IT People Gonna Learn

I’ve had conversations on the Internet with liberalesque people working in IT about government regulation and the excess thereof. I’m thinking in particular of a conversation I had a couple years back with a fellow I went to college with.

My friend shared a post on Google+ about a software entrepreneur who said he heard a Republican candidate who said people weren’t starting businesses because of excessive taxation and regulation. The software entrepreneur said that was RIDICULOUS, HE was an entrepreneur, and this never entered his thinking!

So I argued that software was a low-footprint industry, that you could start a software business with a laptop at the coffee shop, but that getting into other real-world businesses runs into a lot of regulation. I cited examples of renting a stall in a salon, which requires a certain amount of regulated training; opening an automobile garage, which runs into all sorts of Federal, state and local regulations and inspections; and a restaurant owner I knew who had to pass so many inspections that he blew through his seed money and ultimately spent more time trying to comply with regulations than he did actually cooking food for the public.

I can’t link to the actual post since it wasn’t shared publicly, but rest assured, I was eloquent, self-assured, and presented a compelling case.

Still, so many people in the industry I’m in harbor a certain shortsightedness about how government regulation chokes off the little guy (on purpose, often).

Maybe not for long.

Computer coding program delays launch after inquiry from state agency:

Ward 5 Code Camp, which had planned to open Wisconsin’s first computer coding boot camp this month, has delayed its launch after a state agency said it had to register for regulatory oversight.

The Educational Approval Board, a Wisconsin agency that oversees 245 postsecondary schools, approached Ward 5 in early December after hearing about it from another school it oversees. Ward 5 this month postponed discussions with the agency, but it said it is working to find a way to open.

Welcome to the party, pals.

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