My favorite flavor, cherry red
02 Dec 4
Last month, the company at which I am employed, had its 10 year anniversary. As requested, I am going to write about the state of things, as I see them, for my company, technology, and digital art during these shaky economic times.
I’ve always been a fortunate person. I’m fully aware that even the toughest times I’ve had pale in comparison to the struggles some are forced to face. Right now, with the country knocked so far out of alignment, I can’t say I really feel any differently. Maybe it’s because of my geographical location. It’s certainly because of my job. I make a decent wage. I pay my bills with relative ease. I’m able to do this because Sioux Falls does appear to exist in an economic bubble. I’m not going to try to pretend I understand economics; numbers mostly make my brain shut down, but I will take a crack at it.
Every map or statistic I read tells me that Sioux Falls is at worse, “at risk” and at best, the #1 place to look for a new job (we’re always in the top 5). Can the economic bubble that exists, in primarily Midwestern states, be attributed to technology? Sure, partly. The great thing about living in South Dakota is that not a lot of people want to (especially now, it gets goddamn cold). That doesn’t mean any of those who choose to live here are any less-capable of performing tasks that people perform in cities. So what do we have? We have a lot of space which means we can pop up a house pretty easily for a generally low cost. Not a lot of demand, makes for not a lot of cost. Then we have people living here who can do jobs with a famous work ethic and use the ease of communication that technology provides to do work for people in cities that are sweating their mortgages. That sound right? It’s like outsourcing your jobs overseas without the language barrier. Only, we do charge a little more because we do speak English and we do need SUVs (how else would we haul the logs for our cabins?) All that silliness aside, one must also consider that, if companies in cities can’t afford to keep wheels in motion, then they will have no need for us. That’s certainly something to think about and it has affected the work that comes into my company.
First, I’ll just say that my company primarily works regionally and all that city talk doesn’t really apply to us. It could. It definitely does apply to other companies in town. It doesn’t much apply to us but similar issues do appear. One of the most important lessons I learned when I was young was the difference between wants and needs. We were taught this lesson in school but the most potent application was presented to me by my dad when he played The Rolling Stones You Can’t Always Get What You Want. The lyrics begin with the title of the song and follow with “but if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.” That lesson has never been more relevant. This mentality applies to where I work now because, when people need to cut corners, the luxuries are the first to go. Companies (at least the ones we deal with) don’t want to spend the extra money to make their application look pretty; they just want it to function. Due to this approach I have been less and less able to work on graphics and have been forced into a position of development support. Do I mind being put in a position of admittedly less interest, sure. I like getting a paycheck under a title that still suggests I’m doing art. I like expanding my skill set. I don’t necessarily like working with the skills I’m cultivating, but then again, I just feel fortunate to have a job.
