I forgot that the ACS even existed, just let it fade into obscurity on its own terms.
The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
11–20 of 165 posts
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#12I basically joined the ACS because it's there and I figured I ought to.
They gave me a post-nominal: CT.
If I want the next grade up -- CP -- I will need to take thousands of dollars of synergising-outside-the-box courses.
Basically the ACS isn't really for software engineers. It's for middle management.
I won't be renewing.
(I might renew my ACM/IEEE memberships).
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#13I'm not particularly fond of the ACS. I was provided with membership by my work and started getting a large volume of email from them. Unsubscribing from their mailing lists was a complete ordeal[1], and it was impossible to completely unsubscribe online - I had to call someone at their office to get taken off a mailing list. In the end I gave up and filtered their emails instead. Despite the fact that my membership…
Exactly the same experience but instead of emails (filtered out) I get a ton of snail mail asking me to re-join / attend events, its probably been 2-3 years since i've been a member and I still get the mail forwarded to me from my old address
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#14Accreditation is common in many industries in Australia, it's basically a huge racket. To legally do any wiring work at all it must be done by an accredited electrician, not merely inspected by one as in most countries. in fact most home improvements of any kind must be performed by an accredited tradesman. add to this the laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes,…
> laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes
This is patently false
> this leads to urban decay and property abandonment on a massive scale
Australia does not have property abandonment nor urban decay on a massive scale. Go to Detroit to witness such things.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#15I think I can explain the Electrical Engineering thing.
A few years ago the ACS geared up to join some sort of peak body for professions. They took the view that they should represent all software professionals of any kind.
Then Engineers Australia put in a competing claim for jurisdiction over software engineers. The scoundrels.
I remember this because I was a student member at the time (hey, free BBQs) and they sent a sob story email to all their members about it.
Basically everybody is pissing on everybody's curtains.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#16Accreditation is common in many industries in Australia, it's basically a huge racket. To legally do any wiring work at all it must be done by an accredited electrician, not merely inspected by one as in most countries. in fact most home improvements of any kind must be performed by an accredited tradesman. add to this the laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes,…
> laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes This is patently false > this leads to urban decay and property abandonment on a massive scale Australia does not have property abandonment nor urban decay on a massive scale. Go to Detroit to witness such things.
Rent control is usually one cause of urban blight. We don't have that in Australia.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#17This reflects pretty poorly on a country and government which supposedly is trying to shift from a "get stuff out the ground and sell it" to a knowledge economy...
Moving from commodity based, bricks and mortar investment focus to an abstract, information industry innovating mindset is a huge paradigm shift for most Australians. It has unfortunately been popular mantra that banking, real-estate, commodities or finance-oriented (to fund commodity) business is the bread and butter for a happy, future-proof life and not easy to break. Many people have done well under that mantra,…
Different countries can be good at different things.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#18I forgot that the ACS even existed, just let it fade into obscurity on its own terms.
The problem is this is the professional body that determines what we teach in universities, that promotes the technology industry as a whole and who decides who we let into the country on a skilled visa.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#19Accreditation is common in many industries in Australia, it's basically a huge racket. To legally do any wiring work at all it must be done by an accredited electrician, not merely inspected by one as in most countries. in fact most home improvements of any kind must be performed by an accredited tradesman. add to this the laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes,…
> laws that state any home improvement must bring the entire house up to current building codes This is patently false > this leads to urban decay and property abandonment on a massive scale Australia does not have property abandonment nor urban decay on a massive scale. Go to Detroit to witness such things.
10.2% (2011 census data) of Australian properties are sitting there vacant.
[ http://blog.id.com.au/2012/australian-census-2011/the-where-... ]
And there is certainly urban decay all over the city I live in (Perth).
Also, building codes are local government, aren't they? So it depends on what council you are in. And I've certainly heard some bad stories.
Re: The Australian Computer Society should be disbanded
#20I was recently involved in an ACS "Re-accreditation" review for my University which I graduated from in 2011. It was clear from the outset that the whole thing was a farce - to be re-accredited required the ACS to ask past students generic questions (such as "How important is ethics to an IT Professional") and for us to give canned answers. While the university didn't explicitly tell us to give the 'expected' answers to ACS questions, it was strongly implied that we were expected to represent the virtues that the ACS "teaches".
It is in the universities interests to advertise that their IT degrees include ACS accreditation (despite no Australian IT employers I know of giving a damn about it) and it is in the interest of ACS for the university to keep paying the exorbitant fees. If anything, I feel that ACS accrediation is detrimental to the students as it requires the university to include such useful courses as "Ethics for the IT Professional" in their degrees. While being ethical is obviously important to any professional, this is time that could be spent learning real skills instead.