8/27/2012

How do you feel about growing food for your gas tank?

The first time I heard about corn-based ethanol, I was gobsmacked. Growing food so you can feed your SUV? It sounded wrong to me, and still does. Maybe I'm being super naïve, but shouldn't we solve the problem of feeding the world's hungry before pumping corn into V8s?

If that's not enough, the practice has contributed to a significant increase in food prices — a problem that hurts the poor (read: hungry) far more than it does the rich or financially comfortable.

Of course, there are arguments for using corn-based ethanol, but they aren't water-tight. In fact, some argue that using corn-based ethanol may increase, rather than decrease, the carbon footprint of your gas tank.

But let me stop right there. My friend Andy Gryc tackles this topic in further detail on the QNX auto blog. Hop over there and check out what he has to say.
 

8/01/2012

Why do I work at QNX?
Reason #4: I hate being bored

I get to avoid this.
How about you?
I’ll admit it, I get bored easily. And when I get bored, I become a real pain in the, ahem, derrière. So I learned long ago to embrace the difficult. To pursue the challenging. To avoid the routine.

Which is why you find me at QNX. Because there is nothing routine about our technology or the markets we serve.

Let’s rewind a bit. At one time, an embedded OS company like QNX could provide its customers with an OS kernel, a file system, a compiler, some device drivers, and they were off to the races. But no longer. Now, most QNX customers need an incredibly comprehensive and well-integrated software stack. Moreover, that stack keeps evolving in response to very dynamic market requirements. A year ago, for example, relatively few customers wanted support for HTML5. Today, it is a front-and-center requirement.

All this creates a challenge on the technical side, since customers want us to provide this goodness while still delivering the high levels of quality and performance they’ve come to expect of QNX. So, if you’re a software developer who likes a challenge, this is the place to be.

But it’s also a challenge on the marketing side, where I sit. Because what you knew yesterday doesn’t apply today. And what applies in one market segment doesn’t apply in another. So I’ve found that I need to have an open mind, and to keep it that way. And to learn constantly.

Nice thing is, I don’t get bored.

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