Tech Careers

Top IT Jobs of 2012

Two new surveys show the job outlook for some of the best and worst IT positions in the US this year.

The Mobile App Gold Rush

Monday November 19, 2012

Apple is reporting this week that its iOS devices like the iPhone and iPad has helped create over 275,000 jobs in the U.S. with another 6,000 openings posted in want ads across the country.
So far, Apple reports it has paid $6.5 billion to developers through the Apple App Store. Of course, none of these numbers include developers building apps for other platforms like Android or Windows.
This works out to just over $23,000 per developer, but it doesn't take an expert to know that apps like Angry Birds, GarageBand and Minecraft put these earnings on a steep curve. It's also difficult to determine how many registered app developers haven't yet put out an app. But how big is that curve and what can the average mobile app developer expect to make in a year?
An informal survey of 252 developers done by Steaming Colour discovered that 36 percent were full-time game developers. The rest were part-time and only 4 percent worked for a game development company. About 14 percent made under $100 so far. A quarter made under $1,000. A quarter made under $10,000 and about 22 percent made under $100,000. About 15 percent have made over $1 million in lifetime revenue from the Apple App Store.
Ethan Nicholas was one app developer who made it big in 2008 with an artillery game app, iShoot, which he wrote himself in six weeks. It sold 17,000 copies and returned more than $1 million to him, according to a recent article in the New York Times. His subsequent apps barely brought in any revenue at all.
It's much harder to make it big in app development today simply because of the quality of the competition and the sheer number of apps available - over 700,000 and counting, he explained. For his own success, Nicholas chalks it up to "sheer dumb luck and being in the right place at the right time."

Twitter and the IT Industry Today

With over 517 million accounts in 2012, with 147 million being in the U.S. alone, despite it's shortcomings, Twitter is still a preferred social media platform for those in the IT industry.
Certainly Twitter is not the social media darling for everyone in the tech industry. Many have gone to Google+ never to return, and others prefer LinkedIn or Facebook.
For the past week I've been sorting through my lists, most saved from 2008 and 2009, composed of over 100 programmers, web designers, network architects and others in the IT industry, and discovered the overwhelming majority of them are still actively daily on Twitter today. In fact, less than ten percent of those who were active in those years have not posted on Twitter in the past month.
To help you get the most from Twitter for your tech career, we've begun compiling lists of some of the most informative, helpful and influential people to follow.
Here is a list of suggestions for web developers.
Here is a Twitter list for programmers.
If you're new to Twitter, here are some tips on getting the most of Twitter for your tech career, including how to find news sources, experts and job leads on the website.

JavaScript Ninja? Find New Gigs Here

If you're a web developer, designer or writer looking for work, here's a website you should check out. JavaScript Ninja Jobs posts full-time, part-time and contract positions for all sorts of JavaScript ninjas. A couple dozen positions are listed each month nation-wide from a variety of sources, including postings you may not see anywhere else.
Subscribing to the website's RSS feed will of course give you automatic notices of the latest openings.
The services is run by John Resig, currently the Dean of Computer Science at Khan Academy, but perhaps more famous for being the creator and lead developer of the jQuery JavaScript library. Resig is just one of the top Web Developers we have recently listed to follow on Twitter.

Hiring From an App

Monday October 8, 2012

Most companies today post hiring information on the career pages of their websites. Some use job websites and others use targeted ads on Google and Facebook.
I was surprised and delighted this week when opening one of my favorite stress-relieving, time-killing apps, Zombie Gunship, to discover Limbic Software is hiring software engineers. They placed the ad on the main menu, ensuring any software developers who love the app will be certain to see it. Tapping the the ad brings you to the job description on the Limbic website.
Limbic Software is based in Silicon Valley but hires developers world-wide to work from virtual offices. To apply, you will have to list your top five favorite mobile apps.
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