502). I’m trying to avoid one thing at all costs: accepting the offer from the local org. and then getting an offer from the large company. I will not back out of an offer once I’ve accepted it, it’s not cool professionally, it would really hurt the relationship the school has with the organization, and I’m not sure I could be comfortable with that decision personally.

All things being equal, I would go to the large company given the choice. It’s not that the local org. isn’t offering me an exciting opportunity (they are), it’s just that in many ways they can’t match what the larger company can offer (and not financially, either, I’d probably do better financially accepting the local org’s offer). If I turn them down on Monday and the large company decides not to puruse the hiring process any further, then I’m likely left to find employment in town for the summer. Which is not a terrible outcome, but it’s unlikely I’ll find an opportunity as exciting and relevant as the one on the table now.

So, yeah. It was nice just to type all that out as it helps me think about the situation with more clarity. But I’d sincerely like to hear any advice from anyone who has read this far. Any lurkers, too. Have a great weekend.

Subject: Avoiding Exploitation
From: Dean Susan Eklund
Date: 6:26 PM
To: “All U-M Students”:;

Dear Students:

Two items of concern have come to our attention that we thought worth sharing with you.

A news reporter has made us aware of claims by an individual producing pornographic videos that he has been advertising for U-M students to participate, and has been shooting videotape of sexual acts in campus facilities such as bathrooms, residence halls rooms, classrooms and lounges. Although we do not have any evidence that his claims are true, we are concerned that this individual may be targeting U-M students for his activities.

Although students age 18 or older can make their own decisions about whether to allow themselves to be videotaped, conducting such an activity in campus facilities would be a serious violation of our policies. More importantly, we are disturbed by the element of exploitation that accompanies this behavior. The invitation to appear in a film may feel momentarily exciting and empowering; but those decisions may ultimately prove damaging to the participant in ways he or she may not immediately be able to foresee. Our Sexual Assault Crisis Line, for example, periodically receives calls from people who have been videotaped in sexual acts in whatever context, and then later they discover the images have been shared via the Internet and are readily available to acquaintances, coworkers, etc. Their sense of violation can be profound, and the effects lasting.

In fact, the Internet is a tool that can create an instant sense of community and enable the widespread sharing of information in ways that were never before possible. Our second concern has to do with a very popular website for college students called The Facebook. Many of our students register there to identify other students with similar interests. I want to encourage you to think carefully about what personal or contact information you post to this or any other website. These public sites can be a fun and effective tool for creating community, but they can also expose you to individuals who may take advantage of your personal or contact information, sometimes in harmful ways.

We are always happy to talk with individual students and student groups who have questions or concerns about these issues. If you would like to do so, contact the Dean of Students Office at 764-7420.

There’s some nice subliminal synergy going on in this email between the porn announcement and The Facebook.

Though no one in this city can use a shopping cart corral to save their lives, there is something to be said for Ann Arbor’s lively blogging scene. Ann Arbor Is Overrated is often an entertaining source of local news:

# Dan Faichney, a planning student*, stood up and gave a speech that outlined a few main points to support the DDA’s plan. The only part of it that could have been considered inflammatory was his characterization of the greenway as an “environmentally irresponsible” plan with the potential to “undermine Ann Arbor’s reputation as a place for everyone.” Loud booing followed.

# A pro-greenway speaker asked those in favor of the greenway (that’s how he worded it — he didn’t mention the specific Easthope proposal) to stand. Everyone around us stood, and we couldn’t see anything. We didn’t notice anyone who was standing in the standing-room-only chamber sit on the floor to signify their non-support.

You get the idea. You can bet that pretty much anything I say about Ann Arbor is in some way ripped off of that site. Anyway, the whole point of this post was supposed to be to draw your attention to this AA Is Overrated post from a week ago that makes fun of this LiveJournal community of UM undergrads whose “craziest” drunken exploits include puking, calling someone’s mom, falling down, and, uh, puking some more, this time on someone else’s lawn.

But wait, there’s more: umstudents retaliates by not quite getting the original joke! Hijinx ensue. The comments section of the AAIO post is especially fun reading. Those of you looking for a description of the time I dove into a dumpster after a puke-stained shirt that had (has!) Sexual Chocolate emblazoned across the front in black cursive fuzz letters should save yourself the time.

Mr. Stadium officially jumps the shark.

Pull your ass out of bed by noon and hide the booze, earn $100:

ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — Some University of Michigan students are cleaning up in more ways than one. They’re getting cash payments for keeping their dormitory rooms presentable and available for tours by prospective students and their parents.

The rules for Campus Day participants technically don’t require a clean room. They do, however, have to be dressed and out of bed if they are home, and must let tour groups see their room from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays, Johnson said. Displays of anything illegal, offensive or banned — like hot plates — are forbidden.

Febreeze that shit.

More than you probably wanted to know.

In related academic/personal news, I had the following post written earlier. I think it’s kind of boring, but compared to what I’ve been putting up, well… beggars can’t be choosers I guess?

Ancient newsreel reveals more than bad hair

In Search and Retrieval today we watched this short CNN video clip from 1991 that mentioned the seemingly inevitable march towards 3-D interactive environments on "desk top computers." The actual purpose of watching the video in class was to note some of the cool search interface visualizations developed at Xerox PARC fifteen years ago that differ from the standard "here’s your list of results" display. Many of them were three-dimensional and really quite remarkable considering their age. Three-dimensional org charts, displays that linked academic texts and citations, and so on.

I couldn’t help but wonder where these interfaces ended up, though. Certainly not on my desktop and certainly not in any widely-used search engine or library catalog that I know of. Only now are some of these incredibly powerful visualization concepts starting to find their way onto the desktop. Think Expose.

The video today (and perhaps that twelfth cup of coffee) did get me thinking about interfaces like Google that we all know and love. Maybe this is a naive or totally uninsightful observation, but I realized that it wouldn’t take an earth-shattering idea to do search better than Google. Google supports query really well, far better than any other mainstream search engine. Google does not support the equally important search tasks of filtering and presentation nearly as well. People are used to the query-gets-list paradigm (that’s right, I said paradigm and I know what it means) of online search and retrieval, and they’re especially used to the straightforward layout Google provides. The point of this rambling entry is that I learned today that it could be done better. A search engine with Google’s accuracy that helps the user focus on the objects of highest relevance, or the underlying link structure, or… really anything that would help visualize a list of possibly relevant results better might be a huge improvement.