Steve, great editorial, as usual. My recent bout with folks that have been copying my articles as my own has led me to take one extra step on any candidates for jobs that I may have the pleasure to interview. I take several snippets of their article and code, and I Google the whole snippet just looking for people who take someone else's words as their own. If they'll lie on a blog or steal for a blog, they'll do the same in the place of work.

Personally, I love people's blogs, posts, and some of their articles. It makes my job as an interviewer so much easier. Here's a snippet from one of my recent posts on this very subject...

What's really cool about many of these blogs and articles is that it does in fact make it easier on employers. Think of the pre-interview conversations... (all made up, of course ;-))

Manager: "Ok, have you Googled all the candidates?"

On site DBA: "Yep."

Manager: "Ok, let's start with candidate #1."

On site DBA: "Shouldn't be allowed to use a computer nor talk to humans. The blogs were full of spelling errors and really bad grammar. You could tell he was in a hurry and paid no attention to detail. He just wanted to put something out there."

Manager: "How about #2?"

On site DBA: "It's ironic that you said that. He's a real crud ball... his attitude on his blog is arrogant and very condescending while most of his code violated all common sense and best practices. I also Googled some phrases from his blog and determined that he stole articles from the internet and posted them on his blog as his own."

Manager: "Wow. Ok, how about candidate #3?"

On site DBA: "Needs severe mental health counseling. Blogged about how to plant "bombs" in the code so that if she got fired, things would either stop working or data would be destroyed. Her discussions about her personal life were also startling. We should report her to the FBI because I think she might be a terrorist."

Manager: "#4?"

On site DBA: "I had some of the developers take a look at his code on his blog and the advice he gave in two articles he wrote. We've coined a new term for people like this guy. 'MOROFF'"

Manger: "Moroff?"

On site DBA: "Yep... he's a real moron except his code and conjectures were 'more off' than on."

Manager: "#5!!???"

On site DBA: "Let's schedule an interview for this guy. His resume was well written, had no spelling errors, and he cited examples of some of the major improvements he made in previous environments in a rather matter-of-fact way. He doesn't have a blog but the handful of articles he published were also well written, the code examples were well done, appropriate for the task, and easy to read. He did make a mistake here and there but took the criticism offered in the discussions that followed very well and made corrections. He appears to be confident, detail oriented, and yet he gives the impression of being appropriately humble and cooperative without being a milk-sop that would simply give in to bad users requests. Some of the things he said in both his resume and in his articles shows the he thinks that protection of the data is paramount even if it means occasionally defying the team by saying "NO" and he did so without arrogance. I think the developers would like him and I think I could work with him very easily.

Manager: "We really need to speed this up... I'm running out of time. #6?"

On site DBA: "Terrorist."

Manager: "#7?"

On site DBA: "Bully."

Manager: "#8?"

On site DBA: "Moroff."

Manager: "#9?"

On site DBA: "Interview."

Manager: "#10?"

On site DBA: "Milk-sop."

Manager: "#11?"

On site DBA: "Lazy sot."

Manager: "#12?"

On site DBA: "Can't actually spell SQL."

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Yeah... I love people's blogs... 😛