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THE COMPUTER-MEDIATED PROFESSIONAL (CMP) |
A skill is composed partly of knowledge and partly of practice. You need to know how to do something, and you need to have done it enough times that you can prove your competence to whoever might want to hire you.
There are many skills available. You can't have all of them. Pick the ones you like and practice until you become very, very good at them.
And be aware that some skills are worth more (in terms of remuneration) than others.
DATA ACQUISITION : photography, videography, sound recording |
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Photography spent its first hundred years slowly developing its mechanics, its lenses, cameras, emulsions, and lights. But war speeded progress will place the camera in the forefront of man's technical devices when victory comes. To determine the new uses, new methods, new viewpoints that will give camera work its direction in the postwar period, POPULAR PHOTOGRAPHY has asked a trusted photographic editor, a war correspondent, documentary photographer; teachers of photography, manufacturers, and a soldier to contribute to this symposium. Their opinions differ. Yet somehow all seem to feel that the second hundred years will see the camera put to use as never before with the amateur often leading the way. |
Only fifty years after this article was published, traditional cameras and film are on their way out. The arrival of consumer accessible digital imaging is driving down the price of equipment and software, and driving up the number of photographers and videographers. Photography, filmography and sound recording will likely survive as arts requiring a high degree of talent and practice, but the sheer volume of "amateur" work is already reducing the need for skilled professionals in these fields. Only the very best are likely to have access to steady commercial employment. If you have the talent, it is worthwhile to develop these skills. But you may need to look to some other activity for your primary professional career. |
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DATA CREATION : writing, painting, graphics, music |
Who knows? Perhaps the new coalitions of independent artists will find a way to distribute their work over the internet without the need for the publicity machines of the big media companies. Perhaps not. In any case, creativity remains a premium quality. If you want to be an artist, and you have the talent, and you're willing to work long hours for small pay (little has changed in this regard for hundreds of years), then electronic media offer more outlets for your product than at any time in history. The downside: a lot of people believe that they have the talent and motivation to make the grade and their stuff will be right there beside yours. (So see, perhaps, "marketing", below.) |
IODA provides digital distribution services for independent record labels, artists and publishers. IODA services include:
Independents make up nearly 20% of the multi-billion dollar music industry, while the "Big Five" major labels control the rest. IODA helps independents take advantage of the opportunities in digital music today, ensuring their fair share in the digital music future. |
| The most commercially valuable professions in the information age deal with the manipulation, transmission and presentation of the data collected or created by others. |
Although attempts have been made to automate these skills (see, for example, Google's AutoNews - which is compiled entirely by computer), the need for creativity, and the value of idiosyncratic judgment, has limited their success.
The downside is that these skills can only be learned through practice. If you want to develop them, you have to look for opportunities to edit, design, compile and organize data for presentation to others.
There are more of these opportunities than one might assume - for example, you might:
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One Halloween my next door neighbor took digital photos of every group of trick-or-treaters who came to the house. As the pictures were being taken, my neighbor's daughters handed each parent a slip of paper with a web address and a brief message about an online photo gallery. Afterwards, I ran the photos through Photoshop's automatic web presentation routine, and put the pages online at my website. The response from the parents was enthusiastic. (After a month, we took the site down.)
As another example, consider this photo gallery for the town where I live. I've received emails from people who lived here once and moved away, saw the site online and were reminiscing. Tourism is a major industry here, and potential tourists look at them, too. But for me, the site advertises my web design and image creation skills. For similar reasons, I designed the McDaniel College Communication Department website at no charge. [By the way, if you clicked on this link, then the McDaniel Com Department just received some free publicity. It's all interconnected. 
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MANAGEMENT : organization and coordination of effort |
The way that businesses function inevitably requires that some people be responsible for organizing and coordinating the work of others. Generally, it is difficult to advance professionally in an organization without taking on at least a few management responsibilities.
Management involves many general business skills , such as:
... people join and stay with cults for the exact same reasons as people join and stay with brands. The reason why is pretty obvious if you think about it: The desire to belong to something, to make meaning out of something, is universal. What's changed nowadays is, as we've become a more consumerist society, the institutions that become vessels for making meaning or venues for creating community have in turn become more consumerist, so the kind of functions that cults and religions used to perform years and years ago are increasingly being taken over by brands. -- Douglas Atkin, PBS: Frontline, The Persuaders |
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| I am much more interested in how you feel than in how you think. - - Frank Lutz, Political Consultant |
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| Human Languages | For whatever reason, English is widely used as a global commercial and scientific language. If you grew up in the United States, then you probably speak only English. This is a problem that you should fix it as soon as possible. If speak English and another language, and you are interested in learning more, then you have an advantage. The world is multi-lingual. You should continue to expand your language abilities. |
BASIC, Perl, HTML, XML, C+, Java, Javascript, Applescript, Actionscript, and so on -- computer languages provide humans with a way of giving commands to machines. Statistics, calculus, formal logic, and so on -- mathematical languages provide a way to describe certain physical processes in exact detail. The people who are experts in these languages are the de facto developers of global technology. You may not be one of them, but you will gain a great advantage if you learn how to talk with them. |
Non-Human Languages |
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