Amazon slashes hundreds of jobs in AWS cloud unit despite $7 billion Q4 profit.

Citizen Watch Report ^

[davikkm]

In a move that reeks of corporate callousness, Amazon’s cloud computing behemoth, AWS, slashes hundreds of jobs despite boasting a staggering $7 billion profit in the fourth quarter. The company’s ruthless pursuit of profit comes at the expense of its employees, with layoffs hitting hard in the physical stores technology and sales and marketing units.

The justification? A hollow promise of streamlining operations to focus on “key strategic areas” while conveniently ignoring the human cost of their actions. Amazon’s spokesperson paints a picture of empathy, claiming the decisions were not made lightly and pledging support for affected employees. But the reality is stark: livelihoods are sacrificed on the altar of corporate greed.

[SaveFerris]

☺️🌝🌞

My last employer is having trouble finding people. They love to get rid of people.

Their high-tech devices are an abysmal failure. LOL

Few people can survive the intensive training; even fewer can survive the work, especially overtime. It also requires a high degree of accuracy.

My class was small. We had 7 people.

6 months later I’m not sure that there was even one of us doing the original job.

I used to laugh when I’d walk past training classes; knowing that at least 80%-90% would not be there in 3-6 months.

[proxy_user]

Never mind the human cost - if their cloud services become unreliable, then their corporate customers will move their accounts to a competitor.

There have already been several major screw-ups, this can’t help.

[Responsibility2nd]

I used to laugh when I’d walk past training classes; knowing that at least 80%-90% would not be there in 3-6 months.

 

In related news...

Gen-Z is shunning college to take up traditional trades like welding and plumbing they say is far more satisfying and which doesn't incur huge student debt
The Daily Mail ^ | 02 Apr 2024 | Rachel Bowman

[SaveFerris]

Sounds like a good idea these days

[griswold3]

Your Social credit Score is going through the roof!

[Myrddin]

Well, it’s going to lay waste to the coding profession. It’s hard to predict what’s going to happen elsewhere in tech.

Perhaps. I've been working on a project that employs keycloak for authentication/authorization. As time has progressed, the CVE reports have spurred the customer to request updates to the latest version to fix vulnerabilities. We have many custom interfaces to meet customer requirements that continue to morph as new releases arrive. Early in the process, I could write a ChatGPT query to get a quick starter template in Java to address a special issue. That doesn't work anymore. The trained model is now almost 10 releases behind the current keycloak. Answers offered are more often incorrect, so it isn't saving time anymore.

[Vaduz]

The justification of streamlining operations to focus on “key strategic areas.

Tax brake for giving what ever the illegals needs for the next few years?.

Joey not answering the phone.

[Tell It Right]

(Regarding AI laying waste to the coding profession.)
Perhaps. I've been working on a project that employs keycloak for authentication/authorization. As time has progressed, the CVE reports have spurred the customer to request updates to the latest version to fix vulnerabilities. We have many custom interfaces to meet customer requirements that continue to morph as new releases arrive. Early in the process, I could write a ChatGPT query to get a quick starter template in Java to address a special issue. That doesn't work anymore. The trained model is now almost 10 releases behind the current keycloak. Answers offered are more often incorrect, so it isn't saving time anymore.

True that. And in a way the AI coding is just a new layer of the same ol' same ol' that we've heard for decades was going to end the programmer profession. Remember how the code-filler feature in IDE's (in MS Visual Studio it's called intellisense) was gonna make it so that middle managers would do all coding? The same for adding DB connection tools within IDE's so they can be drag and dropped into a project. The same for Java. The same for...

Always there's a new feature to make it way easier to program. Yet here I am still earning a decent paycheck in quasi-retirement because the demand keeps growing.

[Mr. Jeeves]

Large corporations are places for young people to serve apprenticeships in their twenties, when they are willing to work cheap and are loved by management.

Anybody expecting a lifetime career at one needs their heads examined.

[RoosterRedux]

Here's what Co-Pilot (AI) said on this matter in response to my question about something Nvidia CEO Jenson Huang said the other day:

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang has indeed made a bold statement regarding the future of coding. During the World Government Summit in Dubai, he argued that due to rapid advancements in AI, learning to code should no longer be a top priority for those entering the tech sector. Here’s what he said:

“It is our job to create computing technology such that nobody has to program. And that the programming language is human, everybody in the world is now a programmer. This is the miracle of artificial intelligence.”

Huang believes that generative AI and natural language processing will revolutionize coding. Instead of spending countless hours mastering specific coding languages, young professionals should focus on expertise in other fields like farming, biology, manufacturing, and education. While coding won’t disappear entirely, upskilling to understand when and how to use AI programming will be essential.

In the future, native language might be the only language needed for coding12. So, while the coding landscape evolves, it’s essential to adapt and embrace these changes! 🌐🤖

[DPMD]

Bezos channeling Tyson.

[DPMD]

$40 an hour? Don’t you realize you’re undermining that famous capitalist barbara lee who proposes $50 an hour? Counter her with $60; who knows, maybe we can get to $2K an hour. Then we’ll all be rich.

[Pollard]

Sounds like someone’s confident in AI being able to do those jobs.

[Myrddin]

I recall a time at PacBell in the late 80s when the management was convinced that "low code", no brains coding was coming to the secretarial pool. No more expensive CS grads writing complex software. The output of those "tools" was a disaster. The engagement lasted less than a month.

[Myrddin]

AI is only as good as the user driving it. When seeking an answer from a Google search, it often takes many variations of the search terms to get a hit on what you really want. The same applies to driving an AI coding tool. I already have good skills in math, physics, chemistry, biology, electronics and computer science. New languages, operating systems and hardware to host them are constantly evolving. The world has 45 years of systems that encompass a broad range of evolving technology. Sometimes the modern world pines of access to the functionality of times past, but implemented on current languages, operating systems and hardware. That keeps a pretty steady paycheck for me. I'm reaching the point where retirement looks attractive. Perhaps AI can back-fill my vacancy.

[MikeHu]

Why is the writer of this article taking time off from her busy schedule of protesting and social justice tirades to advise one of the most successful enterprises in history in how they should be running their business?

The reason there are so many starving writers and artists is because they are doing what doesn’t need to be done — and not that they should be guaranteed lifetime sinecures for doing it — to ensure Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.

Those people need to apply to Harvard and become president.

[wally_bert]

My current employer has developed the mindset of making good productive and competent people’s lives different levels of awful.

The few of us that above mentioned group are all looking to abandon ship as soon as possible.

A few years ago the organization could have a good selection of potential employees. Now it is almost impossible to get anyone now.

I know I will never be allowed out of my dead end slot. What times I ever mention my ideas and where I am in them, crickets. All I hear is increasing babble about iTIL and service desk. I picked up a couple of minor IT certifications in the past couple of months. They were ones easy to afford. None of the higher ups seem to care.

Nowadays I apply for anything I am remotely qualified to do. In the meantime carry on and study for certification exams when I can afford to take one. I plan to take another formal class in cybersecurity this summer. That is about a thousand dollars a pop. I’ve completed two of the ten.

Tuition reimbursement was killed off a few years ago. World class organization.

It was a very different place once. The ones who remember miss that era.

[Newtoidaho]

Sooooooo....learn to code wasn’t such great career advice?