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The Devil Wears Prada and Networking

So I was watching "The Devil Wears Prada" and it got to the scene where Andy is told to get the newest unpublished Harry Potter book or lose her job.  While there are a lot of things wrong with this setup, how Andy goes about solving her problem really reminded me of how networking is supposed to function.  Earlier in the film Andy had been sent on an errand when during the event she ran into Christian Thompson a writer she respects.  She had taken the time to introduce herself and connect with him.  So she is freaking out  over this impossible task and it occurs to her to call him.  She clearly feels awkward about asking, but she does anyway.  She has given up when he calls back and through his  network actually managed to find the manuscript and can get it to Andy for an hour, allowing her to fulfill her impossible task for her boss and keep her job.  This is a dramatized example,  but it struck me as an interesting example of how networking functions and how it can h
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Review of UserTesting from a Professional Tester's Perspective

So when I started looking at side hustles, one that stood out was a site called UserTesting.  A bit of digging showed what was advertised as 10-20 minute testing blocks that are provided and then you would be paid $10 through PayPal.  As I am a professional quality assurance analyst and tester, I knew I could provide a high level of quality and once I verified that it was true freelancing work, I signed up. The signup process was fairly simple.  They wanted basic info, a connection to a PayPal account and a verified email.  I did actually start laughing during the application process as it stated that "Testing is not a full-time job" I  was sure they meant "through UserTesting" but it made me laugh!  Now I feel like it was a warning sign but more on that later. The final step was to have a interview type test session that was reviewed by the company before being eligible to do test sessions for pay.  A test session is actually fairly straight-forward.  They pre
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The User isn't Stupid

Have you ever read a bug report and think (or be told)  that the user isn't stupid.  No one would  ever  do this! So why are you wasting our time? Because every user does "dumb" things sometimes.  Occasionally this is from a ditzy moment (Like that time I touched my iron right after using it) but mostly this is not the case.  Reality is that people do things because it seems like it will work.  While there are always those that purposefully test the boundaries of a system, mostly people are just trying to use your software to solve a problem or get a task done.  They try things because they can.  If it wasn't a good idea, the program will prevent us, right? Even though I know better, this is still how I approach things!  Also, people have been trained to explore products now.  Some sites and apps will have tutorials but most often tech comes without instructions.  The last time I got a Blu-Ray player the instructions were basically, "plug it in and follow the
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