4 ms·

Its harder than it looks to solve this problem. And its also not that simple to weed out bad actors when normally the government sites that should rank are pro

Its harder than it looks to solve this problem. And its also not that simple to weed out bad actors when normally the government sites that should rank are probably hopeless and the senior civil servants in charge knowledge of the web is “in need of some improvement” Google and Bing could turn up the YMYL (“your money or your life” ) knob but they would also need to employ higher paid local people to vet these sorts of ads. Stricter KYC (Know Your Customer) could be required to run online adverts is another solution. Pre covid I got pitched a grade 7/6 (v senior O-6 /GS15 ) job for the DWP to sort out the technical seo side. Looking at these scam sites in search would have been a priority had that gone anywhere – maybe set up some meetings with Matt Cutts and discuss a joint us / uk approach. Maybe I should follow that job up.

tacticalDonut 5y ago
I've tried pitching similar roles in Government on the DoD side of the house for knowledge workers like Software Dev and Data Scientists. It's hard to get traction though when the folks making the decisions feel threatened that a 25 year old is going to be making the same as them and be the same "rank". I think part of the solution needs to be creating it on a separate scale than GS, similar to an SL or ST position, but geared specifically towards knowledge workers. That's a solution that would probably require congressional involvement though...
- Mauricebranagh 5y ago
  Probably not going to work for 25 year old junior developers at the more senior levels you need to be aware of the political side. But its is a problem your not going to attract many B+ candidates if your so far behind industry. About 3 years ago one uk org (I wont say which one) tried pitching people on linked in I got the pitch and so did a mate who's ex military he laughed and said "not on those poverty wages"
  - tacticalDonut 5y ago
    Yeah, the problem is that the US Government is trying to hire developers in at GS11 positions (~$72k salary in high cost of living area). Never going to get good junior devs at that price point. Don't get me started on security clearance requirements in addition to low wages... The fix is to provide competitive wages, but the politics of it is difficult.
tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
On the government side, especially US government side, the solution would be simple: 1. Ban the sites in one way or another. 2. Jail the people who run them, if reachable. 3. Require payment providers to reverse the payments of the last X days once caught.

tacticalDonut 5y ago

I've tried pitching similar roles in Government on the DoD side of the house for knowledge workers like Software Dev and Data Scientists. It's hard to get traction though when the folks making the decisions feel threatened that a 25 year old is going to be making the same as them and be the same "rank". I think part of the solution needs to be creating it on a separate scale than GS, similar to an SL or ST position, but geared specifically towards knowledge workers. That's a solution that would probably require congressional involvement though...

Mauricebranagh 5y ago
Probably not going to work for 25 year old junior developers at the more senior levels you need to be aware of the political side. But its is a problem your not going to attract many B+ candidates if your so far behind industry. About 3 years ago one uk org (I wont say which one) tried pitching people on linked in I got the pitch and so did a mate who's ex military he laughed and said "not on those poverty wages"
- tacticalDonut 5y ago
  Yeah, the problem is that the US Government is trying to hire developers in at GS11 positions (~$72k salary in high cost of living area). Never going to get good junior devs at that price point. Don't get me started on security clearance requirements in addition to low wages... The fix is to provide competitive wages, but the politics of it is difficult.

tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago

On the government side, especially US government side, the solution would be simple: 1. Ban the sites in one way or another. 2. Jail the people who run them, if reachable. 3. Require payment providers to reverse the payments of the last X days once caught.