H1B

[Rich Braun]

Patrick R. McManus wrote:
> Linux is an international phenomenon. We owe the industry around it to
> the amazing open cooperation of its developers and the fact that bits
> seem to see physical boundaries as less important than people do. ...
> We (americans) are not independent of the world. And I don't want to
> be. When the computer industry resorts to protectionism for its
> workforce is when it gets remarkably uninteresting and its time
> to question what we're doing.

You have a point.  Globalism is something you can rail against and protest all
you want, but in the end the commerce and jobs will eventually find the most
cost-efficient locale.

Ironically it is the Internet and long-distance network pioneered by Americans
which has enabled companies to shed their international boundaries and enabled
them to utilize workforces overseas.  Also ironically it is these media which
have led to increased incentives for schoolchildren everywhere to learn
English and the use of American technology from an early age.

What made America great in the past, and can in the future, is ongoing
innovation.  If we collectively rest on our laurels and permit the rest of the
world to "catch up" in adopting American technology developed in the past,
then of course the jobs will flow ever outward.

Protectionism, while it may stem losses for a while, won't create new jobs for
American technology workers.  Only innovation can.  To me that has been
obvious my whole life.

-rich