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'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

theguardian.com

31–40 of 124 posts

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#31
post #10
post #7

I’m in New Zealand. My friends are really struggling to get work here. Employers here are really tough on Chinese developers. Immigration is even tougher. I think our government needs to address these issues if we want more skilled workers.

> Employees here are really tough on Chinese developers. Immigration is even tougher Can you elaborate on this? I'm just curious.

In New Zealand and Australia Indian and Chinese workers are essentially seen as replaceable due to the huge numbers of them migrating to both countries (those countries make up the #1 and #2 sources of migrants respectively).

The whole point of the migration schemes are to get workers for cheap and to put downwards pressure on wages. A very high skill level is not really required, and big companies will just throw bodies at jobs and rotate out anyone who can't make the cut.

The IT contracting shops there are called 'body shops' for this very reason.

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#32
post #11

>Two guys in a garage Is this urban legend still taken seriously? I mean, it was a thing 40 years ago, but now there is hardly anyone "with nothing to lose" that can reach anywhere without a good amount of luck.

I started my current thing in my garage, with my cofounder. I loved that garage.

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#33
post #11

>Two guys in a garage Is this urban legend still taken seriously? I mean, it was a thing 40 years ago, but now there is hardly anyone "with nothing to lose" that can reach anywhere without a good amount of luck.

it's one guy and a standing desk now

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#34

They have a really odd way to attract tech talent.... I exited my startup in the uk two years ago, successfully, leaving a successful and growing technology business behind. I have several ideas which I am prepared to self-fund up to £0.5M, and want a good environment in which to start a new business. I know coders in NZ, and they’re a talented bunch, we began to hatch a plan. In short, the NZ gov’t don’t want it. Th…

I'm not in NZ, but seriously considered it as a destination. I agree with you, the article has nothing to do with reality and is just wishful thinking or, more likely, a PR shill paid up by NZ's foreign promotion board or however they're called.

Jacinda Ardern had a strong anti-immigration position during her campaign, she literally promised to cut immigration by 20'000-30'000 per year, from 70'000. No surprise that current government basically dismantled all immigration schemes.

Good luck to them building their own Silicon Valley!

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#35
Shit salaries, overpriced housing, and everything is expensive. Seriously, if you're American name me the last thing you just purchased and I can guarantee it will be at least 25% more expensive here, sometimes double.

If you're an American you'd be crazy to come here unless you've already made your money.

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#36
> The government believes that 40% of jobs will go [to AI] within the next ten years. I think its going to be a lot faster than that.

It's going to be a lot slower than that. Ten years from now AI will barely have made a dent in the existing job market in the developed world. Maybe in 30 years 10-15% of existing jobs will have been replaced by AI. That's an optimistic outcome. The AI jobs predictions are hilariously wrong. Ten years is a short amount of time, they have the impact time scale wrong as is typical in tech predictions (making the mistake of shuttling the impact far too close to the present).

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#37
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Grow up. If you think the US can't strong-arm other countries in its sphere of influence you aren't living in reality.

I think the egregious aspect of this is that there's no evidence they had to strong-arm the NZ government much at all.

Although the initial raid/ arrest was absurd, the NZ courts denied extradition for years. Also that was the previous government, famous for licking us dick

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#38
post #29

I’m in NZ, and involved in the startup community down here. Great people, great vibe. There’s a long history of Innovation down here at the bottom of the planet. The best example is David Downs book “#8 Rewired” which gives examples of great NZ Innovations such as: Disposable hypodermic syringe Manned flight(disputed) Jet boat Nanotube Freeze dried coffee(sorry) DNA discovery Splitting the atom(Rutherford) DNA double…

One of the most underated software produced in NZ is Serato - pretty much changed the DJing game.

Yeah serato is huge

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#39

I’m in NZ, and involved in the startup community down here. Great people, great vibe. There’s a long history of Innovation down here at the bottom of the planet. The best example is David Downs book “#8 Rewired” which gives examples of great NZ Innovations such as: Disposable hypodermic syringe Manned flight(disputed) Jet boat Nanotube Freeze dried coffee(sorry) DNA discovery Splitting the atom(Rutherford) DNA double…

We've got rocketlabs, does that count? It's not homegrown but it's based in nz.

Also flying taxis, lol

Re: 'New Zealand wants you': the problem with tech at the edge of the world

#40

They have a really odd way to attract tech talent.... I exited my startup in the uk two years ago, successfully, leaving a successful and growing technology business behind. I have several ideas which I am prepared to self-fund up to £0.5M, and want a good environment in which to start a new business. I know coders in NZ, and they’re a talented bunch, we began to hatch a plan. In short, the NZ gov’t don’t want it. Th…

Just sign up for a degree at a degree mill and you'll get a student visa and an easy route to permanent residency. New Zealand (and Australia) don't care about quality migrants, just quantity, to keep up demand for housing (both countries have housing-bubble-based economies) and to add extra consumption to national GDP. The migrants they really want are Indians who can put downwards pressure on wages. Go to Auckland,…

Basically this. Europe has a lot of cheapish countries with wasted talent that typically migrates to the US, UK or Germany for corp.

I'd say that Portugal is a great choice.

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